by Shervin Malekzadeh
Millions of Iranians will gather in the coming days to watch their country take on the world in something other than politics. Against the odds, against Argentina, and after a long, eight-year absence, Iran’s participation in the World Cup is a welcome break from usual state TV programming. While the people [...]]]>
by Shervin Malekzadeh
Millions of Iranians will gather in the coming days to watch their country take on the world in something other than politics. Against the odds, against Argentina, and after a long, eight-year absence, Iran’s participation in the World Cup is a welcome break from usual state TV programming. While the people of Iran ceaselessly hope for sanctions relief and a better economy, at least for now, sports will draw their interest more than their government’s wrangling with Western powers over Iran’s nuclear portfolio.
Missing out on the festivities will be the more than 1 million recent high school graduates studying for the dreaded konkoor, a yearly university entrance exam scheduled for June 26. Tucked away in their bedrooms, poorly sheltered against the frantic shouts and exhortations just outside their doors, the temptation of the World Cup could not have come at a worse time for these students. They face a cruel calculus: an entire year of preparation to take a four-hour test focusing on five subject areas — the only way to gain college admission. The cost of failure will be an entire year of waiting just to retake the test. Those students who pass, on the other hand, will have no way of knowing beforehand where they will be placed (there are no campus visits in Iran) nor whether they will be able to enroll in their preferred course of study (their ranking on the konkoor determines both).
What is not uncertain is that most of the successful test-takers will complete their university education without securing a job or an obvious career path. More than 21 percent of all young people with a college degree were unemployed according to last year’s state figures, more than double the official national average. An astounding 43 percent of college-educated women are without work. Young, overqualified, and unemployed, most of Iran’s college graduates will continue to live at home and toil away at jobs unrelated to their degrees and majors, a state of adolescent suspension that the political scientist Diane Singerman has memorably labeled, “waithood.”
It is an inconsistency that youth and the possession of a university degree have become the strongest predictors for unemployment in Iran today. The great mystery is that none of this seems to matter. Despite considerable outrage in the media and amongst the general public about the inability of Iran’s educational system to funnel graduates into the workforce, the demand for college amongst ordinary Iranians remains insatiable.
The single-minded pursuit of credentialed merit in Iran persists against dim prospects. Since 2005, the percentage of 18-24-year-olds attending college has nearly tripled, rising from just over 20 percent to the current 55 percent, a demand fueled in part by an Ahmadinejad administration determined to establish its populist bona fides through education. State planners keen on expanding the government’s reach have been met more than halfway from below, by a society obsessed with the distinction and opportunities that “getting the paper” supposedly brings. “Learn and study what you will,” writes one long time observer of Iran’s educational system, “but above all get a university degree!”
So why participate in a system in which the odds, if not the system itself, appear to be stacked against you? This question is not limited to academia. Iranians take part in all kinds of “games,” be they educational (attending college to gain employment), political (voting in presidential elections), or athletic (the World Cup), despite very low chances of success.
Indeed, almost exactly a year ago today, more than 18 million Iranians, over 70 percent of the voting age population, participated in Iran’s presidential election despite the turmoil of the 2009 election and violent suppression of the Green Movement. Though polling and anecdotal evidence showed that many Iranians believed their vote “would not matter” and that the election would be rigged, an absolute majority turned up at the ballot box in June 2013 to vote Hassan Rouhani into office, shocking even the most astute of observers and creating a “political earthquake.”
The politics of participation in Iran is not without explanation. Disappointment and fatigue with a revolution that remains wedded to large and unwieldy promises have left many people inclined to seek their advantage in the small and manageable, to get what they can from revolutionary strictures. A college degree is unlikely to produce a job, just as a vote for Hassan Rouhani will surely not lead to Jeffersonian democracy. But while both are uncertain opportunities for progress, nonparticipation guarantees failure.
Something similar is happening with Iran’s Team Melli. The national team qualified for the World Cup just days after Rouhani’s election, the celebratory crowds for which dwarfed even the widespread street celebrations following Rouhani’s presidential win. Today, every Iranian knows the chances of the national team making it to the second round, much less winning the tournament, are almost zero. That does not mean, however, that Iranians will turn off the TV when Iran plays against Lionel Messi and the formidable Argentinian team on Saturday, or that young people won’t find a way to sneak away from their books to watch the match, all in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, the odds will turn their way.
This article was first published by LobeLog and was reprinted here with permission. Follow LobeLog on Twitter and like us on Facebook
Photo: Iranian youth celebrating in northern Tehran after Team Melli qualified for the 2014 Brazil World Cup on June 18, 2013, just days after Hassan Rouhani was elected president. Credit: Kosoof
by Ali Reza Eshraghi
In the current debate over the November 24 interim deal with Iran on its nuclear program, an important lesson from Politics 101 is neglected: state and regime are two conceptually different terms. But when it comes to Iran, US foreign policy has systematically been incompetent in grasping this [...]]]>
by Ali Reza Eshraghi
In the current debate over the November 24 interim deal with Iran on its nuclear program, an important lesson from Politics 101 is neglected: state and regime are two conceptually different terms. But when it comes to Iran, US foreign policy has systematically been incompetent in grasping this distinction.
State refers to a sovereign political entity, which (at least in theory) is supposed to pursue the common good of its population. Regime, on the other hand, signifies an authoritarian form of governance and its ruling elites.
However, the rhetorical use of this word can be biased and highly politically motivated. In Western media one recurrently hears phrases such as “Iranian regime” and “Islamic regime” and not so much “Saudi regime,” despite Iran having significantly greater democratic features than the kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Louis XIV of France once said: “L’Etat c’est moi,” I am the state. In the discourse over Iran’s nuclear program, it is often mistakenly assumed that the regime (along with the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) is the state. Subsequently, the nuclear conundrum is framed as only the problem of a regime that is greedily obsessed with its own survival, and not that of a state bound to consider long-term national interests.
If one sees a problem as a nail, the solution would be to look for a hammer. In this regard, it is not surprising that many members of the U.S. congress, assuming that more pressure will ultimately force capitulation by the regime, are pushing (though apparently defeated for the time being) for evermore sanctions against Iran.
And when it comes to negotiating with Iran, we see that the old Kremlinology of the Soviet era is ludicrously imitated, with moderate President Hassan Rouhani being compared to Mikhail Gorbachev. All the speculations are focused on how far the Iranian President could go in selling an accord to other players in the regime, and ultimately how much the whole regime, including Rouhani, can be trusted.
But what about the Iranian People? Some argue they would be happy for any deal as long as it alleviates the suffering caused by economic sanctions. It is even claimed that the democratic Iranian opposition is worried a nuclear agreement would empower the regime.
These assertions are inaccurate.
Two days after the historic phone conversation between Presidents Barack Hussein Obama and Hassan Rouhani, a rap song titled “Hassan & Hussein” went viral. The lyrics encouraged Iran-US reconciliation, but cautioned Rouhani: “Just remember when you are dancing [with Obama] / Not to give away the country two-handedly to [him] the foreigner.”
A recent poll by the Zogby Research Service shows 96% of Iranians (also the majority of Rouhani supporters) believe “maintaining the right to advance a nuclear program is worth the price being paid in economic sanctions and international isolation.”
Some Iranian opposition groups — though hateful of the regime — also believe that the nuclear dispute with the West should not be resolved at the price of damaging the pride and interests of the country.
For example Ardeshir Zahedi, the Shah’s last Ambassador to the US, in an interview with BBC Persian in July 2012 defended the nuclear program of a regime that has forced him into exile: “Iranians must maintain their patriotism. No matter who is in power, Iran is our country.”
Akbar Etemad, the founder of the Atomic Energy Organization during the Shah’s regime, even recommends that Iran withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in order to keep its uranium enrichment program. This is the same position that some of the regime’s hardliners have insisted on.
Moreover, the Green Movement leaders (the largest democratic movement in Iran since the 1979 revolution, which the U.S. was sympathetic toward) are also against the Iranian regime signing a nuclear deal at the cost of disregarding national interests.
In October 2009, Iran’s top negotiator Saeed Jalili welcomed a deal in which Iran would send enriched uranium abroad. But Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the Green Movement leader who has been under house arrest for more than a thousand days, accused the regime of “making a deal over the Iranian nation’s long-term interests.” The Supreme Leader later rejected the deal.
Another severe comment was made in May 2010 when Iran signed a nuclear deal with the mediation of Brazil and Turkey (initially encouraged by President Obama but later rejected). This time Zahra Rahnavard, Mousavi’s wife who has also been under house arrest, admonished the agreement as “worse than the disgraceful” Gulistan Treaty.
Coincidentally, this October the Iranian media commemorated the 200th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Gulistan between the Iranian and Russian empires following the peace negotiations that were mediated by Great Britain.
Gulistan (1813) and its following Treaty of Turkmenchay (1828) in which Iran had to give up a great deal of territories and rights have deeply haunted the Iranian psyche.
