Iran: The Green Movement and the Labour Movement (Assadi)

An interview by Gozaar journalist Mohammad Tavahori in Paris with Professor Jamshid Assadi, an analyst of political economy and member of the opposition group United Republicans of Iran:

Tahavori: In assessing the breadth and depth of the Green movement over the past ten months, many political analysts and observers have pointed to the lackluster role of the labor movement. Mir Hussein Mousavi, in a recent meeting with members of the Sazman-e Mojahedin-e Enqelab-e Eslami (Mojahedin of Islamic Revolution), stressed the need for the Green Movement to band together with the labor movement and to voice the demands of workers, teachers and other social classes. In your view, why has the labor movement failed to have a strong presence in the Green Movement so far?

Iran: A View from the Labour Front (Rahnema)

Assadi: That depends on how you define the Green Movement. If we look at it as a civil-social movement that is rooted in the public’s soaring, long-rooted discontent, but which flared up in a violent reaction to the blatant rigging of the June 12, 2009 elections and spread from there, then we’d conclude that the Green Movement is at core a wide-ranging movement encompassing diverse social groups, such as youth, women, workers, teachers, journalists, Muslims, atheists–in other words, a majority of society’s citizens.



With this definition in mind, the labor movement has never been excluded or disjointed from the Green Movement. There’s no need to wait for workers to be invited to “join” the Greens; the labor movement has always been an active component of the Green Movement.

But allow me to pose a question on the apparent lack of presence of workers among the Greens: Has Mr. Mousavi presented any strategy and roadmap going forward for his supporters whom he believes constitute the main active body of the movement, for him to voice concern about the absence of the labor class? In my view, the labor movement’s inclusion in the Green Movement is less a cause for concern than the performance of prominent Green figures in roles of leadership and providing guidance for the road ahead.

Tahavori: The question, though, is why the role and presence of workers is not visible [in the Green Movement] despite their long record [of social activism]?

Assadi: How is it not visible? Have workers at Haft Tapeh sugar factory and members of the Vahed Bus Company Union not been active in recent years? Has Mansour Osanlou, the president of Vahed Bus Company Union’s executive committee and one of Iran’s most prominent trade activists, ceased his resistance for a single moment in the past few years?

Let me offer some examples of labor movement activities during Esfand 1388-Farvardin 1389 [February-March 2010]. In this period, workers at Simin and Milad factories (subsidiaries of Qaemreza Industries) in Isfahan, the Telecommunications Industries (ITI) in Shiraz, Qaemshahr Textiles in Mazandaran, Alborz China in Qazvin, as well as workers in several other cities convened and staged demonstrations protesting unpaid wages in front of the Governor’s office and other official institutes in their districts.

Also bear in mind that the persecution of trade activists has continued during this period --- Homayoun Jaberi and Qolamreza Khani, two Tehran Bus Company Union members, are two examples. The elected representative of Kian Tires has also refused to sign a letter of agreement with the Ministry of Labor. These are cases that have occurred in the last 40 days --- I can cite more!

Tahavori: Actually, that’s just the question: with such a shining record, why does the labor movement play such a weak role in the Green Movement?

Assadi: The point is that when the movement takes on a social and civil form, the primary, national slogans replace the demands of specific groups, including trade unions. This is not a bad thing.

Like the student, women’s, and teachers’ movements, the labor movement has embraced the common demands and slogans of the past ten months. Given the conditions of this struggle, instead of articulating group-specific demands, workers have also voiced these public demands. This is why we don’t hear worker-related slogans chanted during Green protests.

Do young people --- who comprise the large part of this movement --- voice slogans for student demands? Do women, who have been frontrunners in popular movements in the past 30 years, chant slogans for gender equality? These groups founded the Green Movement, without raising their group-specific demands at this point in time. This is a plus, not a minus --- that the labor movement not focus on exclusive demands and instead, alongside other social movements, champion the mantra of seeking freedom for all Iranians.

Of course, the process of prioritizing demands and slogans is not limited to the Greens in Iran. All over the world, when a social movement emerges and takes shape, the common denominator of demands --- namely: freedom, justice, democracy, human rights --- become pivotal. In Poland, labor unionists were the pillar of the struggle, but they did not elevate their trade demands above the public’s common demands. Indeed, the strength of social movements lies in the fact that group demands give way to core national demands.

