The elites and the elites, as the link of knowledge between the Imam and the masses, play a decisive role in the intellectual destiny of societies. The present study, using the approach of "strategic inference" and the method of directional qualitative content analysis, has investigated the mechanisms of the influence of the elites on the growth or decline of society and the corresponding reform strategies of Imam Reza (AS). The findings show that the deviant elites in the Razavi era, with four coordinated mechanisms of destroying the source of knowledge (systematic fabrication of hadith), paralyzing the collective will (promoting predestination and delegation), replacing imagination with reason (similative storytelling), and sanctifying power (courting scholars), led the society to epistemic decline.In contrast, Imam Reza (AS) radically reformed the Wasit circle with four parallel and symmetrical strategies: doctrinal demarcation (explanation of the inter-ministerial order and rejection of predestination, delegation, analogy, and personification), elite networking (training more than 300 narrators and creating a network of lawyers), intelligent sanctions (prohibition of zakat and rejection of the testimony of court scholars), and practical modeling (letter to Imam Jawad (AS) emphasizing direct contact with the people). The theory derived from this research, namely “Managing the Wasit Circle,” claims that the center of reform in Razavi thought is not the masses of the people, but the elites themselves; and accordingly, it presents four operational indicators of avoiding predestination and delegation, membership in a network of aligned elites, ceasing cooperation with corrupt powers, and continuous contact with the masses for assessing and managing the elites in today’s societies.This article, for the first time, maps the Imam's mechanisms of destruction and reform strategies in a two-way and systematic model, providing a theoretical framework for reinterpreting the functioning of elites in the present era