Democracy in Iran

R. Jahanbegloo

• Editorial: Palgrave Pivot
• Año: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781137330178
• Categoría: Law
• Categoría: Civil Rights in Law

Democratic government is something that has eluded Iran despite a series of non-violent revolutions aimed at establishing a system of governance that would promote both public freedom and political accountability. This explores the obstacles to the growth of democracy in Iran and posits a plan for non-violent action to help Iranians achieve it.

Part I

Iran: The Anguished Odyssey of Democracy

1

Iran: A Century of Undemocratic Violence

Abstract: The history of 20th century Iran is dominated by reoccurring episodes of civic struggles in the face of three successive authoritarian regimes – Qajar, Pahlavi and the Islamic Republic. This century also saw two defining moments in Iranian history: the Constitutional Revolution 1906 and the Islamic Revolution of 1979. Although these revolutions were preceded by violent and nondemocratic regimes, they created positive and concrete consequences. The first revolution was significant because it ushered in a protracted period of modernization, culminating in the implementation of liberal reforms. And while the Islamic Revolution has seen an unprecedented centralization of the state, it has led to the strengthening of civil society, opening the door for viable democratic movements.

Jahanbegloo, Ramin. Democracy in Iran. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. DOI: 10.1057/9781137330178.

Much of the contemporary history of Iran is the story of clashes between aspirations for freedom and obstacles to democracy. Starting from Iran’s 1906 Constitutional Revolution to the Islamic Revolution of 1979, contemporary Iranian politics has been the scene of multiple sociopolitical efforts and civic struggles to place limits on the despotic sovereignties of the Qajar and Pahlavi dynasties. The goal of each of these two revolutions was to limit state authority and assure political liberties enshrined in law. However, in both cases, popular aspirations for democracy, social justice and the rule of law were obstructed by the enduring violence of traditionalism and authoritarianism inscribed in the political structures of Iran and Iranian political culture. This said, despite the short and momentary successes of nonviolent actions in contemporary Iran, there has been a permanent subjection of the Iranian civic actors to the systematic and oppressive violence of the political establishment. From the second half of the 19th century until the present day, members of the Iranian elite, a certain number of Iranian guilds and merchants and dissident elements of the Iranian Shi’ite clergy, have been constantly in conflict with various political regimes in power. The authoritarian character of the three Iranian successive regimes – Qajar, Pahlavi and Islamic Republic – pushed different categories of Iranian society to look for diverse strategies of resistance in order to find freedom and security. Though the ideas of reform and modernity started in late-19th century Iran among the aristocratic and elite classes, it gradually extended to other social classes, who became familiar with the West and were interested in entering the public sphere. That is to say, the intellectual encounters with the West, which started with the first efforts of the Qajar prince Abbas Mirza to modernize the Iranian army and the policy of centralization and rationalization of the state bureaucracy inaugurated and pursued by Naser ad-Din Shah’s prime minister, Mirza Taqi Khan Amir Kabir after the military defeats of Persia at Russian hands in 1812 and 1828, made their ways from the upper classes to ordinary civic actors in Iran who acclaimed and accepted the modern idea of a constitutional government in 1906. Moreover, the awareness of the need for a less cruel and more just political system came through the Iranian public sphere itself. The spreading of ideas such as “moderation” (itidal) which became a popular concept helped a new era of political culture to emerge in Iran. However, this advent of nonviolent and moderate political vocabulary in Iranian public sphere was accompanied by the growth of authoritarianism and its onslaught against civil society.