In the Persian vocabulary “Turkmenchay” has become a metaphor for any humiliating compromise that jeopardizes national interests. In fact, after the recent Geneva agreement Iranians active on social media were wondering if it is another Turkmenchay or not. Luckily, the majority of Iranians don’t believe so although Abolhassan Banisadr, a prominent opposition figure who served as the first President of post-revolutionary Iran, has called the interim deal “worst than the Turkmenchay Treaty.”
To further understand the situation, let’s compare this metaphor to another one, which is often used in explaining the behavior of the regime:
In July 1988 after the eight-year Iran-Iraq war, the Supreme Leader of the time Ayatollah Rouhollah Khomeini reluctantly accepted UN Security Council Resolution 598 and the immediate ceasefire. He equated his decision (like Socrates) to drinking the poisonous chalice. Since then, pundits have participated in an incongruous scholastic dispute over what conditions would lead the current Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to drink the proverbial poison and accept a nuclear deal like his predecessor.
Khomeini has been lambasted by many Iranians for prolonging the war with Iraq but no one has condemned his decision to accept the UN Security Council resolution as an act of giving away a piece of land or undermining national interests and rights.
The real problem for the current Iranian regime headed by Ayatollah Khamenei is not about drinking the poisonous chalice. It has to do with the signing of a nuclear Turkmenchay. Realpolitik suggests that the regime should not be trapped between the Scylla of ever-growing sanctions and the Charybdis of a humiliating unilateral concession.
The US President has apparently grasped this notion. Speaking at the Brookings Institution’s Saban Forum last Saturday, Obama rejected that Iran would surrender under more sanctions and military threats: “I think [this notion] does not reflect an honest understanding of the Iranian people or the Iranian regime.”
When debating the recent Geneva deal and the prospect of a comprehensive agreement, US foreign policy makers, especially Congress, need to distinguish between Iran as a regime and Iran as a state. “What’s the difference?” they might ask.
Yet, as the literary critic Paul De Man once brilliantly explained, “What’s the difference” in some situations could be an answer rather than a question that indicates the responder does not “give a damn what the difference is.” This would be an imprudent answer from the US Congress.
Photo Credit: ISNA/Mehdi Ghasemi
]]>by Barbara Slavin
A new poll following the election of Hassan Rouhani says that a majority of Iranians oppose Iran’s intervention in Syria and Iraq and believe that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons despite their government’s claims to the contrary.
The poll, released Friday (December 6) and conducted August [...]]]>
by Barbara Slavin
A new poll following the election of Hassan Rouhani says that a majority of Iranians oppose Iran’s intervention in Syria and Iraq and believe that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons despite their government’s claims to the contrary.
The poll, released Friday (December 6) and conducted August 26-September 22, of 1,205 Iranians in face-to-face interviews by a subcontractor for Zogby Research Services, also indicated that Rouhani had relatively lukewarm support at the time and that many Iranians would like to see a more democratic political system in their country.
The results jibe with the June presidential elections in which Rouhani won a bare majority of votes, albeit against half a dozen other candidates. Half of those polled after the election either opposed Rouhani or said that his victory would make no difference in their lives. This reporter gained a similar impression of Iranian skepticism about their new president during a visit to Tehran in early August.
Not surprisingly, given the impact of draconian sanctions and mismanagement by the previous Ahmadinejad government on the Iranian economy, the poll found that only 36 percent of Iranians said they were better off now than five years ago, compared to 43 percent who said they were worse off. However, the same percentage — 43 percent — said they expected their lives to improve under the Rouhani administration.
Among the most interesting findings were those related to foreign policy. The poll found that 54 percent believe Iran’s intervention in Syria has had negative consequences – perhaps a reflection of the financial drain on Iran of the war in Syria and of the unpopularity of the Bashar al-Assad regime. Nearly the same proportion of the Iranian population – 52 percent – also opposed Iranian involvement in Iraq, which is ruled by a Shi’ite Muslim government friendly to Tehran. Iranian activities in support of fellow Shi’ites in Lebanon and Bahrain were only slightly more popular, while only in Yemen and Afghanistan did a majority of Iranians say their country’s actions have had a positive impact.
Jim Zogby, director of Zogby Research Services, told IPS that Iranians know “Syria has become a huge problem in the world and they don’t want to have more problems with the world.” The low marks for ties to Iraq may reflect “lingering anti-Iraq sentiment” stemming from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, Zogby said.
Iranian attitudes toward democracy and the nuclear issue were also interesting. While a plurality of Iranians (29 percent) listed unemployment as their top priority, a quarter of the population rated advancing democracy first
Other major priorities included:
According to the poll, only a tiny fraction – six percent – listed continuing Iran’s uranium enrichment as a top priority. Yet 55 percent agreed with the statement that “my country has ambitions to produce nuclear weapons” compared to 37 percent who believe the government’s assertions that the program is purely peaceful. The Iranian government insists that it is not aiming to produce weapons and signed an agreement in Geneva November 24 to constrain its nuclear program in return for modest sanctions relief.
In a strong show of nationalism, 96 percent said continuing the nuclear program was worth the pain of sanctions. Only seven percent listed resolving the stand-off with the world over the Iranian nuclear program so sanctions could be lifted as their top priority and only five percent put improving relations with the United States and the West at the head of their list.
Zogby said it was not surprising that Iranians would give a low priority to the nuclear program yet “when you push that button [and question Iran’s rights], the nationalism takes off.” He noted those who identified themselves as Rouhani supporters were more inclined to affirm Iran’s right to nuclear weapons than Rouhani opponents — 76 percent compared to 61 percent.
The poll results, Zogby said, suggest that Iranians do not consider Rouhani an exemplar of the reformist Green Movement that convulsed the country during and following 2009 presidential elections, but rather as an establishment figure.
“His supporters are more in the hardline camp,” Zogby said.
]]>by Mohammad Ali Kadivar
It took only a few months after president Hassan Rouhani’s inauguration for the broad but fragile alliance behind him to face challenges after the shutdown of a reformist newspaper as well as the harassment of the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi and [...]]]>
by Mohammad Ali Kadivar
It took only a few months after president Hassan Rouhani’s inauguration for the broad but fragile alliance behind him to face challenges after the shutdown of a reformist newspaper as well as the harassment of the daughters of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Zahra Rahnavard, two leaders of the opposition Green Movement who are still under house arrest.
Reformists and supporters of the Green Movement that had voted for Rouhani in June 2013, outraged from these incidents, urged him to take a more aggressive and confrontational stance against hardliners. Ayatollah Dastgheib, the most outspoken clerical supporter of the Greens who had also endorsed Rouhani in his presidential campaign, reminded the President that his vote for him had been on the condition that political prisoners be released and Rouhani should do anything to fulfill that condition. Jaras, a major website of the Green Movement, also published multiple articles with a similar theme. One of those articles warned Rouhani that if he stayed silent and did not join popular forces, he would be defeated from that point forward. The Organization of Iran’s Republicans, an elite opposition group in exile that has an astute strategic vision, concluded that these actions show that Iran’s Leader and governmental organizations under his supervision are determined to abort Rouhani’s policies, similar to what they did in paralyzing the reformist administration of Mohammad Khatami from 1997 to 2005.
Responding to this wave of criticism on Oct. 30, former president Khatami, a key supporter of Rouhani in the 2013 election, stated that hardliners “want to detach Rouhani from his social backbone, and pretend that his administration is inefficient.” Khatami also highlighted the positive role of the Leader Ali Khamenei in the outcome of the 2013 election, and asked the youth in particular to be patient and maintain realistic expectations for Rouhani. Political commentators in the opposition received this speech rather differently. While some urged the people to stay moderate and take Khatami’s advice seriously, others recalled that during his presidency, Khatami’s approach to demobilizing his popular supporters and following reformist demands through established institutions and elite negotiations was ultimately unsuccessful.
As different sides of the debate draw analogies and examples from the Reform Era (1997-2005), the content of their arguments resonate a great deal with hot discussions during that eight year period. In a recently published article in the American Sociological Review, I explain the major strategic debates within the Reform Movement and how these strategic chasms derived coalition changes within the movement. I argue that the positions of reformist actors in these debates can be better understood and classified along the lines of three different dimensions: optimism about the incumbent elite in the Islamic Republic of Iran, optimism about the possibility of reform through the institutions of the Islamic Republic, and optimism about the viability and consequences of popular mobilization. The convergence or divergence of reformist groups’ perceptions along these three dimensions drove the formation and disintegration of alliances in the Reform Movement.
The Reform Movement took off in Khatami’s landslide victory in the 1997 presidential election. It hoped to promote the rule of law, hold officeholders accountable, and strengthen civil society. Three major actors backed Khatami’s campaign and later constituted the grand reformist alliance that supported Khatami’s policies and plans: a clerical reformist party (the Assembly of Militant Clerics), two lay reformist parties (the Organization of the Mujahedin of the Islamic Revolution and the Participation Front), and the student movement (represented by the Office for Strengthening Unity).
