Human Rights and Democracy in Iran
Modern Iran is the world’s only Shi’a theocracy, born out of the People’s Islamic Revolution of 1979. The deposed Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi originally sought to restore Iran to the prestige it once knew, but instead managed only to constrict his people’s freedoms and stifle their liberties. Today’s Iranians are overwhelmingly antagonistic towards the draconic clergy and 26 years of their broken promises of reform and a better life. The young generation has grown so restless with their government that an underground movement spawned, advocating Western ideologies such as secularism, freedom of press, and freedom of religion.
The development of democracy and improvement of human rights has been slow since 1979, but is nonetheless pursued by people who seek to break through the limitations pressed on them by stringent mullahs and antiquated Shariah laws. Through careful examination of the unique nature of Shi’a theocracy, the treatment of various minority groups, Iranian political structure and history, it becomes evident that the new generation demands democratic and human rights reforms from the mullahs that rule their society.
Though only an Islamic state since 1979, Iran’s human rights record has suffered since the days of the former pro-Western Shah Pahlavi. As a theocracy, Iran is one of only a handful of Islamic states run by its clergy. Unlike other so-called fundamentalist states such as the Wahabbi-dominated Saudi Arabia, Iran’s Guardian Council serves as both a judicial and clerical governing body.
Most Middle Eastern theocracies are merely military dictatorships that utilized religion to galvanize the masses.Iran is no different, as the existing leadership exploited religious affiliation to organize the common anti-Western sentiment that was rampant throughout the 1970s. The Islamic Revolution, in reality, was a unified group of Islamic activists, secular nationalists, leftist militia members, militant students, and clerics (Abdo 2003, p. 3).
Peculiarly enough, Shi’a Islam places heavy emphasis on separation of faith and state. Despite this emphasis, Iran is still very much entrenched in a government whose inner workings are manipulated by a small council of ruling elder clerics. The Guardian Council has worked to subvert Iran’s increasingly pro-Western reforms.
The latest generation of Iranian students has frequently petitioned to become a moderate state, particularly one that promotes women’s rights and democracy. Seminarians have gone as far as issuing a fatwa, or religious decree, about women’s rights, with one with enough fortitude to take the bold step of declaring that Islamic law does not bar a woman from becoming the president of Iran or even the supreme clerical leader (Abdo 20).
Unlike other Muslim countries whose clerics work within a framework of specified Islam (Wahabbism, Salafism, etc), Iran’s Shi’a theocracy is ever-changing as the senior ayatollahs have the power to decree new or revised interpretations of the Qur’an. According to Iran’s leading clerics, Shi’ism [is] a religion in a constant state of reinterpretation, making absolutism unthinkable (Abdo 30).
However, the nature of Iran’s theocracy, a country predicated upon radical and ultimately unsustainable precepts, is one naturally volatile and subject to radical change (Abdo 31). The new Shi’a theocracy was a huge threat to the Arab world, as its new form of fundamentalism threatened the balance of power in Arab Sunni states, most notably in Lebanon during the 1982 Israeli invasion.
The 1979 Iranian Revolution had charged Shiites everywhere with a sudden new energy, and the regime in Tehran was anxious to capitalize on the new position of influence it was being offered in Lebanon (Simpson 209). Syria’s Alawite-Shi’a government quickly made ties with the new Shi’a bulwark in the Middle East, much to the chagrin of religious monarchies like Saudi Arabia, and even the Egyptian secular monolith.
Arab countries constantly feared Iran’s intentions as a Shi’a stronghold. Iran’s aims at regional supremacy were set from 1969 onward, and the Revolution added religion to race discrepancies, further threatening the Arab Nationalist movement (Al-Saud 78). As a theocracy rich in oil and natural resources, the West was wary of Iran’s rise to power, but it was joined by the Arab world that enjoyed Sunni dominance for the better part of a millennia.
Tags: human rights, Iran, Iranians, Islamic Revolution, Middle East, Saudi Arabia