In general, next and in opposition to grass-roots democratic and nonviolent experiences in Iran, it is possible to identify different phases of violent state-domination throughout the 20th century. This political domination was not a natural process of Iranian society, but a top-down project ordered and applied by different authoritarian regimes in Iran. The peripheralization of the Iranian society as a result of Iran’s dangerous and uncertain buffer-state position between imperial Russia and British Empire led to three experiences of authoritarian state formation from above. The first time was between 1921 and 1941 under Reza Shah which was essentially marked by the establishment of a modernist state. The second attempt occurred during the reign of Mohammad Reza Shah, between 1953 and 1977, and manifested itself as a techno-bureaucratic program that included land reform, industrialization, and royal-patrimonial rule. The third experience from 1979 to the present day is illustrated by a theocratic and clan-oriented regime which has systematically abolished secular criteria and promoted Islamic fundamentalist values in Iran. As a matter of fact in three cases, but more especially in the latter, the governing class based its ideological project on the violent apparatus of the authoritarian state in order to usher in a modernization process from above. As a result from 1921 to 2011 the Iranian society shifted from a tribalist and rural order to a more urban and middle class structure. But rapid urbanization and the development of urban workers and the middle class in Iran happened without fundamental changes in the nature of the political system. Paradoxically, the royal-nationalist projects of the first and second Pahlavi regimes and the revolutionary Islamic political ideology of the present Iranian theocracy each created a vacuum which was filled by Iranian civil society and its sociological actors. In the case of Iran, civil society can be described as a voluntary zone of societal interconnectedness separate from the structures of state and family and containing a wide variety of cultural associations, advocacy groups, labor unions, ethnic associations, student groups, women’s right movements, intellectual spheres and alternative youth circles. Though nonviolent initiatives have often been related to civil society development in Iran, the nature of modernization itself and the centralization of the Iranian state has been a way of strengthening the erratic movement of the Iranian civil society. As such, despite the fact that it gives an impression of instability and uncertainty, the evolution of the Iranian state-society relations in the past 80 years has created real opportunities for inaugurating a viable democratic movement. The development of nonviolent ideals and principles and the expansion of civil rights, occur not overnight but over decades. Historically, Iranian society’s experiences with democracy have been intense and widespread. Revolutionary upheavals, urban riots, anti-government guerilla insurgencies, coup d’états, state oppression have had enduring impacts on the Iranian society. These events, along with the gradual transformation of Iranian civil society have reshaped the foundation of Iran’s political culture. Thus the roots of today’s nonviolent public initiatives in Iran can be found in the increasing disenchantment of various sections of Iranian society like intellectuals, youth and women groups with the palpable political handicaps and moral weaknesses of successive ailing states in contemporary Iran.