These three groups all shared a strategic assessment of the political context in Iran at the time that was key to sustaining the alliance. This assessment, the political negotiation model, was based on optimism toward the incumbent elite in the Islamic Republic, optimism about reforming the regime through its own institutions, and pessimism about the consequences of popular mobilization for the Reform project. This model indicated that dialogue and negotiation with hardliners would finally convince them of the benefits of reformism.
“The best way to engage the enemies of civil society is to give them this opportunity to rethink and to let them readjust,” one affiliated newspaper suggested. “We should show them in practice that transition to democracy presents greater opportunities than threats” (Hayat-e No, June 1, 2000). This model was also credited with stating that institutions of the Islamic Republic were capable of reforming the regime from within (Asr-e Ma, December 1999/January 2000). As a journalist affiliated with the lay reformist parties put it, the political institutions of the Islamic Republic were not “dead-ends.” Indeed, he continued, “there is no way to change the world than to act within legal institutions” (Neshat, July 13, 1999). In addition, supporters of this model feared that because of deep grievances, mass mobilization would stir up emotions, spawning radicalism and provide hardliners with an excuse for repression, possibly leading to civil war. In addition, these reformists felt the Reform Movement lacked the organizational capacity to keep public demonstrations under control.
This model was dominant among the clerical reformist party, lay reformist parties, and the major organization of the student movement between 1997 and 2000, and even survived earlier waves of repression. At the same time, the nationalist opposition — the Iran Liberation Movement, and the Nationalist-Religious Activists — were the one set of reform organizations that did not share this view of political opportunities. Their perception profile, which I call the political-activist model, was not optimistic about persuading the conservative elite of the Islamic Republic to accept democratization, and stressed the possibility and necessity of contentious collective action to confront the regime. Nationalist groups encouraged Khatami to adopt the political style of Mohammad Mossadeq, the democratically elected prime minister who mobilized mass support for the nationalization of Iran’s oil industry in 1950, forcing his better-placed opponents within Iran’s political institutions to accept his programs (Iran Liberation Movement, statement #1369, May 19, 1999). At the same time, the nationalist opposition shared the political-negotiation view that Iran’s political institutions offered opportunities for democratization. Nonetheless, nationalist groups did not act in alliance with the other three reformist groups. The alliance in this period was only between groups that shared the political-negotiation model.
The escalation of repression against the movement in 2000 triggered new strategic debates within, disillusioned many reform movement supporters about the political-negotiation model and transformed their political perception. The most radical reaction came from the student movement. They became discouraged about the prospects of convincing hardliners through dialogue as well as reforming the regime through its own political institutions. The statement of the Unity Office (the main organization of the student movement) after the 2003 municipal elections explained this position: “To speak of the ineffectiveness of the May 23 Front is to acknowledge the reality that the strategy of ‘self-reforming’ the regime has reached a dead-end. Of course, this is not just because of the weaknesses of the reformists. The fact that the hard core of power does not surrender to the process of reform has been one of the root causes of this dead-end” (Asr-e No, March 10, 2003). Accordingly, they did not participate in any elections from 2000 to 2005.
Lay Reformist parties ultimately lost their optimism about Iran’s dominant elite and stated that reformists in the government should take a confrontational position and use all of their institutional and legal authorities in their struggle with the hardliners. This new perception brought these groups closer to the Nationalist groups who were also pessimistic about Iran’s incumbent elite but optimistic about the capacities of Iran’s political institutions. At the same time, president Khatami and his allies in the clerical reformist party maintained the negotiation profile even after the Guardian Council disqualified thousands of reformist candidates from the 2004 parliamentary elections, including dozens of incumbents.
Shifting perception profiles resulted in a new set of alliances during the 2005 presidential election. Adherents of the political-negotiation model supported Mehdi Karroubi, who emphasized his pragmatism and bargaining skills. The student movement’s Unity Office boycotted the election based on its radical perception profile that saw no chance of reforming the regime through institutions such as elections. Lay reformist groups nominated Mostafa Mo’in, who stressed his confrontational stance, and promised for example that he would never hold elections with mass candidate disqualifications, as Khatami had done in 2004 (ISNA, May 15, 2005).
When the Guardian Council disqualified the candidate of the Nationalist opposition, they entered into negotiations with the lay reformist parties and chose to support Mo’in’s candidacy, formalizing the alliance between the lay reformist parties and the nationalist groups. They justified this decision by pointing to the threat they perceived if the hardliners were to solidify control of all political institutions, adding the executive branch to their control of parliament, the municipal councils, and the unelected branches of government. Late Ezzatollah Sahabi, head of the Nationalist-Religious Activists at the time said that “if we do not participate in the election, the right faction will win the election, and that will be a disaster for the country, as we can observe in the behavior of the mayor of Tehran [Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]” (ISNA, June 6, 2005). This marked the first time the nationalist opposition had allied with other opposition groups since the 1979 revolution and resulted in a coordinated electoral campaign on behalf of Mo’in. Although this short-term coalition was not successful in the 2005 election, it became the pioneer strategic cooperation among pro-democratic forces of different ideologies and backgrounds within Iranian politics.
The outcome of the 2005 election was disastrous for reformists though; their votes were divided between multiple candidates and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad managed to win the election in two rounds.
The 2009 massive protests reshuffled the perception profiles of many reformist groups and individuals. However, eight years after the end of the Reform Era, we again observe that supporters of democratic change in Iranian politics are debating similar themes about the possibility of reform through negotiation with Iran’s incumbent elite, participation in political institutions, and popular mobilization.
Are these debates and quarrels going to create fractures in the alliance behind Rouhani? Is the moderation project repeating the fate of the Reform Movement, as several well-known commentators fear? While there are definite similarities between Iran’s political landscapes now and the period between 1997 and 2005, there are also important disparities. One distinctive feature of these two eras is the fact that now we have the experience of the Reform Era for reference. While multiple political actors draw examples from the Reform Era to make sense of the current situation, they are also working to avoid the same mistakes by charting a new way to the future rather than engaging in a tragic repetition of history.
]]>by Farideh Farhi & Jasmin Ramsey
Editor’s Note: Following is Jasmin Ramsey’s introduction and interview with Farideh Farhi, an independent scholar and expert on Iran from the University of Hawaii who has been in Tehran since the end of August.
The Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was inaugurated [...]]]>
by Farideh Farhi & Jasmin Ramsey
Editor’s Note: Following is Jasmin Ramsey’s introduction and interview with Farideh Farhi, an independent scholar and expert on Iran from the University of Hawaii who has been in Tehran since the end of August.
The Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was inaugurated just three months ago and two important historic events have already occurred under his watch: the private meeting between Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Secretary of State John Kerry on the sidelines of September’s UN General Assembly in New York and President Barack Obama’s 15-minute phone conversation with Rouhani on Sept. 28.
The hope that was generated in New York — where Rouhani and Zarif effectively presented Iran’s new administration to the world — carried through into the Oct. 15-16 resumed talks in Geneva between Iran and the 6-world power P5+1 team. While all parties have remained officially silent on the details of those talks, Iran, the US and the EU concluded with positive statements.
At the very least, it was obvious that Iran’s new negotiating team, led by Zarif — a well-known diplomat with demonstrable knowledge of the US and how to solve political quagmires — has entered negotiations with a serious plan and intent to resolve the nuclear issue once and for all. Of course, Iran and the P5+1 insist on certain bottom lines and it remains to be seen whether the stars will align in Tehran and Washington enough to allow a deal to happen. With that in mind, I spoke by phone with the Iran expert Farideh Farhi, who’s currently in Tehran, to get a sense of where things stand ahead of the next round of talks scheduled for Nov. 7-8 in Geneva.
Jasmin Ramsey: What is the political environment like in Iran right now in relation to the nuclear issue?
Farideh Farhi: A good part of the Iranian political spectrum is supportive of their nuclear negotiating team’s different approach and efforts for resolving this issue. The folks who are not supportive of this effort are effectively marginalized because of the presidential election’s results; the only argument that they have at this particular moment is: “it’s not going to work.” They’re hedging so that if the talks fail, they can come back and say: “we told you so.”
Does that raise the stakes for the Rouhani administration?
This government has a lot riding on the resolution of the nuclear issue because it made it a campaign promise and priority. Had Mr. Rouhani’s rival, Tehran mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, been elected a failure on the nuclear diplomacy front would have posed less of a problem since Mr. Qalibaf’s campaign platform was more focused on the better management of Iran’s economy. But Rouhani’s campaign promise, as well as a quick jump on the nuclear issue, has raised the stakes for him and his foreign policy team (failure on this front may also end up impacting his promises on the domestic front). This is not to say that Rouhani is ready or desperate to make any deal in order to save his presidency or his other agenda items. The Iranian political environment continues to make the acceptance of an agreement that does not acknowledge Iran’s rights under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) impossible. So, the acceptance of a bad deal is politically even more dangerous for Rouhani than not reaching an agreement.
Are the Iranians reasonable in terms of what they are expecting from the other side as part of a mutual deal?
