Iran was my first experience of revolutionary violence. As a 12 and 13 year old I sat captivated in front of the TV set as ordinary citizens took to the streets in what seemed a thrilling expression of people power.
To a youngster it seemed a simple story; the public didn’t like an corrupt old king who had failed to use the country’s oil wealth for their betterment.
So, they were throwing him out and replacing him with his fiercest critic, an old guy with a beard who promised justice for the poor.
It seemed fair enough. Replace a tyrant with justice and the chances are you will end up with a better society. But even in 1979, from western eyes at least, it seemed an odd manifestation of a socially-progressive change in the way things worked.
For a start the old guy with the beard was a religious leader and he was creating a theocratic state based on a code of law and governance that harked back to the middle ages, if not before that. To us, it still seems a strange choice for a society to make; reject the new and make way for the old.
But that was to take a secularist approach to history. It ignored the fact that Iran had a high number of pious poor people who perhaps welcomed the certainty that rule by religious fundamentalists brought.
And there now seems no doubt that amongst the educated, more prosperous part of society there was an element of nationalism at play. At a time of Cold War tensions Iran could have swung to the left amid the melting pot of revolutionary fervour. Left-wing groups were involved on the streets in the overthrow of the Shah and perhaps fancied their chances of a secularist, nationalist, left-leaning nation either non-alligned or maybe even a Soviet client state.
But that didn’t happen. Largely because there was little popular support for it. That in turn seems to have been guided by the intermingling of nationalism and religion.
Iran is one of the very few Muslim countries with an overwhelmingly Shia majority. That sense of difference, not just from the western values of Socialism, but also of ‘otherness’ from Sunni countries may have helped convince many of the need not just for a revolution to topple a tyrant, but for a specific ‘Iranian’ type of revolution.
Perhaps. Maybe it was because Ayatollah Khomeini was simply the most prominent, long-standing critic of the Shah. The opponent with the loudest voice and who shouts the longest has the best chance of convincing people of his ideas. You can’t rule out, as well, that his ideas also convinced some within the ruling clique, most crucially sections of the military.
Once you have a revolution, though, you have to sustain it and history tells us the easiest way is through war. Saddam Hussein was largely to blame for the nine year Iran-Iraq conflict. It was a kind of hell for both nations but Iran used it to build its revolutionary creed, entrench an autocratic, theocracy and, in the minds of many, create an image of a united nation-state able to defeat a more powerful neighbour.
The revolution was a success, the war was a kind of success, and Iran, at huge cost, had some reason to feel good about itself. But the power invested in the revolutionary ideals must have suffered a shock with Khomeni’s death.
Crucially, before the old man died, a succession was sorted out. But since then the power struggle has been for the heart of the revolution, played out between conservatives and reformers.
The former always seem to have the upper hand simply because the architecture of state, put in place by Khomeini before his death, gives the religious leaders, not the political ones, all the real power.
Hence the recent election and its aftermath has a crucial subtext; politicians in Iran are elected but have limited power to direct policy. They can’t even stand for office unless they have first been approved by the religious leaders. Mir Hossein Mousavi claims he lost the election fraudulently and his supporters have taken to the streets. He is the ‘leader’ of this new revolution, according to western analysis, but he is an establishment figure.
His supporters shout ‘Death to the dictator’ but they don’t mean Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, the man who ‘won’ the election. Instead they want the head of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, because he’s the guy that runs the place; the President is merely his puppet.
There seems little doubt that is what has precipitated this whole crisis. Khameini took one look at the way the semi-democratic wind was blowing and didn’t like what he saw. He would much rather have someone in his own image as the political figurehead.
Which raises the question of what a Mousavi presidency would be like. Some Iranians liked the idea of greater freedom of expression and a more liberal social environment their man was promising. There are some too who weary of all the confrontation with the west and with Israel. But they voted for Mohammed Khatami in 1997 with similar hopes in their heart and got very little in return because he lacked the powerbase and, ultimately, the determination to force his reforms to a conclusion in the face of likely opposition from the religious elite.
