The Iranian crisis is not yet over 

The Iranian crisis is not yet over 

Context

The recent protests which spread around Iran in the waning days of 2017 and early 2018 represented the largest public display of discontent in Iran since the 2009 Green Movement

Reason behind the protest

Unlike the 2009 Green Movement, which was largely a product of the urban middle class youth in Tehran,

• The recent unrest in Iran seems to reflect the economic grievances of the lower and working classes, alienated from institutional politics and suffering heavily from the consequences of an unjust and unequal management of the Iranian economy
• As a result, these protests have been largely driven by disaffected young people in rural areas, towns and small cities who seized a pretext to express their frustrations with economic woes that are caused by Iran’s foreign policy, as the country has been largely involved in both the Syrian conflict and turmoil in Yemen

Evolutionary trend

The growing generational gap between the Islamic state and the Iranian youth, particularly young women, has never been wider. In the ‘last 25 years Iran has been on a course of major political and societal evolution, as the increasingly young population has become more educated, secular and rebellious’

A divided society

An ‘explosive mix of,

• Growing population
• Urbanisation
• An increasing unemployment rate and
• The rapid expansion of university education,

Led to new sociological actors in Iran who were essentially young and educated (and mostly women, in fact) but with no political, economic or social future

As a result, a generational gap divided Iranian society between moneymaking and powerful conservatives and young rebels without a cause

• Iran became a society divided between rich supporters of the regime and poor rebels with no ideology and no political leaders
• On one side are those who use power to make money, and on the other side are those who disobey the social and political order’

Aspirations of the youth

A large segment of the youth in Iran have access to ‘satellite television and the Internet and see how their counterparts in the rest of the world, particularly in the West, are living, and they long for the same lifestyle’

Against theocracy

It happens that Iranians remain unsurprisingly unreconciled to theocracy. Moreover, even when protests in Iran start over economic issues, as in the past few weeks, it seems that people are not just ‘demonstrating for better working conditions or pay, but insisting on wholesale rejection of the system itself’

• The widespread waves of protests that have swept Iran practically every ten years suggest the gradual meltdown of the theocratic ideology in Iran.

Failed promises

The Iranian government’s promises to revitalise the Iranian economy after the re-election of Mr.Rouhani as President must be seen against the rise of youth unemployment which stands today at more than 40%

• Also, those young Iranians who supported the nuclear deal of 2015 between the Rouhani cabinet and the Obama administration considered it as an ‘opportunity for Iranian civic actors to enable and empower Iran’s civil society space’.

Silence of the reformists

Strangely, the reformists were totally absent in leading or participating in the recent unrest in Iran. Iranian reformists, like former President Mohammad Khatami, could have provided leadership but decided to stay out of the action. Some have attributed the reformists’ reluctance to their fear of Iran turning into a new Syria, in other words, a war-torn country heading for “failed state” status and threatening the region’s fragile stability

This is certainly not what Saudi Arabia, Israel and Donald Trump’s America are looking for

Global political reaction

As a result, while the recent protests engulfed Iranian cities of all sizes and the country’s lower class population, the reaction among political leaders around the globe has been far from united

• While Mr. Trump endorsed the protests in Iran, advocating change, the European leaders along with Russia’s Vladimir Putin took a more cautious tone, pointing to the “unpredictable outcome” of the Arab Spring
• Even Saudi Arabia, Iran’s arch-enemy in the region, stayed unusually quiet

A worrying future

One way or another, both inside and outside Iran, observers are worried about the future. All this as Iran might be leading to a new period of political repression and economic hardship, while its population continues to grow, with few new jobs, and more international isolation. It looks like the Iranian crisis is not yet over.