
Political Sociology of Trust/ Ahmad Faal
In geographical divisions, Iran is considered a large and expansive land and, in terms of geopolitical significance, it has a strategic role and importance in the region, as it is located at the crossroads of the West and East, North and South. Iran is connected to Western Europe from the West, to the Middle East and Northern Europe from the North, to East Asia from the East, and to Arab countries from the South. It is not an exaggeration to say that Iran, in terms of geopolitics, is both the heart of the Islamic world and the gateway to the rest of the world. This is perhaps why Gobineau referred to Iran as the “crossroads of world events.” This land has been at the center of conflicts between various ethnic groups since ancient times. With this description, it is not an exaggeration to claim that the security and stability of Iran is the security and stability of the entire world. If not, it can at least be argued that insecurity and lack
In a perspective that defines national security as limited and confined to the security of the rulers, the foundations of security in society are the existence of social and political controls. A controlled society, for the ruling groups, is a safe and secure society. In such a society, ordinary people, who make up the majority of the society, can feel that they are living in a safe society. A secure society where trust is the foundation. If security is intertwined with trust, how can we dare to solve this contradiction?
I will explain the final part of this introduction in terms of mechanical and dynamic control and trust. Trust is the product of open and organic systems. Open systems are systems that have dynamic structures. Open systems have internal dynamism, meaning that each component and element of the system appears as a real driving force, so that the sum of these forces creates the main decision-making action of the system. The decision-making axis also refers to the internal sources of the system itself. This is why trust remains an invisible thread in the overall configuration of the system, creating cohesion among its components and elements. Trust is a conscientious element and for this reason, we compare it to an invisible thread; a thread that creates strong, stable, and enduring goals and plans for a system’s components. In turn, control flow is the product of closed and mechanical systems. In mechanical systems, driving forces originate from external sources. Therefore, it is necessary for the cohesion of components and elements with the goals and plans of the
Realities that hinder trust-building.
(A) Realities in social and political life.
Given the introduction that has passed, it is now clear what the source of trust is in a workplace and beyond that in a society? And how can we use both the driving force of the organization and the driving force of society in building trust? But instead of delving into this discussion, it is better for us to draw the attention of the audience to a few important and fundamental realities and ultimately leave the solutions to the reader:
1- The first reality relates to the relationship between government and nation. The contradiction between government and nation is a historical issue that, despite the presence of three revolutions and national movements from the constitutional period to the present, has not been resolved. If we want to point out a point that relates to the recent elections in Iran, when the government or political system does not allow people to freely vote for their true representatives through supervision, there is a possibility of deceiving them. In other words, if the elections were completely free and every political and cultural actor could register without the Guardian Council’s screening and present themselves to the people, because the majority of people do not recognize their own interests, there is a possibility of deceiving them. As a result, the Guardian Council, as a religious and legal duty, by disqualifying candidates and even creating conditions that prevent a large part of free actors from participating in the election, the political agents of the elections openly announce that the people cannot trust them and
2- The second reality of distrust is related to the disappearance of authorities. On one hand, distrust returns to the postmodern wave that exists in the world. These waves have passed over all nations. Unlike modernist waves that required modernizing the country and economic structures, postmodernist waves do not require any introduction. With low cost and high speed through the internet and social networks, the vibrations of these waves have spread in all aspects of life. In the postmodern situation, grand narratives disappear and as a result, small narratives and subcultures become prominent in the form of identity politics. No one stands under the banner of a grand narrative, everyone creates their own. National trust and bonds are disappearing and are being replaced by smaller bonds. Social networks have taken away the shadows of professional writers, journalists, and intellectuals and have created a number of people present in social networks as journalists and writers. As Bauman says, civil societies are giving way to tribal systems; a kind of return to
3- In the third reality, it is good to mention an incident that has recently become one of the country’s top news. A company called “Kourosh Company” has embezzled hundreds of billions of tomans from people’s capital by taking advantage of their trust and promising to provide a product at half the price, and eventually disappears without a trace. Now the question arises, when trust is lost, there must inevitably be some cynicism towards authorities. So what does this distrust say about trusting anonymous authorities? This fact must be explored in three aspects. Firstly, when names and symbols take away trust, anonymous and symbolless entities create a place for people’s trust. This can be seen especially in politics and economics. Trust in the unknown began in 1992, the first parliament after the war. The reason is clear; when the known take away trust, people turn to the unknown. The second aspect is related to people’s economic desperation. In a desperate situation, people
B) Realities in work organizations
In this section of the discussion, we will return to labor organizations and examine the realities that lead to inefficiencies in these organizations.