Even if they get their wish of a new election and Mousavi wins what are the chances that they will get what they want ? Will they end up disappointed and the Islamic revolution still unwilling to give them the real change they so evidently want ?
That is why the protestors now have to decide what to do next. They have been told by the Supreme Leader to pack up and go home. In effect, he’s saying the party’s over, I’m still in charge, things aren’t going to change so you can like it or lump it.
By continuing the protests they change their meaning. At the outset there was anger at apparent election fraud. Now the state has laid its cards on the table as far as that one goes, the next step from there is an open challenge to the regime itself.
From an appeal to get the ‘right’ President inside the existing framework of the Islamic Republic the only way forward is either to challenge that framework or to challenge the existence of the right of the religious leaders to rule at all.
If they want to end the Islamic Republic then it would appear they need new leaders because Mousavi is not really their man. And, after all, why would someone who had invested so much time and effort in setting up and sustaining the theocratic state want to pull it all down ?
But his response to the intransigence of Khameini and the apparatus of state repression will be crucial. His apparent claim to favour ‘martyrdom’ suggests militancy but he still appears to be a man willing to work within the system. He will accept compromise, that’s for sure, especially if more people within the establishment come over to his way of thinking and more politicial pressure ensues on the clerics. And it seems the majority of those in green would probably settle for the same and go home.
However, those out battling the riot police have moved their own goalposts. The Twitterers are starting to call for freedom. What does that mean, other than the end of the old regime? But they lack one crucial aspect, real leadership. Which, in turn, tends to suggest talk of a 1979 regime-change scenario is unlikely. Those who would use the protests to overturn the revolution have no Khomeini and will flounder without one.
The best outcome for the greens ? More politicians back Mousavi and some limited reforms are introduced. The worst case would be intransigence on both sides and more deaths. With the outside world unwilling to interfere until the dust settles on the internal wrangling it could be more of the latter than the former.
To a youngster it seemed a simple story; the public didn’t like an corrupt old king who had failed to use the country’s oil wealth for their betterment.
So, they were throwing him out and replacing him with his fiercest critic, an old guy with a beard who promised justice for the poor.
It seemed fair enough. Replace a tyrant with justice and the chances are you will end up with a better society. But even in 1979, from western eyes at least, it seemed an odd manifestation of a socially-progressive change in the way things worked.
For a start the old guy with the beard was a religious leader and he was creating a theocratic state based on a code of law and governance that harked back to the middle ages, if not before that. To us, it still seems a strange choice for a society to make; reject the new and make way for the old.
But that was to take a secularist approach to history. It ignored the fact that Iran had a high number of pious poor people who perhaps welcomed the certainty that rule by religious fundamentalists brought.
And there now seems no doubt that amongst the educated, more prosperous part of society there was an element of nationalism at play. At a time of Cold War tensions Iran could have swung to the left amid the melting pot of revolutionary fervour. Left-wing groups were involved on the streets in the overthrow of the Shah and perhaps fancied their chances of a secularist, nationalist, left-leaning nation either non-alligned or maybe even a Soviet client state.
But that didn’t happen. Largely because there was little popular support for it. That in turn seems to have been guided by the intermingling of nationalism and religion.
Iran is one of the very few Muslim countries with an overwhelmingly Shia majority. That sense of difference, not just from the western values of Socialism, but also of ‘otherness’ from Sunni countries may have helped convince many of the need not just for a revolution to topple a tyrant, but for a specific ‘Iranian’ type of revolution.
Perhaps. Maybe it was because Ayatollah Khomeini was simply the most prominent, long-standing critic of the Shah. The opponent with the loudest voice and who shouts the longest has the best chance of convincing people of his ideas. You can’t rule out, as well, that his ideas also convinced some within the ruling clique, most crucially sections of the military.
