Two facets of Iranian society distinguish Iran from its Arab neighbors. First, Iranians are not Arabs. Rather, they represent a distinct ethnolinguistic configuration whose origins are lost in the far reaches of history. Second, Iranians are overwhelm ...

Two facets of Iranian society distinguish Iran from its Arab neighbors. First, Iranians are not Arabs. Rather, they represent a distinct ethnolinguistic configuration whose origins are lost in the far reaches of history. Second, Iranians are overwhelmingly members of the "Twelver" branch of Shia Islam.
The Iranian political history is in fact the history of the rise and fall of tribes. The potential strength of Iranian tribes enabled them to both usurp local power and play a significant role in the government of the whole country.
One of thee distinguishing features of Iranian political history is the active role played by the religious elites in the political events of the country. In virtually all the historically significant events - the tobacco protest movement of 1891, the Constitutional Revolution of 1906, the oil nationalization movement of the early 1950s, and the Iranian Revolution of 1979 - religious elites were actively involved.
In the pst-Borujerdi era of the 1960s and 1970s, the clerical establishment was divided into three factions. The first segment centered at Qom. This segment had been established by the founder of the Qom center, Ayatollah Abd al-Karim Haeri, in the 1920s and 1930s and was continued by Ayatollah Borujerdi for the following two decades. The second segment of the ulama assumed a collaborationist stance toward the Pahlavi regime. Some members of this group, appointees of the shah, served as leaders of Friday prayers in Tehran and other major cities. The third group within the religious establishment began to form after the 1963 anti government riots led by Ayatollah Khomeini and a small group of his students.
Khomeini exemplified a multifaceted charisma in the course of his ascendance, first, to the position of the highest Shite authority and later, to the theocratic position of the national political leadership. Personal charisma is different from other types of established authority. Personal charisma is the power relation of command and obedience, based on the belief of both leader and followers.