Abstract
Drawing on Tilly and Tarrow’s theory of Contentious Politics, this chapter analyses the mechanisms employed for women’s empowerment in Iran. Since the decline of the reform movement in the mid-2000s, the women’s movement has focused its efforts on ‘contentious campaigns.’ Two noteworthy initiatives are analysed in this chapter: the One Million Signatures Campaign (OMSC) (2006–?) and the Campaign to Change the Male Face of Parliament (2015–2016). Both campaigns demobilised despite not having reached their goals following heavy state crackdowns. The author shows how the women’s movement has been influenced by the state: in response to varying degrees of opportunity and threat from above, activists have employed combinations of contained (Islamic feminism) and transgressive (secular feminism) forms of contention. The retrospective analysis of both popular campaigns suggests that Iran’s volatile political landscape has trapped the women’s movement in a game of ‘cat and mouse’ with the regime, seriously inhibiting its ability to plan and deploy long-term strategies for change that can sustain pressure from above.
Keywords
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- 1.
Member of the Iranian women’s movement. Pers. Comm., February 2016.
- 2.
Charles Tilly & Sidney Tarrow, Contentious Politics, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015).
- 3.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 49.
- 4.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 76.
- 5.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 63.
- 6.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 153.
- 7.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 127.
- 8.
Alina Rocha Menocal, Verena Fritz, and Lise Rakner, ‘Hybrid Regimes and the Challenge of Deepening and Sustaining Democracy in Developing Countries,’ South African Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 15, Iss. 1 (2008): 29–40.
- 9.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 75–76.
- 10.
Pejman Abdolmohammadi & Giampiero Cama, ‘Iran as a Peculiar Hybrid Regime: Structure and Dynamics of the Islamic Republic,’ British Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 42, Iss. 4 (2015): 558–578.
- 11.
Abdolmohammadi & Cama, ‘Iran as a Peculiar Hybrid Regime’: 561.
- 12.
Abdolmohammadi & Cama, ‘Iran as a Peculiar Hybrid Regime’: 569–574.
- 13.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 76.
- 14.
Ziba Mir-Hosseini, Islam and Gender: The Religious Debate in Contemporary Iran (London and New York: I.B. Tauris, 2000): 250.
- 15.
See Rebecca Barlow & Shahram Akbarzadeh, ‘Prospects for Feminism in the Islamic Republic of Iran,’ Human Rights Quarterly, Vol. 30, Iss. 1 (2008): 21–40; and, Valentine Moghadam, ‘Islamic Feminism and Its Discontents,’ Signs, Vol. 27, Iss. 4 (2002): 1135–1171.
- 16.
Elaheh Koolaee, ‘The Prospects for Democracy: Women Reformists in the Iranian Parliament’ in Fereshteh Nouraie-Simone (ed), On Shifting Ground, Muslim Women in the Global Era (New York: The Feminist Press at the City University of New York, 2005): 205.
- 17.
Mehrangiz Kar, ‘Women and Civil Society in Iran,’ in Nouraie-Simone, On Shifting Ground, Muslim Women in the Global Era: 325.
- 18.
Koolaee, ‘The Prospects for Democracy’: 210.
- 19.
Mahmood Monshipouri, ‘The Road to Globalization Runs through Women’s Struggle,’ World Affairs, Vol. 167, Iss. 1 (2004): 5.
- 20.
Ziba Mir-Hosseini, ‘Fatemeh Haqiqatjoo and the Sixth Majlis, a Woman in Her Own Right.’ Middle East Report Online, Vol. 34 (2004). http://www.merip.org/mer/mer233/fatemeh-haqiqatjoo-sixth-majles
- 21.
Shirin Ebadi, Iran Awakening, a Memoir of Revolution and Hope (New York: Random House, 2006): 191–192.
- 22.
See Moghadam, ‘Islamic Feminism and Its Discontents’: 1135–1171.
- 23.