While discussing the complex web of sanctions that have been imposed on Iran, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Europe and Americas, Majid Takht-Ravanchi, argued that in exchange for Iran’s confidence-building moves, at least one of these sanctions should be removed as a first step. This suggests that Iran will not be asking for the removal of all sanctions immediately, as it has done in the past, but is looking for something that will show a change of direction in the U.S. approach to this issue. A reversal of the sanctions trend is important for selling whatever compromises the Iranian nuclear team makes to its audience back home.
As I mentioned previously, this government has a lot riding on this issue and if it is unable to frame the results of the negotiations as also protective of Iran’s rights, then it will not only be unable to sell the agreement domestically, it will also begin to face serious challenges regarding its domestic agenda.
Can you elaborate?
Mr. Rouhani’s election platform had three prongs. One was related to foreign policy; he promised a reduction of tensions with the Western world at least partly through successful nuclear negotiations. Then there was the economic prong, which has a management component. Against the backdrop of deteriorating economic conditions, Rouhani promised both better management of the economy and more rationalized state support for the private sector and productive activities. Finally, he called for the de-securitization of Iran’s political environment.
The continuation and further tightening of the sanctions regime will force the private sector and producers in Iran to rely even more on the state for protection against a deteriorating economic environment and the challenges of getting around sanctions. It will also increase the threat perception of the political system as a whole and as such make the further easing of political controls more difficult.
What about what’s happening in Iran domestically. Earlier this month the daughter of a key opposition figure, Mir Hossein Mousavi — who’s currently under house arrest — was reportedly harshly harassed by a guard outside of Mousavi’s home. Can movement on the nuclear issue aid the de-securitization of Iran’s domestic environment?
If a movement on the nuclear issue ends up reversing the economic war that has been waged and eliminate the threat of military attack that keeps being issued against Iran, then it is not too outlandish to think of the further opening of the Iranian political system. It should be noted that the high participation rate in the presidential election has already had some impact in terms of reducing the systemic fears that motivated the terribly restricted political environment of the past four years. In other words, on the domestic front the move towards the center, supported by the electorate, has already eased tensions within the country. The removal of external threats is likely to further this process. But if Mr. Rouhani’s foreign policy agenda is blocked by the United States taking a maximalist position, then there is no guarantee that this process will continue. In fact, it is more likely that old fears about outsiders — and particularly the US — trying to foment domestic disturbances will once again resurface.
So President Rouhani definitely wants to relax the state’s hand in the personal lives of Iranians?
He has certainly expressed his desire for a less interventionist state in the personal lives of the citizenry as well as a less repressive state in the treatment of critics and dissidents. His Intelligence Minister even said recently that dealing with security issues through securitizing the political environment is not something to boast about. So the expression of desire and/or pretense is there.
But there has been more than an expression of desire or hope. As I mentioned before, the political environment has also opened up considerably since the election. No doubt hundreds of political prisoners, including former presidential candidates, remain. Abuses such as the one you mentioned regarding Mousavi’s daughters also continue to occur. Just last week, a reformist newspaper was shut down for an article that should have been challenged through a critical engagement rather than shutting down a whole newspaper. Still, I arrived in Tehran two months ago and have yet to meet someone who does not acknowledge a vastly different political environment than prior to the election. This may be just temporary given how bad things were after the 2009 election, but there is nevertheless a palpable and acknowledged sense of relief and political release.
President Rouhani and the Iranian nuclear negotiating team have referenced a limited timeline for reaching a deal. How long do you think it will be before they say too much time has passed?
The process has become accelerated, but I don’t think anyone is expecting the sanctions regime to crumble within 6 months. People have even talked about some sanctions remaining for a long time — they reference the sanctions on Iraq and the time it took for them to be lifted. Nevertheless, there is expectation or hope regarding a reversal of these deteriorating trends.
The bottom line is that a good part of the Iranian population as well as the leadership is ready for a compromise. Under these circumstances, there is readiness for a full-fledged process of give and take and as such, agreements to keep meeting are no longer deemed satisfactory. Hence the expectation that something needs to happen by the next meeting. I don’t think this necessarily means immediate major concessions from either side, but I do think that once the first step is taken, there is no reason why this process cannot become even more accelerated.
In a speech on Sunday, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei essentially voiced support for Iran’s nuclear negotiating team and told hardliners to hold back for now. Does this signal a shift on his part?
It does not signal a shift, but it does highlight two key elements of Iran’s approach to the nuclear talks. First, his words make clear that despite the noise made by the hardliners criticizing the negotiation team’s softness, excitement, and perhaps even gullibility, Zarif and his aides have full systemic support in their efforts to find a reasonable solution to the nuclear conflict — a solution that addresses both Iran’s bottom lines in relation to the right to peaceful uranium enrichment as well as western concerns regarding potential weaponization. Secondly, Khamenei’s words also made clear that Iran’s approach to negotiations is quite pragmatic. As he said, if the negotiations work, “so much for the better”, if not, Iran will carry on with a more inwardly oriented approach to its development. By giving full support to the negotiating team — led by the very popular Foreign Minister Javad Zarif — the Leader is positioning himself on the side of public opinion, which favors talks, while making sure that the same public opinion eventually does not consider him a stumbling block to a reasonable solution. Such a positioning will make it more likely that domestic public opinion will blame US unreasonableness, egged on by the Israeli government, and not inflexibility or lack of diplomatic acumen of a Zarif-led negotiating team if talks fail.
Do you sense that Iran’s hardliners are willing to support a nuclear deal?
It’s not a question of their willingness; despite the hardliners’ loud voices at this particular moment, they’re marginalized. A systemic go-ahead has been issued for the perusal of some sort of compromise that acknowledges Iran’s right to enrichment despite limitations on the levels and extent. The hardliners will come out of the margins if the Obama administration insists on the maximalist position of no enrichment that is being pushed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or is unable to offer any kind of meaningful sanctions relief in exchange for significant Iranian concessions.
So Rouhani is walking a fine line in trying to balance his foreign policy agenda on the nuclear issue with the tricky situation he’s dealing with politically at home?
No doubt, but I would say that at this particular moment, President Rouhani and his team have some leeway regarding how to frame an agreement because of the consensus that was generated by the election. I would even argue that their hands are less tied than President Obama’s, considering Congress’ hardline position on the sanctions regime.
On that point, it’s quite interesting, because on one hand there’s almost a sense among those who are hopeful here regarding negotiations that Obama needs help. But on the other hand there seems to be a tactical urge on the part of others to mirror US policy on Iran. So, while some would like to reduce expressions of anti-Americanism that have long been present in the Iranian public sphere through slogans, posters and so on, others argue that the pursuit of diplomacy while emphatically chanting “Death to America” is Iran’s version of the US’ dual-track policy of sanctions and diplomacy on Iran.
Do you think the taking down of anti-US billboards earlier this month in Tehran is part of that?
Yes, they were taken down by the Tehran municipality and that was apparently on Mayor Qalibaf’s order. I saw smaller versions of those billboards, calling on the Iranian negotiators not to trust the American negotiators, being carried by demonstrators on Nov. 4, the anniversary of the US embassy takeover.
The protest rally in front of the former US embassy was more robust this year as well. Many people showed up or were bused in and instead of avoiding “Death to America” chants, Saeed Jalili, the former nuclear negotiator and presidential contender, made the case that it is perfectly fine to simultaneously negotiate and chant “Death to America.” He added that the chant is not directed at the American people, only at the US government. There was a clear rhetorical play on the US’ dual track of sanctions and diplomacy; the underlying point was that chants of “Death to America” are not directed at the US public in the same way that both the Obama administration and US Congress make the claim that sanctions are not directed at the Iranian people.
There have been several reports recently that foreign commercial actors such as oil companies are thinking about how they could return to Iran in the event of a nuclear deal. Are you seeing any of that on the ground?
Not yet. The sanctions regime is still in full force. I was talking to an Iranian businessman the other day and he told me that he can’t even receive brochures through the mail from German companies because they fear they would be violating sanctions. Of course, he then told me how he gets around that issue byway of Dubai.
Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Zaganeh has stated that the Petroleum Ministry is re-evaluating its terms and conditions for investment in the country’s oil and gas sector with an eye for offering better terms. He has also acknowledged conversations with some European companies but he said all of this is just at the level of initial talks. So, people do seem to be getting ready for something — the mood for now seems to be that things may work out well because people are also sensing some change in the Obama administration. That said, everybody remains extremely cautious; they know very well that things could also fall apart very quickly.
]]>by Ali Reza Eshraghi
News media accounts of reactions from Iran to the recent talks in Geneva remind me of a joke that has gone viral there:
A salesman shows a variety of hearing aids ranging in cost from one to a thousand dollars to a customer, who then asks, “How well does [...]]]>
by Ali Reza Eshraghi
News media accounts of reactions from Iran to the recent talks in Geneva remind me of a joke that has gone viral there:
A salesman shows a variety of hearing aids ranging in cost from one to a thousand dollars to a customer, who then asks, “How well does the one dollar one work?” The salesman responds, “It doesn’t work at all! But, people speak louder when they see you wearing it.”
