Some Islamist parties such as Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt seems to be conservative and aligned with right political wing. Are there any Islamist parties that are aligned with left political wing or have some sort of reformist or socialist ideology.
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1What do you mean islamist? Are you talking about terrorists like ISIS? They're just anarchists and want to see everything destroyed... But if you are talking about some political gestures from totalitarian regimes of middle east, like Iran, where some people call themselves right-wing conservative party and some other people call themselves left-wing reformists and socialists, I should say yes, there are a couple of them. But, remember these are just political games of totalitarian regimes of middle east and you can't compare it to the US for example of republican and democratic parties.– Mithridates the GreatOct 16, 2019 at 14:10
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FYI: politics.stackexchange.com/questions/46704/…– FizzOct 20, 2019 at 5:28
2 Answers
I'm from Middle East but I live in the US for a couple of years now. I will talk about my knowledge about political parties mainly in Iran, which you may consider them as Islamist if you want. At least, totalitarian regime of Iran itself claims that they are Islamist.
So, basically my answer to your question is Yes. There are both conservative parties with Islamic ideology and some other parties as reformists or socialists that still they classified themselves as Islamic parties in Iran. The first Islamic conservative party, which is aligned to right political wing and specially the leader of Iran is called: Principlists Grand Coalition. From their Wikipedia:
The alliance is mainly made up by the members of the 'traditional' parties Combatant Clergy Association and Islamic Coalition Party, the 'Transformationalist' Society of Devotees and Pathseekers of the Islamic Revolution and the radical Front of Islamic Revolution Stability.
So, you see they are in some sense resemble right or far-right political wing by emphasizing on keeping the main political power in the hand of people that have strong allegiance to the Islamic Republic regime and more or less they don't tolerate any reform that may ease the involvement of other people into political sphere of Iran.
On other hand you have: Pervasive Coalition of Reformists, which is the supporter of current Islamic Republic president Hassan Rouhani, is more or less looks like a left political party by introducing some sort of reforms in social hierarchy as well as other areas of politics, economics, foreign relation, etc. and supporting more involvement of people in ruling the Islamic Republic, still in the context of Islamic ideology.
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+1. It's great to get an answer from someone in the region. How would you distinguish between conservative and liberal Islamist parties? Oct 16, 2019 at 16:10
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@indigochild If you compare the last president of Iran before this current one (Ahmadinejad that he had endorsement of Principlists Grand Coalition party) and this current one (Rouhani that he has endorsement of Pervasive Coalition of Reformists) you will realize how they are different and they could be easily distinguished in context of their foreign relations, economy, internal political sphere, etc. For example, West was not able to reach an agreement with Ahmadinejad for years but just a couple of month after Rouhani took the office, West was able to reach a nuclear agreement with Iran. Oct 16, 2019 at 16:18
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1Wow. First-hand perspective, instead of "this is what fits my world-view." Thank you very much. This is why I come to these sites. Oct 16, 2019 at 17:37
Yes, there are left wing Islamist parties/political factions. Even though Muammar Gaddafi is gone, he implemented Gaddafism, a form of Islamic socialism that inspired Islamic parties like the Revolutionary United Front Party. Then, there is the People's Mujahedin of Iran, a political-militant group that is very left-wing and originally espoused "Islam with revolutionary Marxism". Even now, it still has some communist ideas and aims to create a "classless society that would combat world imperialism, international Zionism, colonialism, exploitation, racism, and multinational corporations". Then there is the anarchist ideology called democratic confederalism practiced by Kurdish Muslims and implemented by the community known as Rojava which has a community of over two million living in a libertarian socialist society.