From the Islamic Republic to the Green Movement: Social Movements in Contemporary Iran

This paper examines how oppositional groups go about exploiting opportunities to mobilizeen massein settings that are less than auspicious. The Green Movement is used here as a case study, the aim of which is to show that understanding how a people go about mobilizing requires, first and foremost, examining the core beliefs that motivate them toseize opportunitieswhen conditions allow. To this end, a constructivist approach will be used to demonstrate that it was the oppositional forces that took a proactive role in constructing opportunities to mobilize becausethey perceivedthe circumstances to be favorable, which suggests that greater attention ought to be focused on the sociopolitical and historical context within which a given situation is viewed as conducive to mass mobilization. Citing the examples of the student and women’s groups involved in Iran’s Green Movement, and tracing their historical trajectories and particular experiences during Ahmadinejad’s first term (2004–2008), I argue that the Green Movement may be best described as a ‘movement of movements,’ the kind of mega social movement capable of harnessing the potential, not only of Iranians but of other Middle East peoples, to mobilize with a view to pursuing specific social and political goals. This approach has the virtue of offeringa way to understandspecific traits of social movements operating in repressive settings.

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The Arab Spring: Ideals of the Iranian Green Movement, Methods of the Iranian Revolution

International Journal of Middle East Studies ◽

10.1017/s0020743811001346 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 44 (1) ◽

pp. 162-165 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Charles Kurzman

Keyword(s):

Arab Spring ◽

Iranian Revolution ◽

Islamic Republic ◽

Green Movement ◽

Islamic Republic Of Iran ◽

The Arab Spring

Which Iranian uprising does the Arab Spring bring to mind? The Green Movement of 2009, which challenged the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran, or the Iranian Revolution of 1979, which brought the Islamic Republic to power?

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Literary Subterfuge and Contemporary Persian Fiction

American Journal of Islam and Society ◽

10.35632/ajis.v32i4.1008 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 32 (4) ◽

pp. 109-113

Author(s):

Samad Alavi

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Social Movements ◽

Conceptual Framework ◽

Islamic Republic ◽

Persian Literature ◽

Literary Scholarship ◽

The Past ◽

The Social ◽

Course Syllabi ◽

The World

For at least the past several decades, Persian literary scholarship has drawnits conceptual framework largely from the social sciences. Despite severalnoteworthy exceptions, a tendency to read Persian literature for its sociopoliticalcontent still guides the way scholars write about and teach the fieldtoday. Indeed, a brief survey of course syllabi with “Persian literature” in theirtitles would no doubt reveal that instructors (the present writer included) byand large introduce writers and their works based on non-literary socio-historicaldevelopments, either arranging texts chronologically by their years ofproduction or presenting them (still usually chronologically) as reflections ofthe historical events, social movements, and ideological currents that shapedthe societies from which those texts arose.Mehdi Khorrami’s Literary Subterfuge and Contemporary Persian Fiction:Who Writes Iran? challenges this trend, arguing that we do a great disserviceto both individual texts and literary studies as a discipline when weconsider non-literary factors as the primary criteria by which to analyze andschematize literary works. Instead, while acknowledging the importance ofsocial, historical, and ideological contexts, in other words the world outsidethe text, Khorrami’s study of contemporary Persian fiction contends that wemust scrutinize the world inside the texts – their aesthetic, linguistic, and formaldevices and concepts – to develop a comprehensive view of literature’shistorical evolution.The work under review argues that modernist Persian fiction evolves froma counter-discursive to a non-discursive position vis-à-vis official discoursesin Iran, primarily under the Islamic Republic. The author’s conception of discursivityrelates directly to his understanding of the term modernist. The single ...

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The Green Movement in Iran: Reformist Roots and Objective

Protest ◽

10.1163/2667372x-01010002 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 1 (1) ◽

pp. 29-53

Author(s):

Ali Akbar

Keyword(s):

University Students ◽

Presidential Election ◽

Islamic Republic ◽

Green Movement ◽

Revolutionary Movement ◽

Election Result ◽

Key Features ◽

Mass Participation

Abstract The protests that rocked the streets of Tehran and some other major Iranian cities in 2009, gradually coming to be known collectively as the Green Movement, were triggered after the official announcement of that year’s presidential election result. This article will demonstrate how key features of the Green Movement – including the mass participation of youth, women and university students – were rooted in sociopolitical changes that occurred in Iran in the late 1990s and 2000s. The article argues that the Green Movement should be viewed as a reformist movement which sought to implement certain reforms in Iranian society – an agenda also pursued by its leaders – rather than a revolutionary movement seeking to overthrow the Islamic Republic.

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The People Reloaded

American Journal of Islam and Society ◽

10.35632/ajis.v28i3.1251 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 28 (3) ◽

pp. 155-158

Author(s):

Tauseef Ahmad Parray

Keyword(s):

Combined Effect ◽

Nobel Peace Prize ◽

Islamic Republic ◽

Green Movement ◽

University Of Denver ◽

The People ◽

History Of ◽

The Common ◽

The University ◽

Geographical Locations

The People Reloaded ‒ an anthology of the multiplicity of voices, belongingto various perspectives, fields, and geographical locations throughoutthe world, and primarily and principally in the Iran and Iranian diasporas‒ is edited by Nader Hashemi (of the University of Denver) and DannyPostel (the editor of The Common Review). The book is a definitive selectedcollection of fifty-three writings and political analyses written by diverse voices interested in and engaged with the struggle for democracyin Iran. The People Reloaded is comprised of key documents, statements,interviews, letters, and essays ‒ and it seeks to capture “an important momentin Iran’s history (xxii).”This book is a rich, consistently engaging anthology that makes animportant effort to provide “an intellectual and political roadmap,” whichhelps the reader in understanding the tumultuous events that have rockedthe Islamic Republic since June 2009 ‒ a period when the struggle forthe democracy in Iran underwent a “momentous transformation (xi).” Thefacts, analyses, shadings, and nuances that these essays provide allow thereader to better understand whatever direction Iran can or may take in thefuture. The editors contribute to the work the introduction and two essays;the remaining essays are those of noted historians, political activists inand out of Iran, and journalists. Among the historians are Ervand Abrahamian,Hamid Dabashi, and Juan Cole; the activists include AyatollahMohsen Kadivar, Shirin Ebadi (2003 Nobel Peace Prize winner), and HosseinBashiriyeh; and the journalists include Roger Cohen, Stephen Kinzer,and Laura Secor. The combined effect is a history of the Green Movement,which includes much of Iran’s revolutionary past and a vision of the futureof the Green Movement in its struggle for justice and a voice in the ancientcivilization of Iran ...

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