For the first time, different political factions within the Islamic republic of Iran are in agreement about President Hassan Rouhani’s method for resolving the nuclear issue and negotiating with the United States. But local and international media coverage has focused on Iranian radical groups who have shrunk in size and been marginalized after June’s presidential election. While this group occupies a small space in Iran’s current nuclear discourse, it has been presented as a major actor by the media.
Much of this coverage focuses on Kayhan, the Iranian daily newspaper, and its editor-in-chief, Hossein Shariatmadari, who has openly criticized the Iranian delegates for keeping the details of their negotiations with the P5+1 powers (the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China plus Germany) confidential. For Shariatmadari, this secrecy is an indication that the Iranian delegation is making a bad deal.
Of course, Khayan and Shariatmadari are not the only ones who have criticized Iranian diplomats for keeping things under wraps when it comes to the nuclear issue. In October 2009, when the Saeed Jalili-headed negotiation team was trying to make a deal with the P5+1 in Geneva, Iranian reformist media also complained about the lack of available details on the discussions.
At that time, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the sidelined candidate of Iran’s 2009 presidential election, accused the negotiators of trading the long-term interests of Iranians for “nothing” in a statement.
And last year — amid rumors of a meeting between Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior aide to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, with American officials — Kalameh, the flagship website of the opposition Green Movement, demanded that the negotiations be “transparent and [conducted] in front of people.”
Shrinking prominence
This time it’s the hardline Kayhan that has printed the loudest complaints against the confidential negotiations. But things are different now. Not long ago, each time Kayhan started a game of ball, it was immediately picked up and passed around in the Principlist front. Today, no one is willing to play along with the well-known daily.
Indeed, other conservative media outlets affiliated with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corp (IRGC) apparently have no problem with the nuclear negotiations remaining confidential. Here is Sobh-e Sadeq, the official IRGC weekly, expressing satisfaction in its post-Geneva talks coverage:
“The Iranian delegation stressed the importance of respecting Iranian nation’s red lines, as well as the need of change in the position of the West from selfishness to a win-win interaction. [Our delegation] would not back down from the nation’s rights.”
Even more surprisingly, the IRGC has absorbed Rouhani’s vocabulary and is talking about a “win-win interaction with the US.” The Javan daily, another media outlet associated with the IRGC, stressed on Monday that the actions of the Rouhani administration “have the permission of the Supreme Leader.” Javan took this a step further by arguing that even if the administration was unsuccessful in the negotiations, Iran would still emerge victorious because it would be obvious that it was the Americans who, contrary to their claims, have no interest in resolving disputes and restoring relations.
Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, the head of the Majlis Principlist faction whose daughter is married to the Supreme Leader’s son, has also supported the confidentiality of the nuclear negotiations. Considered a hardliner, Haddad Adel, who used to favor Kayhan, could have remained silent in this debate. But he has criticized the newspaper for basing its suspicion of Iran’s diplomatic team on what he considers “the words of the Zionist media.”
With such remarks, Haddad Adel is — perhaps unintentionally — paving the road for reformists to launch a more powerful attack against the radicals. Mir-Mahmoud Mousavi, the former Director General of the Foreign Ministry and the brother of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, has also accused Iranian hardliners of using the language of Israeli hardliners. He believes they both “are trying to weaken Iran’s position in the talks.”
The position of Haddad Adel, the IRGC or even Ahmad Khatami, the radical and sometimes callous Tehran Friday Prayers Leader who also said Rouhani’s administration should be trusted, has confused analysts who measure Iranian politics with a who-is-closer-to-the-Supreme-Leader tape. These pundits are uncomfortably surprised each time they come across such perplexing results. The last such surprise occurred during Iran’s 2013 presidential election when Saeed Jalili, Iran’s nuclear negotiator who was touted as a favorite of the Supreme Leader, lost the vote.
After Ahmadinejad
Of course, it’s crucial to observe certain significant developments in Iran’s nuclear and foreign policy discourse that have occurred since Rouhani took office a few months ago. First, Iranian media can now write more openly and include a variety of opinions about their country’s controversial politics. This is why Mohammad Mohajeri, the editor-in-chief of the popular Khabar Online website and former member of the editorial board of Kayhan, reminded Shariatmadari that Jalili’s former negotiating team had tougher restrictions for the press. Before, “the press would get some burnt intelligence and were then told not to even discuss that useless information because of the confidential nature of the talks.” Compare that situation to the present when trying to gauge the level of change. Last week, for the first time, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif took a group of Iranian reporters from various media outlets to Geneva. Each day they were briefed repeatedly by members of the Iranian team.
That the reformist media are not alone in attacking and quibbling with the hardliners is another new development. The moderate and progressive Principlists, in an unwritten division of labor with the reformists, have taken on the task of silencing the radicals themselves. Popular news websites affiliated with the Principlists like Alef, Khabar Online and Tabank have constantly — albeit with a softer tone — criticized Iran’s radicals since the talks in Geneva.
Bijan Moghaddam, the managing director of the widely circulated Jam-e Jam daily and the former political editor of the hardliner Fars News Agency, has warned the radicals that the “Iranian society has banished them” and asked hardliners to voice their criticism logically and “without creating a ruckus and swearing.”
Finally, there is now a visible rhetorical shift in the debate over Iran’s foreign policy. Critics of Rouhani’s diplomacy team do not merely rely on mnemonic tropes and the Islamic Republic’s ideological repertoire in their arguments. They are also invoking Iran’s “national interest” in criticizing the administration’s diplomatic method. Such changes are even visible in Khayan’s tone. For example, the daily recently criticized Rouhani for publically announcing ahead of the Geneva talks that the treasury is empty, saying that such statements would weaken Iran’s negotiating position.
In such an atmosphere, it’s not surprising that critics of the government’s foreign policy claim they are aiding the administration’s negotiating strategy. As a radical commentator recently said in an interview with the Javan daily, “President Rouhani can use the views of those opposing the talks with the US as powerful leverage to haggle with the US.”
Photo: Gholam Ali Haddad Adel greets Hossein Shariatmadari. Credit: Jam News
]]>by Farideh Farhi
Iran’s cabinet confirmation hearings this week were painful, but not for its new president Hassan Rouhani, despite the rejection of 3 out of his 18 ministerial nominees. They were painful for Iran’s hardliners, whose mismanagement of the country was spotlighted along with their weakening form of political speech.
A [...]]]>
by Farideh Farhi
Iran’s cabinet confirmation hearings this week were painful, but not for its new president Hassan Rouhani, despite the rejection of 3 out of his 18 ministerial nominees. They were painful for Iran’s hardliners, whose mismanagement of the country was spotlighted along with their weakening form of political speech.
A good number of Iran’s political class and punditry must have watched in awe as the people who have been framing and dominating public discourse in Iran — particularly in the last 4 years — adopted the role of the opposition. As they spoke, what has gone wrong with the Islamic Republic became more and more evident: the ideological governance, which is quite distinct from ideological rule, that frames the Islamic Republic as a system. The tension between the ideological framing of the Islamic Republic and the technocratic exigencies of a developmentalist welfare state has existed in the Islamic Republic from day one. But it was dramatically on display in these public hearings.
The undoing of Iran’s hardliners
In rhetorical confrontations between national-level figures and parochial-like local politicians, it’s not hard for the former to outshine the latter. But something else was going on here as well. The questioning of the center-reformist cabinet nominees by the parliament’s hardliners was consumed with the relationship of the nominees to the so-called sedition (fetneh) and had nothing to do with the nominees’ proposed ministerial plans and polices. In other words, the nominees’ qualifications were overshadowed by a focus on what they did during Iran’s 2009 post-election unrest. To boot, the questioning was carried out in a street-talk manner, which is completely out of place in a public forum broadcast on national television. One member of parliament even spoke about the “club” Iranian Lurs use to treat those who do not walk a straight line. He had to apologize for imputing a tendency towards violence to his own ethnic group.
The contrast between the MPs and Rouhani’s nominees — who maintained their dignity while responding to their opponents without transgressing acceptable political speech — was striking. After all, if post-election protests are identified as fetneh in official discourse, one would have a hard time achieving a ministerial post while admitting they supported them. But one can defend one’s record while stating allegiance to the Islamic Republic and its institutions, including the office of the Leader Ali Khamenei. And although some were better than others, Rouhani’s nominees defended themselves well and even engaged in a degree of pushback regarding why they acted more properly and humanely than MPs who showed no sympathy for Iranian protesters who were harmed or even killed.
Again, the contrast between the way Rouhani’s nominees’ spoke in defense of their policies and political outlook and the accusatory language of the MPs was striking. Of course, public displays of official denunciatory language aren’t new for the Iranian public. Indeed, it has been the dominant form political speech in the past few years. What made the broadcasted hearings fascinating was the gradual public realization that the folks who have led Iran into disaster are now sitting in judgment of the folks the electorate voted for. They were voted in precisely because they promised to run the country with managerial expertise and to loosen the grip of ideology over decision-making.
