Abdou Filali-Ansary is now retired from his positions as director and research professor at the Aga Khan University Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilizations (AKU-ISMC) in London.
The uneasy accommodation of competing visions of authority that has characterized Iran’s political system since 1979 is a familiar phenomenon in the Middle East and elsewhere.
The desire for freedom and self-government is written in human hearts everywhere; in this there can be no "clash of civilizations." Claims that Islam is inherently hostile to democracy represent…
