The Political Future of the Reformists in Iran

The recent presidential election and its aftermath have presented a great challenge for the reformist movement in Iran. The main question now is: what does the future hold for   this movement? To answer this question, we must first review some of the reformists’ assumptions.

Over a decade of political activity, reformists in Iran consistently relied on five theoretical and practical principles as their main assumptions. These assumptions are as follows:

1.  A pledge to the survival of the Islamic Republic as a preferred political regime over other systems.

2. A pledge to the political legitimacy of Ayatollah Khamenei as the Supreme Leader (Vali-e Faqih)

3. Existence of relative wisdom in the political deeds of the Leader

4. Possibility of having relatively democratic elections (after the approval process of the nominees)

5. The reformists’ ability to improve the social and political structures after gaining power

These assumptions are restructured and organized in a give and take system based on bilateral advantages. In other words, the underlying thoughts in these assumptions are: by giving the first two privileges to the regime, a pledge to the survival of the Islamic Republic and of the political legitimacy of the Leader, it would be conceivable to enjoy the benefits of the last three, the existence of a relative wisdom in the political acts of the Leader, the existence of a somewhat democratic election and the ability to improve the structures.

But the recent presidential election and the government’s ensuing actions proved this exchange system inefficient and unilateral. The Leader’s strong affirmation of the election coup d’etat was an indication that even a relative rationality is not present in his political acts and the existence of any degree of democracy in the election is only an illusion. The last assumption of the reformists which is their ability to improve the structures after gaining power had already been proven wrong during the presidency of Mohammad Khatami. 

Now that it is quite obvious the reformists are not receiving any advantage in exchange for those they grant, the question is what their position will be toward the regime from now on?

First, some time after the election, after the detainees are released and all hope to attain the goals pursued through the election protests are abandoned, the reformists would intentionally forget everything and deny the invalidity of their own assumptions. If this happens, the reformists despite the experience of the 2009 election will go back to the stance they had before the election and seek to solve the country’s problems by participating in the next election. The justification the reformists may use for this strategy would be that the regime cannot afford the risk of another election coup d’etat and widespread rigging.

Second, the reformists only accept the invalidity of the last three assumptions, but remain committed to the political legitimacy of the Leader (and naturally the survival of the Islamic Republic regime). This means that the reformists, while admitting lack of relative wisdom in the Leader’s political acts, the impossibility of having a fairly free election and lack of any chance to improve the fundamentals, still consider the Leader legitimate (even though forcibly). The natural outcome of this choice is becoming politically inactive and abandoning the political arena.

Third, as a consequence of the behavior of the regime after the election, the reformists discard not only the first three assumptions, but also their pledge to the political legitimacy of the Leader, but maintain their belief in the superiority of a government based on religion over other alternatives. In this case they will change into the regime’s inside opposition and will have a political destiny similar to that of Ayatollah Montazeri and others who questioned the leadership of Ayatollah Khamenei. Consequently, even if the reformists are politically active, they will have no chance to get involved in a political match.

Fourth, the reformists abandon their fist assumption and their pledge to the Islamic Republic and after all the recent events come to the conclusion that this regime is beyond reform and the only salvation for the people and the country is replacing a religious government with a secular one. In this case, the reformists will evolve into the regime’s outside opposition and their future will hold prosecution, imprisonment, or exile from the country.

The decision of the reformists to go with any of the above choices requires re-organization after emerging from the present crisis. It is expected that in this process, some may diverge and some may come together.