As the hearings proceeded — on the first day sedition-related words were reportedly used over 1,600 times — it became clear that “sedition” is the only ammunition the hardliners have. A prominent conservative MP even said out loud that hardliners have become “merchants of sedition” who are making a living from applying the label. But the confirmation of four of Rouhani’s key nominees who were accused of cavorting with seditionists was a disaster for the discourse of sedition. It’s obvious that the hardliners’ favorite mode of attack is becoming increasingly weak.
Ultimately, out of the many effective speeches given by the nominees, two stand out for me because of the unraveling of tensions that accompanied them.
Iran’s new foreign minister
Mohammad Javad Zarif’s speech literally quieted the cacophonous parliament hall. Zarif has spent most of his adult life in the United States as a student and later as a diplomat. This by itself makes him suspect. He did not serve in the Iran-Iraq War even though he was at age for military service at the time. Among other things, he was accused of being educated in the West, meeting with American diplomats and Iranian civil society activists who reside in the US and even suspiciously losing a briefcase that included important documents while he was there. In short, he was portrayed as a man who lost his soul in the West. What Zarif said was not as important as the way he broke apart that image.
Many in the US have heard him publicly speak in English, which he is very good at, but neither the MPs nor the Iranian public had heard him give a speech in Persian. And they had never seen him recite so many Qoranic verses! But Zarif’s speech on Tuesday seamlessly combined expertise and religious rhetoric. In a rather blunt way, he also pushed backed against the accusations that were hurled against him. He reminded the MPs that the previous government had forced him into retirement at the age of 47 and even made teaching difficult for him but that he had not left the country in more than 6 years even for teaching opportunities that had arisen elsewhere. His body language, voice and speech-content confirmed that he was as much of a stakeholder in the Islamic Republic as those who were judging him and that he had every right to be the foreign minister of a president whose promises of a foreign policy involving both expertise and moderation aided his election. Zarif also made clear that the power of Iran’s foreign policy rests on the electorate’s popular confidence in their government at home. As I already mentioned, Zarif’s performance was so stunning that it quieted the Majles chamber — the only time this happened during the hearings.
A noteworthy loss
Another important speech was given by Mohammad Ali Najafi, Rouhani’s nominee for the Ministry of Education. Again, the contrast between his speech and demeanor and the accusations leveled against him was something to behold. His pushback was also telling. Najafi was accused of meeting the families of protestors who died in 2009, to which he essentially responded with: I went to see the aggrieved families in my capacity as a member of the Tehran City Council, which would have been unnecessary if you guys had done your job of at least comforting them.
Although Najafi failed to receive the required number of votes for confirmation, the yay votes outnumbered the nays and a one-vote switch would have made him the cabinet minister. This situates him as an important advisor or a candidate for other posts if he desires them.
Beyond this, Najafi’s near confirmation turned into an argument for some Tehrani voters. Had they not mostly abstained in the 2012 parliamentary election and, ignoring reformist disqualifications and disarray, voted for a moderate conservative slate — which did exist — Najafi would have been the education minister today. The leader of that moderate conservative slate — Ali Mottahari — was the only one who made it into Parliament in 2012 and was a key organizer of votes for the Rouhani cabinet. One more deputy from that slate — which was possible with more participation — would have made a small but important difference in the scheme of things. Of course, yesterday that difference didn’t appear as small to the many teachers who were hoping for Najafi’s successful appointment.
Several blunt exchanges involving the intelligence and judiciary ministries should also be listened to by anyone trying to understand the tensions and polarizations of today’s Iran. The focal point of these tensions is based on issues related to human and civil rights, dignity and the operation of Iran’s surveillance state.
Rouhani’s position
In his closing speech, Rouhani laid out his argument for how to leave behind or at least lessen the deep rifts that resulted from the 2009 election. He argued for an acknowledgment that both sides had made mistakes. He did this by mentioning two words in one sentence: Kahrizak and orduskeshi. He said both were mistakes, giving them equivalency.
Kahrizak is the prison in which many of Iran’s 2009 protesters were abused and several were killed. Ordukeshi is the word used by the Leader to negatively describe the 2009 protests. Instead of acknowledging the constitutionally protected right to peaceful protests, the term frames the events as something the losers of the election illegitimately did by turning the electoral competition into street confrontations. Rouhani surely knows that this is a highly offensive term to many people who voted for him particularly in the city of Tehran, in which protests lasted much longer than the rest of the country.
By saying that mistakes were made in both Kahrizad Prison and by ordukeshi, Rouhani’s message seemed clear: rightly or wrongly, neither side can play the game of political righteousness. Stop asking each other for apologies, which will not be forthcoming from either side; learn to live with this reality. Let’s just move on based on the premise that the time for the continuation of the purge game is over because it is a dangerous game to play when the country is in dire need of civil interactions in the face of external pressures. This was not moral posturing; it was a plea for all to search for their pragmatic side.
These words can only be taken as serious advice if there is some movement on the front of reintegrating those who were purged because of the events of 2009, which will be a challenge for Rouhani. The ministerial confirmation of several former advisors to Mir Hossein Mousavi, who is still under house arrest, is a step in that direction. But it is not enough even if public tolerance for gradualism and moderation — and taking things slowly — seems relatively high at the moment.
Photo Credit: Amir Kholousi
]]>by Mohammad Ali Kadivar
In a historic letter to President Barack Obama, 55 Iranian political prisoners describe the effect of the crippling sanctions regime on the Iranian people and plead for a new approach to the nuclear issue. They write:
Mr. President! We believe it is time to replace sanctions [...]]]>
by Mohammad Ali Kadivar
In a historic letter to President Barack Obama, 55 Iranian political prisoners describe the effect of the crippling sanctions regime on the Iranian people and plead for a new approach to the nuclear issue. They write:
Mr. President! We believe it is time to replace sanctions with an effort to achieve a mutually acceptable resolution of the nuclear issue. To achieve such an end and given the chronic nature of the deep-rooted conflict, all sides concerned should strive for a dignified solution in which no party will be considered the loser. Such a solution should be based on genuinely addressing international concerns about Iran’s nuclear program by the Iranian government on the one hand and acknowledging the legitimate rights of Iran to peaceful nuclear energy, in compliance with international legal standards, by the US and the West on the other.
For the last four years, Iran’s political prisoners have operated as a visible and influential actor in a severely repressed political atmosphere. They are now becoming an important voice in Iranian foreign policy by sending messages to politicians in Tehran and Washington.
The letter’s cosigners are politicians, journalists and democracy activists who were imprisoned during and after the government’s crackdown on the 2009 uprising against the fraudulent re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The heavy-handed response suddenly increased the number of political prisoners in Iran to hundreds — at times even thousands. Many of them included prominent figures in Iran’s political and civil society.
In Iran, imprisonment operates as a conventional method of silencing political dissidents, but many of these prisoners continued their oppositional activities from the beginning of their sentences. What made this new round of prison activism more effective was the Iranian opposition movement’s strong Internet presence. When the Green Movement emerged in Iran, many analysts pointed to the activists’ innovative use of digital technology in initially organizing the electoral campaign and then publicizing information about protest events and regime atrocities.
The government’s crackdown attempted to stifle the public presence of Iran’s democracy movement, but the activists turned the Internet into an oppositional space. This included sharing updates about political prisoners’ situation and actions and spreading open letters smuggled from the prisons.
Sociologists refer to “abeyance structures” as spaces and communities through which social movements continue to exist in periods of repression and public inactivity. Ironically, prisons were a major abeyance structure for Iran’s Green Movement after the 2009 crackdown. During the years of the Green’s decline, Iranian prisoners sustained activity both through direct actions, such as hunger strikes, as well as adopting positions on issues through individual and collective open letters.
In addition to individual strikes against the abuse of prisoners’ rights, hunger strikes were also organized in solidarity with other prisoners and against regime atrocities conducted outside prison walls. In the most stunning example, 12 political prisoners went on hunger strike in 2011 after fellow prisoner Hoda Saber died after prison guards beat him while he was hunger striking against the tragic death of another activist on the outside, Haleh Sahabi. This collective action led to a burst of solidarity among Iranian dissidents inside Iran and among those in exile.
Prisoners also engaged in radical political positions in a country where political activists fear hosting meetings in their homes. In one of the boldest examples, political prisoner Abulfazl Ghadiani publicly accused Leader Ali Khamenei of despotism and compared him to Iran’s pre-revolutionary autocratic monarchs.
In other open letters, prisoners reflected on Iran’s political landscape and offered strategic analyses of Iranian politics and proposed courses of action. In discussions about boycotting or participating in the recent presidential election, Zia Nabavi, an exiled student sentenced to 10 years in prison, argued that Iran’s civil society needs active citizenry who won’t be easily discouraged by destructive authoritarian actions and will act with hope and rationality. He endorsed Hassan Rouhani in that letter and encouraged all democracy supporters to actively participate in the election. As with other letters by political prisoners, that letter became part of the pragmatic wave that resulted in Rouhani’s electoral victory.
During his campaign, Rouhani suggested his election could result in the release of political prisoners. That was one of the major demands that Rouhani’s supporters made during his electoral campaign and in celebrations of his victory. This will be one of the major tasks of the new president’s first term.
