http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1395054/posts
Masoud Kazemzadeh and Shahla Azizi, Iranian.com:
One of the most vexing questions animating observers and analysts of Iranian politics is: why despite being extremely unpopular and incompetent, are the fundamentalists still in power?
One factor that may provide a partial explanation is the huge change of
the dominant ethos among large sectors of the population.
In
the 1970s and 1980s, the dominant ethos among large sectors of the
Iranian people was idealistic, altruistic, and celebrated sacrifice for
the greater good.
Today, on the contrary, the
predominant ethos have become excessive selfishness, acquisitiveness,
cynicism, and lack of willingness to make the smallest sacrifice to
protect the common good.
This pendulum-like swing from one extreme to the other has a deleterious impact on the outcome of political struggles in Iran. If
this observation is correct, although the overwhelming majority of
Iranians are opposed to the ruling Islamic fundamentalist regime, the
vast majority are unwilling to pay the price of replacing it.
Anecdotal and statistical evidence of the alienation of the youth from the fundamentalist regime are overwhelming. For example, a government conducted survey revealed that
- 86 percent of the youth say that they do not perform the obligatory daily Islamic prayer.
In early 2003 a large Internet poll of students of the Amir Kabir University (the second most prestigious university in Iran) was conducted.
- Only 6 percent of the students said that they support the hardliners, while another
- 4 percent said they support the reformists within the regime.
- A mere 5 percent said they support the return of the former monarchy.
- Most significantly, 85 percent of the students said that they would support the establishment of a secular and democratic republic.
Why
then out of two million students at institutions of higher education,
would only a few thousand participate in pro-democracy sit-ins and
protests?
In a large survey of 15 to 29 year-olds
published in January of this year, some interesting data have been
released. The survey entitled “The Values and Opinions of the 15-29
Year Old Youth,” revealed that 59 percent of male and 57 percent of female respondents said “each person should think only of oneself.” To the question on “are people honest and forthright in public,” 79 percent of males and 82 percent of females responded “no.” And 50.4 percent of males and 39 percent of females said that they “would welcome the opportunity to emigrate abroad.”
This
is the generation that was petrified under the rains of scud missiles
and aerial bombardment during the eight-year war with Iraq, and
survived Khomeini’s reign of terror where possession of banned
materials resulted in summary trials and mass executions, and
humiliated and lashed for infractions of the fundamentalists’
puritanical dictates. Monopolization of all levers of power by
fundamentalist clerics, incredible financial corruption by clerical
officials and their children, brutal suppression of dissents, cultural
suffocation, severe economic difficulties, astronomical rise in crime,
addiction, and prostitution have undermined the sense of common purpose
and common good.
For the overwhelming majority in this generation, personal survival trumps any notion of personal sacrifice for the common good. Thus in just one generation cynicism has replaced idealism among vast majority of the population. Economic hardships and lack of freedom have resulted in a mixture of materialism and individualism -- of coveting a Western life-style as seen on satellite television and of believing that it can be achieved only on a personal rather a societal level.
It is easier to imagine that you can move to the West and dress like
Brittany Spears than it is to believe that everyone can one day be like
her here in Iran.
The rise of Khatami and reformist
fundamentalists raised expectations that were quickly dashed, thus
dramatically increasing both frustration and hopelessness. The
inability of the once-popular President Khatami to implement any real
change has greatly disillusioned the more than seventy percent of the
electorate who voted for him. Today, his promise to create a more open
and secular society is perceived to have been nothing but a ploy to
prolong the fundamentalist theocrats in power. He is seen by many in
Iran at best as a powerless and incompetent idealist and at worst as a
sweet talking cleric propped up to deceive the malcontent inside and
critics abroad. The failure of the reformist faction of the
fundamentalists to maintain their hold onto Majles in February 2004
elections, underlined their inability to be regarded in public opinion
as viable vehicle for change.
The fundamentalist
regime has lost its ideological hegemony and political legitimacy, but
not its ability to coerce and intimidate into submission. In
addition, due to the enormous revenues from the sale of oil and natural
gas, the regime is able not only to keep its small social base content
but also to co-opt a few non-fundamentalists. While a few brave
pro-democracy activists and students continue to struggle against the
regime, for now at least, the overwhelming majority of the population
sits on the sidelines wishing them well but is unwilling to risk
life and liberty to replace the incumbent tyranny with a secular and
democratic republic that they obviously desire. Many so infected with
bizarre conspiracy theories, argue that the British have put the
clerics on power and only the American can take them down. This renders
any active participation superfluous because it is not the actions of
Iranians themselves that changes regimes but rather James-Bond-like
schemes behind the scenes.
Has apathy become a
feature of Iranian political culture for the foreseeable future or is
there a revolution brewing? The answer is not clear but we see several possibilities. One possibility is that Iranians have lost the will to confront their oppressors and
instead wish to engage purely in self-improvements devoid of any
broader considerations. The incredible brutality of the regime combined
with the now-prevailing ethos have reduced the possibilities of
nonviolent transition to democracy as have occurred recently in
Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan.
Another
possibility is that while apathy may be the outward appearance, there
is a cumulation of repressed anger, which may explode by a trigger.
A potential trigger may be an outrageous act by regime elements as
occurred in Lebanon by the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafiq
al-Hariri. Another trigger may be American military attacks on
fundamentalist coercive apparatuses such as Islamic Revolutionary
Guards Corps, Basij corps, Ansar-e Hezbollah vigilantes, Ministry of
Intelligence headquarters, and the like.
We do not believe that any military strikes on the nuclear facilities would serve as a trigger for mass uprising
as
some have argued in Washington. The reasons being that with coercive
apparatuses being intact, they have not only the power to crush any
uprising, but also the added motivation and anger to do so. Iranians
are angry at the coercive apparatuses for having oppressed and
repressed them for so long but not at any inanimate nuclear facility.
Another
trigger may be UN Security Council economic sanctions, which may lead
to runs on the banks, food stores, events that would put the masses in
confrontation with the coercive apparatuses. If the coercive
apparatuses did not open fire on the masses, then that would encourage
more valiant rioting and burning of government autos and buildings
cascading out of control. If the coercive apparatuses did open fire on
the masses, then that may increase responses by the masses on such a
scale that the regime would not be able to control and contain. The
UN Security Council international sanctions modeled after those imposed
on the Apartheid regime in South Africa and Burmese dictatorship may be
the least violent way to replace the ruling fundamentalists with a
secular and democratic republic that Iranians so wish.
Iran’s future looks grim in all of these possibilities. Time will tell which one would be the actual history.