Tahavori: I don’t think anyone is saying workers are not a part of the Green Movement. A look at the list of "Green martyrs" reveals the names of workers among them. But looking at the picture from another angle, we see that workers could have played a stronger role. For instance, consider that the neighborhoods where “Allah-u Akbar” (God is great) was chanted at night, such as Shahrak Qarb and Ekbatan, were actually not working-class districts. Besides, the main question is: how can the Green Movement foster stronger ties with social classes across the board -- including the labor class?

Assadi: To answer your question, allow me to note two things. First, the Green Movement, like mass movements everywhere, because it is a social and civil movement, has not chosen group-specific demands as the banner for its struggle. As I mentioned, I believe this is a strength of the movement, not a weakness.

Now to the second point: before inviting workers to join in the movement, Mr. Mousavi must clarify what way forward he is proposing. Let’s imagine no worker so far has been involved in the Green Movement: on what account must they heed Mr. Musavi’s call to join the Greens? What strategy has Mr. Musavi put forth on the kind of presence the labor movement should display within the Green Movement? What strategies has he proposed for those who do currently support him, for that matter?

Say workers do join the movement at Mr. Mousavi’s behest. Great—what’s the next step? Let’s say workers not previously involved in the Green Movement now join the ranks of supporters of the wartime prime minister. The invite is not to drink tea—what are they supposed to do? Should they, as Mr. Mousavi proposes in his Nourouz message, take up the path of “patience and perseverance” at their factories and workshops? Or, as he has suggested elsewhere, should every worker transform himself into a local “leader” for the movement? If that’s the case, why not leave the choice of whether to participate or not, or how to participate, in the movement up to these “autonomous leaders”?

My point, in effect, is that before we start thinking about the nature of the involvement of various groups in the Green Movement, we must think about the leadership of such a social movement. As long as the movement’s leaders and strategies are unclear, there can be no talk of getting various groups in society to actively take part in it and fight for its victory.

Additionally, Mousavi, Karroubi and Khatami are mistaken in thinking they can reduce the costs of the current struggle by venerating Ayatollah Khomeini and the [Islamic Republic] constitution. Of course, if they truly believe in such values, I’m not suggesting they forsake their beliefs. They are entitled to their view, and every person fights for the ideals that he believes in.

The point, however, is that for the regressive-minded ruling clique, the sole qualification for remaining a “regime insider” is loyalty and unconditional surrender to the hardliner Guards and Ayatollah Khamenei (which of them controls the other is another story!). By this token, there is not much difference between Mousavi and Karrubi, who openly declare their loyalty to Khomeini’s ideals and the Islamic Republic’s constitution, and diaspora opposition groups such as Reza Pahlavi, the Shah’s son, or the United Republicans of Iran.

Who has treated the establishment, the constitution, and the Supreme Leader more respectfully in these years than Mr. Khatami? What was his fate? An important point to note is that these [Reformist] statesmen’s lovely words—although they show commendable resistance and deserve appreciation—are not enough; they must break existing taboos with outspoken courage and thus fulfill their roles as the movement’s true leaders by guiding the way forward.

Tahavori: Mr. Mousavi says this year the Green Movement must focus on attracting the labor and teachers’ movements and other social classes. Isn’t that showing leadership and setting a general path for the movement?

Assadi: That’s not leadership; that’s stating the obvious. The role of a leader is to mobilize and organize forces, set effective strategy and provide a plan for the struggle. A leader who strategizes and guides the way, says, for instance, “People, we will march on so-and-so date to state our demand and nonviolent mission for free elections. If the government does not respond, we will increase our demands in the next demonstration.”

To claim that the Green Movement must bond with other movements but to leave it vague that after such bonding takes place, who does what and which strategies will be implemented, is certainly not leadership. In circumstances of severe repression, lovely words appear to symbolize resistance and courage, but they are insufficient and will never lead the movement to victory.

Tahavori: As a political activist and an economist, what strategy would you suggest the labor movement should follow?

Assadi: I’d need more time to answer that! But I can say that under the present conditions, the labor, students, and women’s movements will never achieve their demands until they part ways with the tyranny of the ruling regime. As long as the balance of powers are titled to the advantage of corrupt and dictatorial hardliners, no social demands will ever be met.

The labor movement is no exception. Today, workers are up against a regime that is unresponsive and ignores the wants of its people.

