Warning, some imagery of civilian casualties in the video.
Fareed Zakaria and Dan Drezner both argue that this is the end of the present mixed government, the semi-authoritarian Islamic Republic. This doesn’t mean that the government is about to fall, from both BBC report and videos protesters seem to be regularly driven back.
I’m moving tomorrow, so I’m not following things as closely as I otherwise would. But even if I could give it my full attention, this is tricky even for experts, and I’m not one. One thing I can comment on is the comparison with the Tiananmen Square some twenty years ago which clearly demonstrated that popular mobilization in and of itself isn’t necessarily enough. I’d not two key differences.
- There’s security forces geared towards crowd control. In Tiananmen in ‘89 the People’s Liberation Army was sent in. By contrast, it sounds as if there’s more use of riot police using water cannons, tear gas, and batons.
- The Basij militias appear to be Ackmadinejad’s go to force in this crisis. I don’t think they have the capabilities of the official forces, although according to the aforementioned BBC report they are apparently intermingling with the police. The Basij were implicated in some of the early raids and in ongoing violence (disturbing), but I’m not sure the extent to which they’re still distinct. Regardless, such militias were more present during Mao’s Cultural Revolution but I don’t recall anything similar during Tiananmen.
The availability of more police forces will probably keep casualties lower than they’d otherwise be. The PRC has gotten a lot better at crowd control in more recent years, both for better and worse. Not relying on the Army makes a big difference. However, the Basij my counter some of that and I’m not really sure how to analyze the implications of their involvement.
The key point was that Tiananmen went as long as it did because of power divides at the top level. They were ultimately resolved by Deng Xiaoping, but I don’t think even the Grand Ayatollah has the equivalent of Deng’s clout. Ultimately, this outcome will probably be determined by the behind the scenes power struggle, but the bravery of the crowds and the popular support they can garner is an enabling input.
For one example of those struggles (remember, the Iranian system is really complex), check out this Al Jazeera English report that one of my friends named Jesse (I have two, not counting family) sent me.
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