Ongoing tensions among the ruling elite are an inseparable part of the story of the unrests taking place today. In fact, it is believed that the protests were initially organized by Rouhani’s conservative rivals in the city of Mashhad. What was expected to be the conservatives’ signal to Rouhani (perhaps an intimidation) escalated into widespread protests and morphed into an anti-regime demonstration. It is hard to predict the onset of revolutionary movements. It was Bouazizi who set himself on fire and sparked a revolution in Tunisia in 2011; it was a call from youth groups to protest police brutality that led to the collapse of Mubarak’s regime in Egypt. While Iran is not on the verge of a revolutionary overthrow, the sudden outburst of protests has caught many by surprise. However, it was the ongoing elite infighting, a gridlock in the government, and conservatives’ miscalculated reliance on their social basis to score political points that sparked the protests.
Contentious politics is not uncommon in Iran. Neither are protests and demonstrations. What is striking about the recent events, however, is the struggle over IRGC’s position in the domestic political landscape. Svolik, in his discussion on authoritarian control, highlights the moral hazard of authoritarian repression: if regimes choose to repress the ruled, they become vulnerable to demands of those agents carrying out the act of repression. Usually relying on their militaries, the regimes open themselves up to the demands of the militaries that expect a seat at the decision-making table. In the case of Iran, the IRGC, a military organization that established its position as an active economic and political player following privatization in 2004 and a fraudulent election in 2009, both engages in power-sharing and is a tool of authoritarian control. It is in light of these elite infightings that one should analyze the recent demonstrations in Iran.
Whether these protests stop or continue, two things remain imperative over the next months: (i) Iran is experiencing a crisis of power-sharing. Iran’s institutional setting, existence of a parliament and presidency, permits a degree of elite reshuffling, and hence expression of elite tensions. Khatami’s reformist era exemplified the disagreement between the presidency and other governing institutions. During the Khatami’s era, however, the IRGC did not have the economic and political leverage it enjoys today. (ii) Understanding Iran’s future trajectory is closely tied to examining the future of elite relations in Iran, and the position the IRGC will hold in the next months. Will the conservatives facilitate further consolidation of the IRGC’s role in Iranian politics at the expense of Rouhani’s government or will we see elite coalitions to contain the IRGC’s power?
