Publications

What if you held a national election and no one turned out? That’s the situation currently confronting Iranian officials, who are grappling with the aftermath of a truly disastrous outcome in last week’s parliamentary elections.

Iran’s clerical army could decide that an internal transition is the best answer, and move to remove (or at least subordinate) the country’s current clerical elite. Such a step, after all, would allow the IRGC to preserve its current, extensive grip on national power while simultaneously working to alleviate economic pressure from the U.S. and reintegrate into the international community.

Signs are mounting that in Tehran, which faces rising pressures at home and abroad, the country’s powerful hardline conservatives are circling the wagons, raising the odds of still more Iranian global provocations. The question is whether Washington — which continues to tighten the economic screws on Tehran — is ready for what might come next.

For years, Iran’s ruling ayatollahs have grappled with a profoundly vexing problem: how best to maintain the loyalty of the country’s growing (and increasingly unruly) population. The question isn’t strictly a political one. It is also made significantly more complicated by the age of the Islamic Republic’s population, which cuts against the regime in key ways.