Social Movements in Iran Lessons for Activism

when

our narratives of others become

polarized

they often obscure more than they reveal

it’s no secret that we live in a time of

increasing political tension

and political polarization whether

that’s

in our domestic politics across the

lines of

political ideology or in international

relations

across borders and different political

systems

our narratives of others in this context

have

become increasingly broad and reductive

inside and outside us and them

our values and vision for the future and

theirs

imagine asking da vinci to paint the

mona lisa

using only a paint roller and yet this

is how we approach

constructing our narratives of others

particularly those who appear

most different from ourselves i want to

suggest

today that one way we can push back

against this narrative polarization

is to shift our gaze from the level of

governments to the level of the people

and society how are ordinary people

engaging in activism to try to transform

their world

in my own research i study iranian

politics

i look at narratives of iran from the

outside

when i talk to my students about this

and i ask them what narratives do you

have about

iran they often tell me stories about

iran as a threat

or iran as hostile and antagonistic

iran is a part of the axis of evil

and so on this negative perception is

also reflected

in polling data gallup for example

polls americans and asks them to give

their favorability rating

of select numbers of countries iran

being one of them

and consistently since the late 1980s

until today

about four in five americans respond

that they have an unfavorable

view of iran this is puzzling to me not

only as someone who studies iran but

as someone who has a personal connection

to this culture

i’m iranian-american my father

immigrated to the united states in the

1970s

my mother is an american born in the

united states

and so i grew up between these two

cultures the united states and iran and

the narratives i

saw in the media and later in the

academic and policy

literatures about iran stood starkly at

odds

with my own experiences with iranian

people

and i began to wonder what could be

gained

if we put away the paint roller and took

out

a more nuanced brush so to speak to

our understanding of iran i want to tell

you about three social movements in iran

movements for environmental protection

for gender equality and for economic

justice

which all demonstrate that iranians like

americans

and indeed like the international

community are facing many of the same

challenges

and have very similar aspirations for

what they

would like a future society to look like

before i move on to tell you about these

three movements i want to

share with you a personal story that

got me thinking about the differences

in government narratives versus the

narratives of people so

imagine the scene it’s a hot

summer afternoon in june 2013.

