Life and liberty
Political culture and regime change in Iran
Masoud Kazemzadeh and Shahla Azizi
April 25, 2005
iranian.com
One of the most vexing questions animating observers
and analysts of Iranian politics is: why despite being extremely
unpopular and incompetent, are the fundamentalists still in power?
One factor that may provide a partial explanation is the huge change
of the dominant ethos among large sectors of the population.
In
the 1970s and 1980s, the dominant ethos among large sectors of
the Iranian people was idealistic, altruistic, and celebrated
sacrifice for the greater good. Today, on the contrary, the predominant
ethos have become excessive selfishness, acquisitiveness, cynicism,
and lack of willingness to make the smallest sacrifice to protect
the common good. This pendulum-like swing from one extreme to
the other has a deleterious impact on the outcome of political
struggles
in Iran. If this observation is correct, although the overwhelming
majority of Iranians are opposed to the ruling Islamic fundamentalist
regime, the vast majority are unwilling to pay the price of replacing
it.
Anecdotal and statistical evidence of the alienation
of the youth from the fundamentalist regime are overwhelming. For
example,
a
government conducted survey revealed that 86 percent of the youth
say that they do not perform the obligatory daily Islamic prayer.
In early 2003 a large Internet poll of students of the Amir Kabir
University (the second most prestigious university in Iran) was
conducted. Only 6 percent of the students said that they support
the hardliners, while another 4 percent said they support the
reformists within the regime. A mere 5 percent said they support
the return
of the former monarchy. Most significantly, 85 percent of the
students said that they would support the establishment of a secular
and
democratic republic. Why then out of two million students at
institutions of higher education, would only a few thousand participate
in pro-democracy
sit-ins and protests?
In a large survey of 15 to 29 year-olds published
in January of this year, some interesting data have been released.
The survey
entitled “The Values and Opinions of the 15-29 Year Old Youth,” revealed
that 59 percent of male and 57 percent of female respondents said “each
person should think only of oneself.” To the question on “are
people honest and forthright in public,” 79 percent of
males and 82 percent of females responded “no.” And
50.4 percent of males and 39 percent of females said that they “would
welcome the opportunity to emigrate abroad.”
This is the generation
that was petrified under the rains of scud missiles and aerial
bombardment during the eight-year war with
Iraq, and survived Khomeini’s reign of terror where possession
of banned materials resulted in summary trials and mass executions,
and humiliated and lashed for infractions of the fundamentalists’ puritanical
dictates. Monopolization of all levers of power by fundamentalist
clerics, incredible financial corruption by clerical officials
and their children, brutal suppression of dissents, cultural suffocation,
severe economic difficulties, astronomical rise in crime, addiction,
and prostitution have undermined the sense of common purpose and
common good.
For the overwhelming majority in this generation,
personal survival trumps any notion of personal sacrifice for the
common
good. Thus
in just one generation cynicism has replaced idealism among vast
majority of the population. Economic hardships and lack of freedom
have resulted in a mixture of materialism and individualism --
of coveting a Western life-style as seen on satellite television
and
of believing that it can be achieved only on a personal rather
a societal level. It is easier to imagine that you can move to
the West and dress like Brittany Spears than it is to believe that
everyone can one day be like her here in Iran.
The rise of Khatami and reformist
fundamentalists raised expectations that were quickly dashed,
thus dramatically increasing both frustration
and hopelessness. The inability of the once-popular President
Khatami to implement any real change has greatly disillusioned
the more
than seventy percent of the electorate who voted for him. Today,
his promise to create a more open and secular society is perceived
to have been nothing but a ploy to prolong the fundamentalist
theocrats in power. He is seen by many in Iran at best as a powerless
and
incompetent idealist and at worst as a sweet talking cleric propped
up to deceive the malcontent inside and critics abroad. The failure
of the reformist faction of the fundamentalists to maintain their
hold onto Majles in February 2004 elections, underlined their
inability to be regarded in public opinion as viable vehicle for
change. The
fundamentalist regime has lost its ideological hegemony and political
legitimacy, but not its ability to coerce and intimidate
into submission. In addition, due to the enormous revenues from
the sale of oil and natural gas, the regime is able not only
to keep its small social base content but also to co-opt a few
non-fundamentalists.
While a few brave pro-democracy activists and students continue
to struggle against the regime, for now at least, the overwhelming
majority of the population sits on the sidelines wishing them
well but is unwilling to risk life and liberty to replace the incumbent
tyranny with a secular and democratic republic that they obviously
desire. Many so infected with bizarre conspiracy theories, argue
that the British have put the clerics on power and only the American
can take them down. This renders any active participation superfluous
because it is not the actions of Iranians themselves that changes
regimes but rather James-Bond-like schemes behind the scenes.
Has
apathy become a feature of Iranian political culture for the
foreseeable future or is there a revolution brewing? The
answer
is not clear but we see several possibilities. One possibility
is that Iranians have lost the will to confront their oppressors
and instead wish to engage purely in self-improvements devoid
of any broader considerations. The incredible brutality of
the regime
combined with the now-prevailing ethos have reduced the possibilities
of nonviolent transition to democracy as have occurred recently
in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan.
Another possibility is that while apathy may be the outward
appearance, there is a cumulation of repressed anger, which
may explode by
a trigger. A potential trigger may be an outrageous act by
regime elements as occurred in Lebanon by the assassination
of former
Prime Minister Rafiq al-Hariri. Another trigger may be American
military attacks on fundamentalist coercive apparatuses such
as Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, Basij corps, Ansar-e
Hezbollah vigilantes, Ministry of Intelligence headquarters,
and the like.
We do not believe that any military strikes on the
nuclear facilities would serve as a trigger for mass uprising as
some
have argued
in Washington. The reasons being that with coercive apparatuses
being intact, they have not only the power to crush any uprising,
but also the added motivation and anger to do so. Iranians
are angry at the coercive apparatuses for having oppressed
and repressed
them for so long but not at any inanimate nuclear facility. Another
trigger may be UN Security Council economic sanctions, which
may lead to runs on the banks, food stores, events that would put
the
masses in confrontation with the coercive apparatuses. If the
coercive apparatuses did not open fire on the masses, then that
would encourage
more valiant rioting and burning of government autos and buildings
cascading out of control. If the coercive apparatuses did open
fire on the masses, then that may increase responses by the masses
on such a scale that the regime would not be able to control
and contain. The UN Security Council international sanctions modeled
after those imposed on the Apartheid regime in South Africa and
Burmese dictatorship may be the least violent way to replace
the
ruling fundamentalists with a secular and democratic republic
that Iranians so wish.
Iran’s future looks grim in all of these
possibilities. Time will tell which one would be the actual history.
About
Masoud Kazemzadeh
is Associate Professor of Political Science at Utah Valley State
College. He is the author of Islamic
Fundamentalism, Feminism, and Gender Inequality in Iran Under Khomeini (Lanham,
MD: University Press of America, 2002), and The Bush Doctrine and
Iran: Alternative Scenarios and Consequences (forthcoming). Shahla
Azizi is the pen name of an essayist and pro-democracy activist.
She lives in Tehran.
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