Iran

• High Infant Mortality Rate, this means healthcare is crap

The Accidental President

• Mahmoud Ahmadinejad election
• Iranian politics more nuanced than the view supported by casual observation of poltical rhetoric
• "We're also standing against the forces of extremism embodied by the regime in Tehran"-George W. Bush
• "Iran's rulers oppress a good and talented people. And wherever freedom advances in the Middle East, it seems the Iranian regime is there to oppose it."-George W. Bush People of Iran are very educated, they have been aroiund for many centuries and perhaps helped save the knowledge we have today from being lost.
• Iran wants to have nuclear capabilities because they can jpoin the Nuke club and become first world, has much uranium

Islam is the Solution

• or perhaps it is part of the problem......
• perhaps Iran is a theocracy. a government ruled strictly by religion, however the country is leaning towartd secularization ( belief that government and religion should be sepatrate)
• Iran has 2 parallel and sometimes competing governments-the more competition it can be argued makes it a more liberal democracy because it provides acheck to the other side, assuming onee side can actually say "no" to the other side
• nominally secular government led by the president (President may just be ribbon-cutter)
• the ther is a hierarchy of religious conservatives
• Religious conservtives led by Ayatollah All Khamenei
• Secular governmt led by president
• Muhammed Khatami, a reformist, served as president from 1997 to 2005, acting as a counterwieght to the power fo the clergy, HOWEVER, not so his conservatives, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
• Between 199 and 2001 the reformist won election with big margins, but their attempts to make Iran more democratic were repeatedly prevented, Dahai, which has led to much social unrest

Executive

Structure

• 1st Supreme Leader (highest autority) - velayat faqth (doctrine of guardisnship of the jurisconsull); his power comes from appointments, he apponts those who will follow him and if he has abilityh to appoint he has ability to kick someone out, appioints half of the Guardian Council; 31 members to the Expediency Council; director of Voice and Vision *media)' commander of military; commander fo law-enforcement
• 2nd President (elected for 4 years, max: 2 consecutive terms; confirmed by Supreme Leader; must be Shi'ite; you MUST be male) - head of the Executive branch; signs bills into law approved by Legislature; presen tpolicy into government; power of appontment-cabnet members (his advisors), provisional governors
• 3rd Assembly of Experts (elected for 8 years, 86 members) - chooses the Supreme Leader from the ulema (The Islamic Community)
• 4th Cabinet (Council of Ministers) (chosen by President, approved and can be impeached by Parliament) - advice President

Legislative

• 1st Parliament Majies (unicameral with 290 members elected for 4 years, all Muslims except 3 Christians and ! Jewish member) - law'making power, but the laws can;t go agains the Constitution or against Islam, investigate affairs of state (oversight)
• 2nd Council of Guardians (12 members, 6 ulema appointed by Supreme Leader, 6 lawyers appointed by Head of Judiciary) - ensures the conformity of legislation with Islam & constitution, "supervises" elections to the Assembly of Experts, the presidency, and parliament
• Sharia's Law, interpreted by Supreme Leader and ensured by Council of Guardians
• head if Judiciary appointed by Supreme Leader
• the Iranian judiciary has never been independent of political influence
• the hardliners have used the Judiciary system to undermine reforms
• by imprisoning reformist personnel and journalists and closing down reformist papers

Untary State -

• Local: everything subordinate to the tgop-down decisions, local leaders have to be approved by Guardian Council, can tax but tend not to, Leaders are selected for 4-year terms, decision-making and administrative organs oif the State

Political Parties

• political parties are religious -based rather than ideologically-based
• reformist political parties are now questioning the valididty of the interpretations of the Sharis' Law
• there are also conservatives (agree with strict implementation of Islam)
• Supreme Leader basically appoints most the political leaders
• problem
• controlled by a few people, does not give much efficacy to people
• lot of importance and power is given to unelected structures

Iran

• is a Shi'ite Theocratic Republic
• is in the Arab world-but not an Arab nation
• everyone speaks Farsi, not Arabic
• has a great history - Persia - other nation in the area are post-colonial construction
• 2nd largest oil producer in the East
• 4th largest in the world
• should these resources be controlled by Clerics/
• Should economic matters require expertise outside the Islam realm?
• Is Iran a NIC or LDC?

Surface Cleavage in Iran

• lack of unity
• -neither the mass society or the elite ar unified
• most poor - most of the population depends on the government
• ethnic conflict in the North
• conflict within the dominant ethnic and religious Entrepeneurs
• conflict between merchants, peasants, and entrepeneurs
• renter's economy that depends on globalization (ex: oil)

Civil Society

• can be measured by how much a government intrudes into the provide lives of the idividuals

The Shi'ite Elite

• have launched campaigns that sought to enforce values over the general population; resembles the Cultural Revolution in China
• University Professors favoring a more liberal society found themselves replaced
• other professionals found refuge in other nations

It is the young people that are the keepers of Civil Society; attach themsleves to pop culture:

• music
• dress
• cars

The Regime has tolerated the behavior of the youth

• particularly under Khatami

Political Participation

• despite CL and CR are written into the 1979 Constitution
• Regime has closed down newspaper, labor unions, private organization (NGO), political parties, demonstration