The Final Arena of Political Power in Iran
Aydin Areta

The most effective discourse of political power in Iran is not democracy.
It is not religious ideology.
It is not monarchism.
It is not ethnic identity politics.

The discourse that most powerfully determines the public acceptance of a political current within Iranian society as a whole is Iranian nationalism.

Any political force that succeeds in making this discourse its own largely secures an advantage in the political judgement and trust of the Iranian people.

This is precisely why no coalition of left-wing, identity-oriented or even progressive liberal currents can obtain the political acceptance required to secure power in Iran: either this discourse is not one of their central axes, or they stand at a clearly identifiable distance from it.

Recognizing its importance, the Islamic Republic has attempted to occupy the effective space of this discourse. The problem is that whenever the decisive final question is reached—the most important value of a political structure—despite all its recent efforts to appropriate this discourse, its nationalism is accepted only by that section of society that has already internalized Islamic identity.

Media efforts to present citizens who are not committed to religious rules as supporters of the Islamic government’s nationalist discourse also arise from this very late recognition of its importance. The futile attempt to return to the Lion and Sun flag that the system itself removed is likewise the result of recognizing the importance of this field.

Indeed, the point at which political currents attack one another is often nothing other than a challenge to the other side’s fidelity to the discourse of Iran and an attempt to create doubt about that commitment. A segment of the anti-Iranian left that has little influence on public opinion is an exception to this pattern.
A current such as the Mojahedin is likewise irrelevant to Iranian society because its commitment to this discourse is regarded with the highest degree of distrust.

The strengthening of the Pahlavi discourse—whether as leadership for a transition to democracy, as constitutional monarchy, or as monarchy—arises from the public acceptance of its perceived fidelity and trustworthiness in relation to this discourse. The historical reality, as it exists in collective memory, is that part of this discourse was reconstructed under the first and second Pahlavi monarchs and was for years attacked by a range of other political and religious currents.

The disappearance of ultimately unsuccessful currents such as the national-religious tendency, which attempted to provide a bridge to the discourse of nationalism, further weakened the governing power’s ability to access this discourse at decisive historical moments. Balancing between two discourses is fundamentally impossible, especially when one, in its pure form, is oriented toward the *ummah* and the other toward the nation. Such balancing will eventually tip toward one discourse and produce disappointment and separation on the other side, unless the extreme form of the ideological discourse is removed—something that was never possible and could not have become possible, because that current constituted the hard core of ruling power in Iran.

Many within the Islamic Republic, reformist and non-reformist alike, understood that this internal contradiction would eventually reach a crisis. Yet they never acquired the timely and effective capacity required to change the equation.

Before the war, during it and after it, whoever earns the trust of the Iranian people within this discourse will ultimately prevail in the struggle for political power in Iran.

Even in the midst of war, attack and defence take place on this same terrain, and it is here that the fate of political currents will be determined in the final judgement of Iranian society. War itself has become the most important arena in the struggle to claim this discourse.

One final point: nationalism is a broad semantic network. Its most important dimensions include historical and civilizational memory, cultural commitment to Iran’s heritage, protection of Iran’s territorial independence, and prioritizing Iran’s flourishing and the welfare of its people.

Through its insistence on what I regard as historical errors, the Islamic Republic has created its own defeat in three dimensions of this discourse. Only one arena remains in which, under conditions of war, it is attempting to remain within this struggle: strengthening and expanding the narrative that it is the sole force capable of protecting Iran’s territorial independence. This is the one final battle that remains. Its outcome will determine either the end of the Islamic Republic’s relationship with this discourse—and even of its ties with a large part of its own supporters—or the beginning of a transformation within the structure of political power that governs Iran.