Twentieth-century Iran started with one revolution and ended with another. Those who hailed the Constitutional Revolution of 1906 and were inspired by its republican ideals found themselves a decade later confronted with political disappointment and disintegration of Iran. The coup of February 21, 1921 which brought Reza Khan, the commander of the Cossack Brigade, to power put an end to the post–World War I chaotic environment in Iran. “Critics of the Pahlavi state and Reza Khan in particular argue that he was the solution to Britain’s problems in Iran after the failure of the Anglo-Persian Agreement and Britain’s need for strong government in Iran.”¹ While in retrospect Reza Khan’s rise to power may appear to some as a British conspiracy, it certainly was confirmation of a savior to Iranian nationalists and especially the secular elites. As such, “In the early years of Reza Khan’s rise to power, he was seen as a modernizing reformer who could give Iran national unity and restore the country’s pride and independence. The reformist intelligentsia rallied behind Reza Khan, perceiving him as a stabilizing, nationalist force.”² Nationalism and state centralization went hand in hand during Reza Shah’s reign. Drawing on the necessity of Iran’s discovery of its classical past, the ideological and political manifestations of Iranian nationalism were articulated within the formation of a modern nation-state and through loyalty to traditional monarchy. As pointed out by two Iranian political historians “It is important to note that Reza Khan’s emphasis on institution-building was able to gain support because it evoked memories of the state among the Iranian people. The legacy of monarchical rule in Iran dating back to the Safavid period (1501–1722) had given Iranians a keen sense of the rights and duties of central authority, as well as the style and language of government. Reza Khan’s promise of a modern state would resonate with a broad segment of the Iranian population through this memory ... .”³ But Reza Shah’s national project for reconstruction of Iran produced at the same time a strong modernizing impetus which distanced itself from aristocratic and religious institutions. It especially found allies among secular elites and reformers like Mohammad Ali Foroughi, Ali Akbar Davar and Abdul Hussein Teymourtache, who accepted to help Reza Shah with his project of modern state-building. Foroughi belonged to a generation of Iranian intellectuals, who, thanks to the Constitutional Revolution of 1906, were able to participate more actively in the political life of the country. The hope and goal of Foroughi was to create suitable conditions for the implementation of modern and liberal principles in Iran, by concentrating his efforts on “reforms from above.” Like most of the modernist intellectuals of his generation, Foroughi considered Reza Shah as the charismatic leader who would put an end to the chaotic situation of post–World War I Iran. To realize such an aim, Foroughi supported the extensive program of reform instituted by Reza Shah during his two premierships. Yet Foroughi’s political career started many years before Reza Shah’s rise to power, with the foundation of the first official Freemason’s lodge in Iran in 1908, called “Le Reveil de l’Iran,” where he held the rank of Grand Master. For Foroughi, as for Mirza Malkum Khan before him, freemasonry was an institution dedicated to striving to spread ideals of modernity in Iran through universalization and promotion of Western principles of freedom, education and secularism. Foroughi’s defense of liberal values and ideals was closely related to his empathy for the philosophical norms of the Western civilization. It is worth mentioning here that Foroughi, while being a fabulous commentator of the Persian literary heritage, was also an attentive reader of the works of Plato and Aristotle. In 1922 Foroughi published his most famous and celebrated philosophical work entitled Seyr-e Hekmat Dar Urupa (The Course of Philosophy in Europe). When Foroughi started this book, he had intended it to be a translation of Rene Descartes’ Discours de la Methode, but after translating this work into Persian he realized that this treatise would not be complete unless proper attention was given to the philosophical developments prior to the time of Descartes. Therefore, he included a long introduction in which he briefly discussed the historical development of philosophy beginning in ancient Greece and going up to the time of Descartes. The 1941 edition of this book saw a considerable expansion containing the historical development of philosophy in Europe starting in the beginning of the 19th century and ending in the early 20th century.

Foroughi’s interest in Descartes as the founding father of modern philosophy and a great philosopher of subjectivity was not without any reason. For Foroughi, Descartes was the initiator of the Enlightenment and to him the Enlightenment meant essentially ridding human individuals from self-imposed bondage to authority and conferring on each individual the responsibility to make personally informed judgments. In Foroughi’s mind the Enlightenment was supposed to emancipate mankind and autonomy as opposed to authority and was to be the hallmark of a new culture. According to Foroughi, in order for the Enlightenment to prevail in Iran two conditions must come together. Not only is it necessary that the constraining forces in society should be introduced in the shape of institutions, but also it is necessary that other types of institutions should be introduced to oversee, as well as improve, the performances of the former type of institutions. Together, these furnish the sufficient condition for the establishment and maintenance of equilibrium in a political society, thus laying the ground for the ideals of the Enlightenment to flourish. What comes across Foroughi’s writings is an absolute belief in the idea of progress and a discussion on the separation of powers and the rights of the people under a liberal constitution. First and foremost in Foroughi’s thought is the idea of inevitability of progress and the fact that progress in the West has been entirely responsible for a liberal re-organization of the social, economic and political spheres. The secret of this re-organization, which in Foroughi’s opinion is the main cause of Western civilization’s scientific and technological advances and achievements, lies in devising a system for administration in every field that is based on an evolutionary process. It is clear that Foroughi’s main goal was to introduce the Iranian youth to modern rationality and to make them think about their own peripheral destiny. In fact, it seems that intellectuals such as Foroughi hoped to bring about the necessary reforms in Iran by educating Iranian youth to the philosophical outlook of modernity founded on a wide range of knowledge on politics, economics, science and culture. Foroughi knew perfectly that modernity began with the emphasis on reason and the philosophical self-assertion of the subject.

Liberal and reformist intellectuals like Foroughi presented the intellectual capital behind Reza Shah’s brute force. But what made their position increasingly untenable in the new Pahlavi state were not only the inordinately suspicious nature of the Shah, which caused him to mistrust his close ...