All these factors have provided political prisoners with a unique place in Iran’s political landscape. They are, after all, the people who have paid the highest price in fighting for freedom and equality for the Iranian people. A year before the election, Hamid Reza Jalaeipour, a prominent reformist sociologist, stated that political prisoners are even more important than reformist organizations. For all these reasons, the prisoners’ recent letter to President Obama contains significant ramifications for politicians in Washington and Tehran.
The message to Washington is clear. Regardless of whether the goal of sanctions or calls for military action is to empower the Iranian people, a suffering element of Iran’s democracy movement is stating that sanctions have been disempowering and should end.
Iran’s political prisoners are also teaching all of us an important lesson: one should not sacrifice the people’s wellbeing and interests for personal revenge. These prisoners had many reasons to ask for more sanctions on a government that has illegally imprisoned them for unjustifiable reasons, deprived them of their most basic rights and tortured them and their families. But they prioritized the Iranian peoples’ interests and asked both Iran and the US to engage in constructive diplomacy rather than blind hostility.
Let us hope that Iran’s leaders, especially Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, learn this lesson and facilitate the release of these prisoners while starting a new era in Iran’s foreign policy.
- Mohammad Ali Kadivar is a sociology PhD candidate and teaching fellow at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He studies global democratization and popular mobilization and writes about Iranian politics in Farsi and English.
Photo Credit: Nima Fatemi
]]>by Ali Reza Eshraghi
Nearly two weeks after Iran’s June 14 presidential election, there’s an unprecedented optimism in the air. Seemingly endless speculation is occurring on a daily basis about the make-up of president-elect Hassan Rouhani’s cabinet. At the same time, another debate is taking place over how Iran’s new government can [...]]]>
by Ali Reza Eshraghi
Nearly two weeks after Iran’s June 14 presidential election, there’s an unprecedented optimism in the air. Seemingly endless speculation is occurring on a daily basis about the make-up of president-elect Hassan Rouhani’s cabinet. At the same time, another debate is taking place over how Iran’s new government can be pressured to meet public demands without being rushed into radicalization.
Within this hopeful atmosphere, the fact that only a few weeks ago such a victory was unthinkable — it was, after all, only possible through a prudent marriage of convenience between idealism and realism — seems forgotten. Debunking this victory’s history will shed light on the birth of a new type of politicking in Iran.
What Happened
Pro-reform groups critical of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameni forced his allied security apparatus to play chess instead of engaging in a wrestling match. They won an unfair match in which they were not allowed to use their bishop and had lost many of their pawns.
Many analysts inside and outside the country did not expect Iran’s regime to honor the people’s vote. The Washington Post editorial board wrote with absolute certainty a few days before the election that Rouhani “will not be allowed to win.” Some mid-level reformist politicians who have left the country over the past four years even advocated against going to the polls — exemplifying just how much being away from Iran can impact your judgment. Pundits, excited by the Arab Spring, forecast that many would abstain from voting and that sooner or later Iran’s future would be decided on the streets.
Yet 72.7% of Iranians participated in this election. In Iran’s Kurdish regions, 60% of the population voted despite calls from Kurdish opposition parties to stay home.
How did such a victory happen? First and foremost, it was pressure from Iranian society that forced the opposition to participate in a game they could not even imagine winning. The 2013 election was a beautiful tango between popular and elitist politics. As the experience of the 2009 election showed, even Iran’s elites must be able to safely navigate their ship from the deep, undulating ocean of the people to the shallow, mine-filled port of the Iranian regime. According to Saeed Leylaz, a reformist economy expert, “ the regime exerted all the pressure it could so that we would throw the game.” Not only did groups critical of the Supreme Leader resist this pressure; for the first time they actually united. They also signaled that the king would not be checkmated if the game goes their way.
Some Recent History
Let’s begin with a cold Friday on March 2, 2012. Reformist Mohammad Khatami — Iran’s former president — travels to a small town 80 kilometers outside Tehran to quietly cast his vote in the 9th Majlis elections. At a time when the majority of Iran’s reformists had decided to ban the vote, Khatami’s participation made him the victim of harsh criticism and even bitter insults. But by voting he sent the message that despite his opposition, he would play inside the regime instead of voluntarily pulling out like a dissident and being at loggerheads with the whole system.
One year later, in March 2013, the reformist’s lower elites began mounting pressure on Khatami to run for president. But he cleverly refused, saying that “no matter the cost”, the regime would not allow him to run and such a move would only make the society more antagonized. Politics would also become more securitized by the regime, argued Khatami.
Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani — another former president who considers himself a centrist — was not so sure about the regime’s reaction to his own bid. At the last minute, he registered for candidacy.
The reformists welcomed his run. In the 10 days between his registration on May 11 to his disqualification by the Guardian Council on May 21, popular politics became reenergized. This concerned the regime. The experience of 2009 had shown that emotional build-up during the campaigning stage of an election could be more troublesome than the actual result. Rafsanjani was not surprised by his disqualification, but he did not expect it either; not every move by political actors is necessarily calculated.
But Rafsanjani remained true to his politically shrewd reputation. As Abbas Abdi, a renowned social analyst wrote, “Hashemi did not even change his tone and more interestingly he called for [the participation of people in the election to create] a political epic.”
Rafsanjani knew that objecting would only lead to his further marginalization in the political arena. By refusing to protest, he sent a message to Ayatollah Khamenei that he is not looking to radicalize public sentiments. The Supreme Leader received this message and in a public speech implicitly thanked Rafsanjani.
After Rafsanjani’s elimination, the reformists became more discouraged and confused. Two candidates close to them had passed through the Guardian Council’s filter but neither was ideal. Mohammadreza Aref , a vice president during Khatami’s term, was considered the most conservative in the reformist camp as he remained publicly silent during the post-election crackdowns in 2009. Rouhani — a former secretary of the Supreme National Security Council with close ties to Rafsanjani — was known as a centrist but had once condemned a February 14, 2011 Green Movement protest. Both these candidates had decided to run for the presidency without consensus from their political camps.
The Politics
From May 21 when Rafsanjani was disqualified until June 10 when Aref withdrew his bid, groups critical of the Supreme Leader experienced non-stop tension and doubt.
At the bottom, those who want change expected these groups to unite and use the opportunity afforded by the elections. At the top, three high-ranking figures from different political currents — reformist Khatami, centrist Rafsanjani and Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri, a former Majlis Speaker who’s considered a moderate principlist — were of the same opinion. But in the middle, confused politicians and political groups were in chaos and competition.
Eshaq Jahangiri, Rafsanjani’s campaign manager, speaks of a meeting on May 28 with Rafsnajani in which he asks reformists and moderate principlists to cooperate and unite to “change the course of the election.” Otherwise, “the radicals could throw the country into crisis by isolating all rationale figures.” A day before, the Reformists Consultative Council also had a meeting at Khatami’s office. But during that meeting the opinion of the majority of the reformists persisted: don’t participate.
The reformists were quickly faced with a bottom-up pressure that the body of society was exerting on them. As Abdi put it, “the principle of participating in the election was imposed on them by the people.”
Different surveys conducted before the election showed that about 60 to 70 percent of Iranians would participate in the elections. Forty-six members of the Reformists Consultative Council residing in the capital city of Tehran were especially facing pressure from their lower cohorts in the townships demanding a coalition between the two candidates. Ultimately, the periphery forced the center to surrender — the reformists must participate in the elections and they must form a coalition.
There was disagreement about the decision-making process. Some mid-rank reformists in the capital wanted to decide on the coalition-candidate behind closed doors. But the decision to consult public opinion ultimately persevered. “Just as in participating or banning the election the collective intellect of the people and Reformists in townships was accepted we must also refer to them on this issue,” said Ahmad Masjed-Jamei, a member of the council.
Ahead of the alliance that propelled him to victory, surveys showed that Rouhani, the candidate who was not affiliated with any reformist group, was more popular. Some reformists questioned the validity of the opinion poll. The process, which was supposed to result in the unity of progressive groups, was headed towards nasty party politics filled with rivalry and competition between mid-level elites lusting after extracting rents and getting public office in the next administration.
While the result of the final coalition headed by Khatami and Rafsanjani was supposed to be announced by Khatami’s Consultative Council, a number of reformist parties announced early endorsement of Aref to present Khatami’s council with a fait accompli. With public opinion still polling in favor of Rouhani on June 8, to reign in the competing reformist groups, the Consultative Council delayed announcing its official endorsement until late Monday night (June 10). On Tuesday, with only two more days of official campaigning left before the polls opened, Khatami and Rafsanjani announced their endorsement of Rouhani.
Aref withdrew his bid with displeasure and refused to officially endorse Rouhani. But this is not important. Despite the disagreements and rivalries, the political groups in Iran managed to ultimately reach a final and determining decision.
Rouhani’s Message
It is wrong to consider Rouhani’s victory the result of the endorsement of political groups, particularly the reformists. This 65-year-old cleric has years of experience in difficult domestic and foreign policy arenas and conflict resolution. He also had a hand in persuading the public to vote for him.