Once you have a revolution, though, you have to sustain it and history tells us the easiest way is through war. Saddam Hussein was largely to blame for the nine year Iran-Iraq conflict. It was a kind of hell for both nations but Iran used it to build its revolutionary creed, entrench an autocratic, theocracy and, in the minds of many, create an image of a united nation-state able to defeat a more powerful neighbour.
The revolution was a success, the war was a kind of success, and Iran, at huge cost, had some reason to feel good about itself. But the power invested in the revolutionary ideals must have suffered a shock with Khomeni’s death.
Crucially, before the old man died, a succession was sorted out. But since then the power struggle has been for the heart of the revolution, played out between conservatives and reformers.
The former always seem to have the upper hand simply because the architecture of state, put in place by Khomeini before his death, gives the religious leaders, not the political ones, all the real power.
Hence the recent election and its aftermath has a crucial subtext; politicians in Iran are elected but have limited power to direct policy. They can’t even stand for office unless they have first been approved by the religious leaders. Mir Hossein Mousavi claims he lost the election fraudulently and his supporters have taken to the streets. He is the ‘leader’ of this new revolution, according to western analysis, but he is an establishment figure.
His supporters shout ‘Death to the dictator’ but they don’t mean Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, the man who ‘won’ the election. Instead they want the head of the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, because he’s the guy that runs the place; the President is merely his puppet.
There seems little doubt that is what has precipitated this whole crisis. Khameini took one look at the way the semi-democratic wind was blowing and didn’t like what he saw. He would much rather have someone in his own image as the political figurehead.
Which raises the question of what a Mousavi presidency would be like. Some Iranians liked the idea of greater freedom of expression and a more liberal social environment their man was promising. There are some too who weary of all the confrontation with the west and with Israel. But they voted for Mohammed Khatami in 1997 with similar hopes in their heart and got very little in return because he lacked the powerbase and, ultimately, the determination to force his reforms to a conclusion in the face of likely opposition from the religious elite.
Even if they get their wish of a new election and Mousavi wins what are the chances that they will get what they want ? Will they end up disappointed and the Islamic revolution still unwilling to give them the real change they so evidently want ?
That is why the protestors now have to decide what to do next. They have been told by the Supreme Leader to pack up and go home. In effect, he’s saying the party’s over, I’m still in charge, things aren’t going to change so you can like it or lump it.
By continuing the protests they change their meaning. At the outset there was anger at apparent election fraud. Now the state has laid its cards on the table as far as that one goes, the next step from there is an open challenge to the regime itself.
From an appeal to get the ‘right’ President inside the existing framework of the Islamic Republic the only way forward is either to challenge that framework or to challenge the existence of the right of the religious leaders to rule at all.
If they want to end the Islamic Republic then it would appear they need new leaders because Mousavi is not really their man. And, after all, why would someone who had invested so much time and effort in setting up and sustaining the theocratic state want to pull it all down ?
But his response to the intransigence of Khameini and the apparatus of state repression will be crucial. His apparent claim to favour ‘martyrdom’ suggests militancy but he still appears to be a man willing to work within the system. He will accept compromise, that’s for sure, especially if more people within the establishment come over to his way of thinking and more politicial pressure ensues on the clerics. And it seems the majority of those in green would probably settle for the same and go home.
However, those out battling the riot police have moved their own goalposts. The Twitterers are starting to call for freedom. What does that mean, other than the end of the old regime? But they lack one crucial aspect, real leadership. Which, in turn, tends to suggest talk of a 1979 regime-change scenario is unlikely. Those who would use the protests to overturn the revolution have no Khomeini and will flounder without one.
The best outcome for the greens ? More politicians back Mousavi and some limited reforms are introduced. The worst case would be intransigence on both sides and more deaths. With the outside world unwilling to interfere until the dust settles on the internal wrangling it could be more of the latter than the former.
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