The prospect of improved relations with the US provides a litmus test of just how far the Islamic republic is prepared to go to transform itself

It’s a perplexing time for Iran. On the international level, the new administration struggles to maintain political momentum for further nuclear talks, despite the spectre of even broader sanctions raised by the Kirk-Menendez bill currently under consideration in Washington. Compounded by economic obstacles and the electorate’s unmet demands for greater social freedoms, the state of uncertainty is fuelling an internal debate about the Islamic regime’s structure and ideological core. Last year’s presidential election gave Hassan Rouhani an unprecedented mandate to implement reforms in virtually all key policymaking areas. Now the question hanging over the heads of Tehran intellectuals is, how far can these reforms go before they crash against the pillars upon which the Islamic republic was built?

According to the oft-cited narrative laid out by historian Nikki Keddie, modern Iranian political developments are best described as the result of an ongoing friction between mass movements and regimes of various stripes – monarchic, nationalist-chauvinist or theocratic – that have benefitted ruling elites at the expense of the majority. With each major uprising have come changes to the nation’s political structure, creating openings for new political forces, both foreign and domestic, that challenged the status quo.

Since the Islamic republic consolidated its power following the 1979 revolution and the war with Iraq, its greatest sociopolitical challenge has been posed by the Green Movement, whose members were effectively absorbed back into the electorate (many evidently cast votes last year) and therefore the system they campaigned against after the disputed 2009 election. The remoulded landscape has created new expectations for both governmental and nongovernmental players, as well as a new common space for debate and compromise. On this still untrammelled intellectual ground, the prospect of improved relations with the United States is a litmus test of just how far the Islamic republic is prepared to go to transform itself.

According to the analysis of scholar Ruhollah Ramezani, even during periods of unmitigated hardline rule, Iran’s leaders have adopted pragmatic policies to secure the long-term survival and advancement of the Islamic state, an approach Ramezani calls “spiritual pragmatism.” From this perspective, much of the behaviour that is viewed as hostile or irrational by outside observers – such as Iran’s dedication to exporting the ideals of the Islamic revolution – could well be scaled back in order to conform to the reality of world politics, much in the same way that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini drank metaphoric poison when he withdrew Iran’s troops from Iraq in 1988 under international pressure. More recently, Khomeini’s successor as supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, delivered a major doctrinal speech advocating “heroic flexibility,” indicating the regime’s continuing adaptability in both international and domestic affairs.

However, the symbolism of the Geneva nuclear agreement has provoked a fearful reaction among those who maintain that the Islamic republic can bend only so far before it destroys its ideological pillars altogether. Renouncing fundamental opposition to western cultural hegemony contradicts the principles of justice and the right to independence, which have been at the heart of Persian nationalism for centuries, the theory goes.

“It’s not the content of the agreement, but the fact that the foreign minister [Mohammad Javad Zarif] sat in a hotel room for four nights with the foreign ministers of six world powers, and all discovered that they are humans,” says one University of Tehran political science professor. “Both sides went to the end and made a deal, using a rational and logical common language. This is a singular moment in postrevolutionary Iranian politics and by itself marks a turning point. I find it disturbing.”

Few understand the complexity of balancing “pragmatism” with the “heroic” ideals of the Islamic republic better than President Rouhani himself. In a recent op-ed widely disseminated by international news outlets, Rouhani reiterated the administration’s dedication to “discarding extreme approaches” to foreign policy, claiming that the “consensus building” and “transparent goal-setting” required for this transition were already under way. In language crafted so as not to rile regime conservatives, Rouhani wrote that while Iran “may not be able to forget the mistrust and suspicion that have haunted Iranians’ thinking about US governments for the last 60 years, now we must focus on the present and look to the future.” Nonetheless, he wrote, “mutual respect” is an absolute precondition for rapprochement with a superpower he charged with creating the “us and them” dynamic at the root of the Islamic revolution.

The pessimistic viewpoint shared by many Iranian conservatives is that this demand to be treated as an equal by the United States is unrealistic. They believe the American government to be inherently imperialist and that it will eventually seek to extend its hegemony over Iran, no matter what shape the bilateral dialogue takes. But the prevalent, more optimistic school of thought asserts that change is possible. By shifting the foreign policy focus from the global to the regional level, Iran’s leaders can adapt to the realities of the country’s position while still advancing the mission of Islamic justice through counterterrorism and a more open relationship with Arab states. Such a transition would require a prudently balanced cooperation with America. Over time, this cooperation might spread to the economic and civil sectors, ultimately challenging the dualism upon which Iran – and, to a lesser degree, the United States – bases its identity.

“As mutual interests grow, so does mutual interaction,” the University of Tehran professor says. “What happens when the two countries discover that there are more commonalities between them than differences?”

There are indications that such a discovery process has actually been eating away at the ideological gap between the two countries for several decades. Prior to the revolution, many Iranians harboured simplistic anti-western sentiments that stood in the way of an honest debate over their homeland’s numerous structural deficiencies. According to Keddie, the revolutionary break from the west has revealed that the root of Iran’s problems may lie elsewhere, leading to a more open and nuanced discussion within the establishment. While the movable ideological “red line” established by Khomeini in the earlier days of the Islamic republic was set relatively high during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s conservative presidency, it is furtively being lowered by the new administration.

This has led to a surprisingly open discourse regarding the separation of state and religion, which only six months ago would have been taboo. In a recent televised debate, the intellectual Saddegh Zibakalam debated this topic with two leading clerics, challenging the traditional Islamic perspective that public happiness can be achieved only through religion. Christian societies long ago cast state religion aside, but have still managed to prosper, he argued. Since Iran owed its constitutional foundations to these societies, was not the idea of secularism worth considering?

For members of the Green Movement, the idea of constitutionalism has long been a rallying cry. Though Iranian civil society is in ruins after years of systematic dismantlement and repression, there remains grassroots support for a return to the ideals articulated in the constitution. Ramezani believes that this could be the base of a new social consensus that redefines the Islamic system without breaking its ideological backbone. If Iran’s rulers are willing to test the concept of “heroic flexibility” by scaling back many of the policies that superseded the constitution, they may indeed discover that their perceived differences with the west have been hugely exaggerated. Rather than sparking an existential crisis, such a process could lead the Islamic regime to discard its dualistic worldview in favour of “oneness,” a concept that underpins both Christian society and Iran’s Perso-Islamic heritage.

The Tehran Bureau is an independent media organisation, hosted by the Guardian. Contact us @tehranbureau. This article was originally published without a byline