i’m in tehran the capital of iran

and i’m heading to a restaurant

my relatives assure me that i have to

try this specific

dish called calapache which means

head and feet they say this dish is

going to help cure my jet lag and give

me a lot of energy

the dish is made from boiled

sheep’s head eyes and tongue and brain

included and boiled sheep’s feet and

then some combination of vegetables

as someone who’s not a particularly

adventurous eater

i thought this was going to be the most

interesting thing to happen to me

on that day we went to the restaurant

and i remember the front facade of the

building was

floor to ceiling glass so you could see

right out onto the street

it was a narrow restaurant with a long

counter

behind which there was many boiling pots

emitting a lot of steam and all kinds of

aromas

that were unfamiliar to me so my cousin

and

family friend and i sat down and we had

our meal and i actually really enjoyed

this new dish as we finished up our meal

i looked out the front of the store the

front of the restaurant and noticed more

and more people filling the street

far more people than should have been

there on a typical saturday afternoon

then i

glanced up to the television in the

corner of the room

and saw a government official standing

behind a podium

and we realized he was announcing the

election results

the presidential election had just taken

place the day prior

and the results were in the more

moderate

candidate favored by reformists

in iranian society named hassan rouhani

had just narrowly crossed the 50 percent

threshold he needed to win the election

outright

and prevent a runoff in fact he had 50.7

percent of the popular vote and what we

were observing in the street was

people coming out spontaneously to

demonstrate and

celebrate this election result

it was not only a partisan victory

but a collective exhale

in a sense the country was pivoting

from a more inward looking world view

and a more hostile relationship with the

outside world

under the previous president more

conservative

mahmoud ahmadinejad and there was a lot

of hope

that the country was changing and would

develop

a more normal relationship with the

outside world

we joined the crowd and i saw things

that i’ll never forget that day

i saw cab drivers standing outside of

their cars

stuck in a large crowd of people they

couldn’t move

honking the horns not out of frustration

but out of joy

to be part of that scene shopkeepers

coming out of their stores

offering trays of tea and other sweets

and goodies

to the crowd and listening to the people

chanting

about change and about their hopes for

the future

i thought where have i seen such a crowd

before

and what came to mind was 2008 in the

united states

after the presidential election of

president obama

we saw similar crowds i was a college

student at that time and i remember

in the city where i was located a

similar

spontaneous demonstration in response to

the election result

so what i learned was if we can shift

our level of analysis

from governments and official government

narrative

and instead look at what’s going on

among

everyday people what’s going on at the

level of society

what i saw on the street in june in

tehran that day

in 2013 how much more could we gain

in terms of the sophistication of our

understanding of others

i want to shift now and tell you about

three social movements

that emerged during uh rouhani’s

presidency

which is now currently coming to an end

in its final year

there’ll be another election in iran in

summer 2021 but that’s the story for a

different day

the three movements i want to talk about

all challenge

our existing narratives of iran and all

provide

lessons for our own activism here in the

united states

and elsewhere the first movement i want

to speak with you about

is the environmental movement and in

particular i want to tell you about a

group

called nature cleaners this group

started as a result of a facebook post

a man named qazim najaryun who’s

affectionately known as

uncle qasem took a trip to a lake

in northern iran in 2012 and was so

appalled by the trash and debris

and litter that he saw in this natural

setting

he made a facebook post about it

decrying

the environmental degradation that he

observed

the post as i said quickly went viral

and

people began to say let’s do something

to address this let’s not wait for

government to respond

let’s take matters into our own hands

and so the group

nature cleaners was formed and here you

can see

an image from one of their clean up

actions

you can see people of all ages all

genders participating in the group

which is very inclusive and essentially

what they do is

go out to some public space in a day or

in an afternoon

and clean up the litter you can see

their slogan in that image

less litter live better i found this

such an interesting case and something

that’s so under

uh outside of iran showing us the shared

challenge

to protect the environment just like we

have movements for environmental

protection here in the united states

so too is this happening in iranian

society

folks who have been interviewed with

nature cleaners report that their

activism makes them feel

more trust and makes them feel greater

a greater sense of self-efficacy that

their action

matters and that they’re working to

produce meaningful change in their

society

so i think looking at iran in this new

way we learn an important lesson

and that is that small actions matter

and it’s important for us to take direct

action in response to a challenge we

perceive

the second movement in iran i want to

speak with you about is

the movement for women’s rights this

movement has a very long tradition in

iranian history

from the pre-revolutionary period indeed

in the revolution itself

in which women participated in large

numbers

and in the post-revolutionary era as

well

by the 1990s women were actively

participating in the labor force in iran

by the early 2000s women outnumbered men

in institutions of higher education and

women have consistently sought

elected office at local and national

levels

in all branches of iran’s government

it’s true that many of their candidacies

have been blocked

by a body called the guardian council

one of which functions is to vet

candidates for elected office

but this has not deterred women from

engaging in political action if

institutional channels have been closed

they’ve shifted

to social action outside of

the institutions of government one

example i want to share with you today

is a movement called the white

wednesdays campaign

this was started in 2017 by an iranian

journalist

an activist named masih alinajad the

white wednesdays campaign

encourages women to wear

white clothing particularly whitehead

scarves on wednesdays

to demonstrate their opposition to

mandatory islamic

veiling in public which has been a law

in iran since the revolution

so as you can see in this image women

are wearing white clothing

sharing those images on social media

to raise awareness about

this call for reform in the direction of

greater

gender equality so what the white

wednesday’s campaign shows us

is that we must be persistent

in our social activism and if one avenue

is blocked

we need to pursue others that are

available

in the next slide you can see this is a

picture of women

attending a an iranian men’s

soccer match from october 2019

this is the first time that they were

able to attend

a men’s sporting event in over 40 years

since the islamic revolution and through

the campaigns of white wednesdays and my

stealthy freedom

this issue of gender equality has um

risen