1- The first reality is that the executive system and work organizations in Iran lack internal dynamism. Although these organizations are present in the role of economic enterprises in society, their main role and nature is political. Political factors are more successful than economic and organizational factors. The origin of management lies in political groupings outside the organization. For this reason, the issue of trust becomes a control system in the same first body and at the source of the main driving force of the organization. Although after more than 40 years, a large part of the technocrats have been attracted to the management system, and a large part of the former political managers have been attracted and integrated into the technocratic system, their harmony with the second reality that I describe, still makes them a part of the control system.
The second reality is the ideological structure of executive systems and work organizations in Iran. Apart from the heavy costs that are spent to maintain the ideological structure of work organizations, this ideology, due to its connection with external driving forces, helps more and more in mechanizing the structure of the organization. The part of management that has the nature and ethics of technocracy, or the large number of managers who have been attracted to technocratic ethics, but due to their connection or the need to pretend and simulate with the ideological structure of the organization, are still considered as part of the driving force of the organizational mechanics. These forces are practically present as external control factors in the configuration of the country’s executive system.
3- The third reality is the existence of a duality between individual goals and organizational goals, which has resulted in the previous two realities. This is explained by the fact that in developed societies, due to reasons such as the presence of internal dynamism in work organizations, free flow of information, and the existence of unions that support the driving force of work, the supply and demand system magically links individual and collective interests together; as if the invisible hand of Adam Smith only operates in markets that collide with the cultural and intellectual superiority of Adam Smith. In Iran, due to insecurity and the duality of individual interests with national rights, pursuing individual interests does not result in anything other than destruction. In the Western world, despite all the ugliness and complexities of the liberal capitalist system, the existence of civil society, civil institutions, and the legal system always creates some common ground between investment and national interests. But in Iran, it seems that the flow of investment must always pass through the bodies of national
4- The fourth reality is the existence of a control system that makes it impossible or at least difficult to establish trust. As mentioned earlier, the control system serves as the basis for the doctrine of national security, which defines security as the security of rulers. It is used as a control system in the administrative and executive system of the country. There are various methods of control in the organization, such as annual evaluations, rewards and overtime, replacement systems, and accepting supervision of higher positions in the organization. These are all part of the control methods. Alongside control methods, work organizations have various control institutions, such as supervision, mobilization, prayer establishment headquarters, selection and cultural council, and in some organizations, public relations institutions. These institutions are either directly considered as control institutions or have organic links with external political control institutions, which together complete the control system in work organizations. It is necessary to mention that in administrative organizations, there is a tradition or written or unwritten rule that is referred to
Buttocks
What passed in this writing was merely the presentation of the problem and the presentation of society’s problems in the process of losing trust and examining the social cognitive backgrounds. The discussion about building trust requires another opportunity. Perhaps the esteemed reader, by understanding the realities that lead to mistrust, can take the initiative to build trust. Understanding the realities that lead to mistrust will pave our way in gaining trust and returning to public trust, both in social relationships and in simple work organizations. It may not be an exaggeration to say that every reader – even a non-professional reader – by studying these realities and other realities that may be hidden from the author’s point of view, can use their thoughts and ideas as a solution in building trust. Undoubtedly, the process of building trust in any society comes through public participation. But not just a participatory tool, but a creative, responsible and fully interventionist participation. In this type of participation, each individual can appear as a source and a solution for
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