Building a constituency for Rouhani was difficult in this election. As I have written before, the regime had learned from the 2009 election and wanted to keep the streets clear of campaign carnivals and antagonism. It was only in the two final official days of campaigning that a bit of election fervor was displayed, though only in some parts of north Tehran. In such a restricted atmosphere, where the public is not given an opportunity to discuss and engage in political deliberation, Rouhani had to rely on his rhetoric to gather votes.
Aristotle called rhetoric “the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion.” Rouhani showed he is well capable of this. With his warm yet calm style of oratory stemming from the tradition of Shia-preaching, he reproduced almost everything that Mir-Hossein Mousavi — the 2009 candidate who is currently under house arrest — said and more.
Rouhani criticized the handling of the nuclear issue — “centrifuges can run [but only] if the country [can also be] run.” He stated he would end the securitized atmosphere [of the past four years], adding, “You who have brought this upon the country, the people don’t want you anymore.” He even promised to prepare the grounds so that “anyone who has fled the country for whatever reason can return.”
While stating the demands of the reformists in his election campaign, he also tried to give moderate principlists a place. A remark he made during one of the election debates became his representative anecdote for the public: “I am a jurist, I am not a colonel.”
At the same time, in one of his campaign videos, Rouhani quoted Hassan Firouzabadi — Commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces — who praised his “prudent yet ethical and friendly management” of the military during the 1980s Iran-Iraq war. He delivered his first campaign speech at Jamaran Husseiniyeh, a symbolic location used by Ayatollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic, to address the masses. But he also highlighted that for the past 24 years he has been Ayatollah Khamenei’s representative at the Supreme National Security Council.
The magic of elections in Iran is that candidates are forced to quickly upgrade and revise their vocabulary so that voters can identify their demands. But Rouhani touched upon what the people wanted while refraining from threatening the regime. His election symbol, a key — which according to his campaign aides was his own idea — meant just that. It signified to the public that closed doors would open to them while assuring the regime that he had no intention of breaking through locks.
This tactic enabled Rouhani to turn many principlist elites — whom he had dealt with for years — to support him and convince many others to remain silent instead of attacking him. In his trips to major Iranian cities like Ahvaz, Isfahan,and Rasht, the Friday Prayers leaders — who are the Supreme Leader’s representatives but can have different inclinations and opinions — met with him. High traffic websites like Alef and Khabaronline, which belong to the principlists, were silent on Rouhani and instead mainly criticized Saeed Jalili, the candidate who was most vocal about his allegiance to the Supreme Leader.
The regime’s hardliners tried their best to guide Rouhani towards radicalization; to find a pretext for repressing him. They arrested dozen of his young supporters and campaign staff. But instead of using this to boil over public emotions, Rouhani calmly began to negotiate their release.
In his campaign ads, Rouhani did not conceal the fact that for years, he was the man behind the curtain. Such a representation would have made voters run for the hills in the past two elections; Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won the 2005 election by implying that he would unveil secrets and out the regime’s backstage people. But this time the majority of the people voted for the man who gave them omid — hope that he would solve problems behind-the-curtain with tadbir — prudency.
In Persian culture, politics is likened to backgammon. Unlike chess, backgammon is a game of contingencies. The dice are thrown, but what’s important is that in every circumstance, the best and most suitable move is made to triumph over fortune. This is exactly what prudence means — it concerns the domain of probabilities.
Many have inquired about the conditions that created the possibility of such an unimaginable victory in Iran’s 2013 elections. Why didn’t the regime rig the vote? How were the ballots counted with such precision that Rouhani won with only 0.7% more than the 50% required for an outright victory when even minor tampering would force a second round? These are important questions. But it’s just as important that in the instant when there was a sudden opening, the prudent move was made by the pro-change groups. If they had decided not to play — that is, participate in the elections, form a coalition and at the same time calm the opponent — there would have been no victory. An unknown Quattrocento humanist once described prudence as a “faculty of judgment exemplary for civic life.” This election showed that civic life and politicking can not only function well in Iran; they also have a chance at succeeding.
– Ali Reza Eshraghi was a senior editor at several of Iran’s reformist dailies. He is the Iran Project Manager at the Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) and a teaching fellow in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
– Photo Credit: Mehdi Ghasemi
]]>by Gary Sick
With the surprising Iranian election over, and the moderate Hassan Rouhani elected by a clear majority, a new narrative is emerging. It asserts that absolutely nothing has changed, that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, let the election proceed for his own devious reasons, and that only he can [...]]]>
by Gary Sick
With the surprising Iranian election over, and the moderate Hassan Rouhani elected by a clear majority, a new narrative is emerging. It asserts that absolutely nothing has changed, that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, let the election proceed for his own devious reasons, and that only he can make decisions about Iran’s strategic policies, regardless of who is president.
This is a facile and self-serving argument. After Friday’s election, which reversed all predictions, those of us who watch Iran closely should ask ourselves whether the supreme leader is as supreme as he pretends.
Despite witticisms about “one man, one vote — and that one man is Khamenei,” I am willing to bet that the leader’s vote very early last Friday morning was not for the winning candidate. After all, Rouhani had argued for changes in how Iran deals with political prisoners and particularly its treatment of the former Green candidates who are languishing in house arrest. Those are Khamenei’s policies.
But it is not only the election. Just look at the record. Over the past 15 years, Iran has pursued a series of quite different negotiating strategies with the West: from a temporary suspension of enrichment under the new president-elect, to an on-again-off-again offer to compromise on 20 percent enrichment that resulted in a formal offer via Turkey and Brazil, then a full court stall and “resistance” strategy under the stewardship of the now-forgettable Saeed Jalili. The one constant during all these episodes was the unquestioned supremacy of one man.
This is the same man who reportedly mobilized Revolutionary Guard support for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2005 to avoid the threat of a new reformist surge. He then presided over the hasty coronation of the same man, under an even more immediate threat of reform, in 2009, proclaiming the results “divine.” He then turned around and began systematically stripping all powers from the recipient of that divine judgment, humiliating him and pondering openly the possibility of doing away entirely with the very office of the presidency. Eventually he came to view his divine choice as part of a “deviant current.”
Khamenei clearly wanted to avoid any turmoil in the 2013 election. He could have told Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani not to register for the election, but apparently he could not bring himself to do it. He then turned around and presided over the public dismissal of one of the most highly credentialed leaders of the revolution as unsuited to run, thereby making himself and the entire system look not only hypocritical but also hapless.
Then, the plan to get conservatives and Khamenei-intimates to consolidate around a single powerful candidate fell apart. Only one withdrew, and all the rest were left scrambling for what turned out to be a shrinking piece of the electoral pie. Instead, the reformists showed much more strategic discipline.
The national media was put to work, trying to take any controversy out of the race. Rouhani’s campaign statement was censored to remove any mention of an endorsement from that radical Rafsanjani. Reports of the surge of interest in Rouhani, which showed up in the excellent iPOS tracking polls, did not make it to the hinterland via the national media. Yet somehow, the word apparently got out to all corners of the realm. That casts some doubt on the blanket control that is supposed to characterize Khamenei and those around him.
Throughout all of this (and there is much more) Western observers persevered in attributing every twist and turn — however unlikely and unforeseeable — to the supremacy of Khamenei. It has become almost a parlor game: if you start with the certainty that everything that happens in Iranian politics and strategy is manipulated by one man, then you are left explaining why he should be behaving so strangely and often apparently contradicting his own best interests, time and again. The explanations get stretched to the point of meaninglessness, like a second-rate conspiracy theory. Our willingness to endow every one of Khamenei’s tergiversations with deep meaning reminds me of Talleyrand’s famous quip after one of his fellow negotiators suddenly died, “I wonder what he meant by that?”
Can we not finally admit that, if the man is truly supreme and exercising the degree of control that has been attributed to him, then he is either remarkably fickle or simply inept? His strategic judgment is deeply flawed, at least that is what the man (and woman) in the streets of Tehran said in so many words to foreign correspondents. They suggested that a lot of the blame for Iran’s present plight was the result of bad judgment and bad management.
The government is broken, and a lot of Iranians seem to know it. Iran is politically complicated, with factions, rivalries and deep disagreements. Reducing this to a one-man show may simplify analysis, but it provides a one-dimensional view of a three-dimensional process.
One of the most fascinating themes in Iranian presidential elections over the years has been the determination of the Iranian electorate to vote — strongly and enthusiastically — for the candidate who appeared to be farthest from the existing status quo. Sometimes the range of choice is quite narrow, but even a relatively unknown candidate (Mohammad Khatami, Ahmadinejad, and now Rouhani) can be propelled into the presidency by the mere appearance of challenging the nezam (system).
But the supreme leader and the nezam have one enormous trump card. They may be unable to persuade or inspire, but they can reject anything that challenges their own cozy circumstances. They are poor at initiating but powerful in their veto.
That, regrettably, is the supreme reality that Rouhani must now confront.
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