Revolutionary Identity and Nuclear Bargaining: How Symbolic Legitimacy Restructures Utility in Iran’s Nuclear Program
Revolutionary Identity and Nuclear Bargaining: How Symbolic Legitimacy Restructures Utility in Iran’s Nuclear Program

Summary/Abstract: Why do some nuclear disputes persist despite severe economic coercion and repeated negotiation opportunities? Existing rationalist models assume materially fixed preferences and predict convergence under sufficient pressure. Yet the Iranian nuclear case reveals persistent bargaining rigidity even under escalating sanctions. This article advances a theoretical correction: revolutionary legitimacy can transform the internal composition of state utility by embedding symbolic payoffs alongside material security incentives. When strategically salient technologies become discursively fused with sovereignty and resistance narratives, concessions threaten not only capability but also ideological authority. The article develops a four-step causal mechanism linking legitimacy anchoring, discursive embedding, symbolic payoff generation, and bargaining rigidity. Using process tracing and systematic discourse analysis of Iranian nuclear episodes from 2003–2020, the study demonstrates that escalation and negotiation breakdowns align more closely with legitimacy stress and identity reinforcement than with shifts in material leverage. Comparative application to North Korea strengthens external plausibility by replicating the mechanism under similar ideological conditions. The findings reconceptualize audience costs as functions of ideological coherence rather than electoral accountability and challenge models that treat preferences as materially exogenous. Nuclear bargaining in revolutionary regimes cannot be understood without incorporating identity-embedded symbolic utility.

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