The west has long been curious if the Islamic faith is compatible with democracy, and people have questioned why so many predominantly Muslim countries are nondemocratic.
"The True Clash of Civilizations" by Ronald Inglehart and Pippa Norris attempts to answer that question through learning how people with different sets of values share the same affinity for democracy, yet those same people may hold other values that contradict the basic principles of democracy.
The authors reference Samuel Huntington's 1993 thesis and say that the Harvard Chair of International Affairs' "response would be that the Muslim world lacks the core political values that gave birth to representative democracy in Western civilization: separation of religious and secular authority, rule of law and social pluralism, parliamentary institutions of representative government, and protection of individual rights and civil liberties as the buffer between citizens and the power of the state." They later state, "Even in established democracies, changes in cultural attitudes-and eventually, attitudes toward democracy-seem to be closely linked with modernization" and that "[We] cannot expect to foster democracy in the Muslim world simply by getting countries to adopt the trappings of democratic governance, such as holding elections and having a parliament." (Inglehart and Norris, 2003). Iran fits this mold perfectly. As a country in which 99%+ of its inhabitants identify as Muslim, it is obvious that religion plays a key role in all aspects of life. The second part of the reason that Iran is uber relevant is that there is plenty of desire for democracy among people across all backgrounds, yet the religious values these seemingly opposing sides have is what unites them all in their apparent incompatibility with democracy. That is to say, among the most pro-democratic Iranians, there is still a (perhaps equally) strong connection between them and Islam.
This is unlikely to change overnight as the study also revealed that "citizens in some Muslim societies agree overwhelmingly with the statement that 'politicians who do not believe in God are unfit for public office'" (Inglehart and Norris, 2003), a statement which a staggering 83% of Iranians agree with. Suppose we are to believe that the values Muslims have are in line with anti-democratic tendencies, and a large majority of voters would not vote for someone without Muslim views. In that case, solutions for promoting democracy in the middle east appear limited as we may have to wait for the Muslims who "march to the beat of a different drummer" to catch up.
Inglehart and Norris are cited three times in "Right-wing populisms north and south: Varieties and gender dynamics" by Valentine M. Moghadam and Gizem Kaftan (who, perhaps, had a competition to see who could cite themselves the most [Moghadam wins 4-3]). Iran is mentioned only in reference to the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and how the "'us versus them' approach to mobilizations and grievances" is what's at the core of any populist movement. Despite its brief mention, the authors draw from many articles that talk extensively about Iran, which layout concepts they then use to discuss Right-Wing Populist (RWP) movements. In saying, "We argue that what is common to both Islamist and Western populist-nationalism is fear of cultural change, and agree that: 'Among those holding authoritarian values, cultural change can activate deep feelings of social intolerance and resentment directed toward those blamed for change'" (the second half of which is from Norris & Ingleharts' Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and Authoritarian Populism) they make the connection between nondemocracies and a lack of "modernization" which Inglehart and Norris (confirming Huntington's argument) attribute to culture in that "culture has a lasting impact on how societies evolve" yet they remain optimistic in saying "culture does not have to be destiny" (Inglehart and Norris, 2003) even if changing it would result in the aforementioned social intolerance and resentment.