Nayereh Tohidi, Women’s Rights in the Middle East and North Africa: Iran (New York: Freedom House, 2010): 29.
- 24.
Jack A. Goldstone & Charles Tilly, ‘Threat (and Opportunity): Popular Action and State Repression in the Dynamics of Contentious Action’ in Ronald R. Aminzade, et al. (eds) Silence and Voice in the Study of Contentious Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001): 180.
- 25.
Shirin Ebadi, Interview with the author, Tehran, 7 July 2007.
- 26.
‘About One Million Signatures Demanding Changes to Discriminatory Laws,’ Change for Equality, 28 August 2006, http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article18
- 27.
It is relevant that three of the five treaties to which Iran is a State Party were signed and ratified by Iran prior to the institutionalization of the Islamic Republic in 1979. Nevertheless, successive governments of the Islamic Republic have remained party to the ICERD (ratified 1968), ICCPR (ratified 1975), and ICESCR (ratified 1975), and have subsequently signed onto the CRC (ratified 1994) and CRPD (ratified 2009).
- 28.
Sussan Tahmasebi, ‘One Million Signatures: Answers to Your Most Frequently Asked Questions,’ Change for Equality, 24 February 2008. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article226
- 29.
See Noushin Ahmadi Khorasani, Iranian Women’s One Million Signatures Campaign for Equality: The Inside Story (Bethesda, MD: Women’s Learning Partnership Translation Series, 2009); Rebecca Barlow, Universal Women’s Human Rights and the Muslim Question: Iran’s Change for Equality Campaign (Carlton, VIC: Melbourne University Publishing, 2012); and, Leila Alikarami, Women and Equality in Iran: Law, Society and Activism (London: I.B. Tauris, forthcoming 2018).
- 30.
Tahmasebi, ‘One Million Signatures.’ http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article226
- 31.
See Fatemeh Nejati, ‘A Big Lesson,’ Change for Equality, 15 December 2006. http://we-change.org/site/spip.php?article326; and, Nahid Keshavarz, ‘Interview with Jelve Javaheri: From a Reading Group to the Campaign for One Million Signatures,’ Change for Equality, 30 December 2007. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article196
- 32.
See Nejati, ‘A Big Lesson.’ http://we-change.org/site/spip.php?article326; Amir Yaghoub-Ali, ‘Interesting Reactions to the Campaign,’ Change for Equality, 20 July 2007. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article114; Parinaz Naeemi, ‘I Returned Empty-Handed, Yet My Heart Is Filled with Confidence That My Decision from Five Years Earlier Was the Right One!,’ Change for Equality, 20 February 2007. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article17
- 33.
Ebadi, Interview with the author.
- 34.
Ahmadi Khorasani, Iranian Women’s One Million Signatures Campaign for Equality.
- 35.
Alikarami, Women and Equality in Iran.
- 36.
Alikarami, Women and Equality in Iran.
- 37.
Tahmasebi, ‘One Million Signatures.’ http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article226
- 38.
Noushin Ahmadi Khorasani, ‘Treating Us Like Criminals! Pressures Increase on Activists Involved in the One Million Signatures Campaign,’ Change for Equality, 19 February 2007. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article10
- 39.
Parvin Ardalan, ‘Campaign: A Matter of Life,’ Change for Equality, 10 March 2007. http://we-change.org/site/english/spip.php?article46
- 40.
‘Why they Left: Stories of Iranian Activists in Exile,’ Human Rights Watch, 2012. https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/12/13/why-they-left/stories-iranian-activists-exile
- 41.
Muhammad Sahimi, ‘Martyrs of the Green Movement,’ Tehran Bureau, 19 June 2010. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2010/06/martyrs-of-the-green-movement.html
- 42.
Ahmadi Khorasani, Iranian Women’s One Million Signatures Campaign for Equality.
- 43.
Sahimi, ‘Martyrs of the Green Movement.’ http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2010/06/martyrs-of-the-green-movement.html
- 44.
‘Why they Left,’ Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/12/13/why-they-left/stories-iranian-activists-exile
- 45.
‘Why they Left,’ Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/12/13/why-they-left/stories-iranian-activists-exile
- 46.
‘Why they Left,’ Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/12/13/why-they-left/stories-iranian-activists-exile
- 47.
Alikarami, Women and Equality in Iran.
- 48.
Pers. Comm., February 2016.
- 49.
Pers. Comm., February 2016.
- 50.
Pers. Comm., May 2016.
- 51.
Pers. Comm., May 2016.
- 52.
In fact, 18 women in total were elected. However, the votes for Minoo Khaleghi, a reformist and environmental activist elected to represent the district of Isfahan, were nullified by the Guardian Council after claims surfaced that she allegedly shook hands with an unrelated male while on a trip to China—an act that is illegal under Islamic law.
- 53.
See Rebecca Barlow & Fatemeh Nejati, (2016) ‘Impact and Significance of the 2016 Campaign to Change the Male Face of Parliament in Iran,’ Journal of Social Movement Studies, Vol. 16, Iss. 3 (2016): 365.
- 54.
Pers. Comm., May 2016.
- 55.
Shahla Mir Galoy Bayat, for example, one of the nine women MPs in Iran’s ninth parliament, said: ‘I think gender equality can create problems for women. For example, if we want to implement gender equality, we should no longer allow women to take maternity leave.’ See Zahra Alipour, ‘Fed-up Iranian women organize to take more seats in parliament,’ Al Monitor, Iran Pulse, 18 January 2016. http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/01/iran-parliamentary-elections-womens-campaign-more-seats.html
- 56.
Golnaz Esfandiari, ‘Iranian activists campaign to bring more women into parliament,’ Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 3 November 2015. http://www.rferl.org/a/iran-parliament-campaign-for-more-women/27343085.html
- 57.
Alipour, ‘Fed-up Iranian women organize to take more seats in parliament.’ http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/01/iran-parliamentary-elections-womens-campaign-more-seats.html
- 58.
Pers. Comm., May 2016.
- 59.
Raz Zimmt, ‘Campaign to increase the representation of women in the Iranian Majlis,’ Moshe Dayan Centre for Middle Eastern and African Studies, December 2015. http://dayan.org/content/beehive-campaign-increase-representation-women-iranian-majlis#_edn8
- 60.
Zimmt, ‘Campaign to increase the representation of women in the Iranian Majlis.’ http://dayan.org/content/beehive-campaign-increase-representation-women-iranian-majlis#_edn8
- 61.
Pers. Comm., June 2016.
- 62.
Pers. Comm., May and June 2016.
- 63.
Member of the Feminist School, Azadeh Davachi, Pers. Comm., June 2016.
- 64.
Pers. Comm., June 2016.
- 65.
Ashraf Brojerdi, ‘Almost 60 percent of reformist’s women are rejected’ Borna News Agency, 8 February 2016. http://www.bornanews.ir/شدند-صلاحیت-رد-طلب-اصلاح-زنان-از-درصد-حدود-3/370943-اقتصادی-سیاسی-بخش
- 66.
Pers. Comm., June 2016.
- 67.
Davachi, Pers. Comm., February 2017.
- 68.
Noushin Ahmadi Khorasani. Pers. Comm., December 2016.
- 69.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 75–76.
- 70.
Tilly & Tarrow, Contentious Politics: 76–77.
- 71.
Abdolmohammadi & Cama, ‘Iran as a Peculiar Hybrid Regime.’
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‘Why they Left: Stories of Iranian Activists in Exile’, Human Rights Watch, 2012. https://www.hrw.org/report/2012/12/13/why-they-left/stories-iranian-activists-exile
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Barlow, R. (2018). The Women’s Movement and State Responses to Contentious Campaigns in Iran. In: Conduit, D., Akbarzadeh, S. (eds) New Opposition in the Middle East. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8821-6_2
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