Let me add a last point. A vital condition for the success of the Greens is for them to impose the rules of the game on their opponent. They will lose the game if resistance figures continue to self-censor based on the pretext of “lessening the toll of the struggle”--to the point that they refrain from naming specific names in the dictatorial regime. Aren’t these leaders tired of having to prove to the regime’s ruling bullies day after day that they do not oppose the Islamic Republic and its constitution, and that they are not foreign stooges?

Tahavori: The question remains, how can workers continue the struggle at present? As you mentioned, the labor movement has been quite active in recent years. But due to the government’s fears that the Green Movement will return to the streets, workers and teachers will no longer be allowed to have their own peaceful protests. It even seems improbable that the state-sponsored march for Labor Day, which was organized by the Workers’ House [the official labor unions] every year, will be held this year.

Assadi: That’s a great question and it reflects what I’ve been saying. Your question illustrates the fact that while the balance of power rests with the hardliners, workers will not even be able to celebrate May Day—much less have the freedom to form unions to protect their rights and receive their wages on time!

In any case, I believe all defenders of freedom should march on May Day to demand freedom and to symbolically show their support for the demands of workers in the framework of the larger struggle for democracy. The first of May, May Day (International Labor Day), should be recorded in history as another successful day for the Greens, even better than Nov. 4 and Student’s Day … why not!

It is also important for the Iranian diaspora to mark this day. They should work to raise awareness among international labor organizations about the widespread repression of workers in Iran, and thereby give Iran’s labor movement hope for a better tomorrow.

Iran: The Green Movement in Transition (Rafat)

Ahmad Rafat writes for Gozaar:

If we consider the unrest and violence that followed the Tenth Presidential Elections of the Islamic Republic in 2009 the starting point of the Green Movement and the new wave of the Iranian people’s struggle for freedom, then this movement and wave have just entered their eleventh month.

The Latest from Iran (10 April): Look Over There!

The first anniversary of any movement is a propitious moment in which to take stock of what that movement has accomplished and what lies ahead of it. Perhaps it is necessary first to ask what exactly was the trigger point of this outpouring of the people’s obviously longstanding seething anger? Was the precise point of departure for this movement June 13, when the election results --- Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s election to a second term as president --- were announced?


There is no doubt that what is now known as the Green Movement came about as a result of the dismal record of the 31-year rule of the Islamic Republic, a regime that has not been able to meet the needs of the ethnically diverse citizenry of Iran in the political, economic, cultural, and social arenas. The social transformations of the last three decades, spanning growing urbanization, a growing number of the under-25 segment of the population, and active participation of women in the cultural, economic, and political spheres—have played a significant role in the birth of this movement.

These transformations have deepened the existing gender-based, social, economic, ethnic, and religious schisms and have brought about a deep schism between a society in search of modernism and the regressive and repressive regime that rules it. Of course, in this connection, the role played by the latest technological advances in communications cannot be ignored. Without the transformations brought about in people’s daily lives by the Internet and telecommunication satellites, perhaps a large movement with such content could not have been born.

Despite the expected ups and downs it has encountered in its path as well as the suppressive instruments at the disposal of the ruling regime, this almost virtually self-propelling movement, which reached its apogee in late May to late June 2009, has demonstrated a remarkable resilience and has had significant accomplishments in various arenas.

On the international level, one of this movement’s accomplishments is its pattern of building trust. In the course of its first six months, the Green Movement was successful in winning the support of public opinion but was not able to gain the trust of the governments and statesmen in the Western countries. However, in recent months we have witnessed the large-scale attention given to the Iranian people’s movement for freedom by such governments and statesmen, especially in Europe. We can consider the decision of the governments of Germany and Italy to limit their economic relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran, as well as the decisions of the governments of France, Germany, and Italy to open their doors to the opponents of the Ahmadinejad government, as the starting point of a trend towards official recognition of the Green Movement and, beyond it, of the sources and forces of protest in Iran.

Clearly, this trend requires the Green Movement to take on new tasks and means that those who claim to be its leaders must shoulder new responsibilities. Given the various viewpoints that have existed within it from its beginning, the current movement for freedom inside Iran has been able to bring about political transformations that could potentially change this movement’s destiny in the coming months.

The Green Movement came into being in the months preceding the 2009 Presidential Elections with a plan to resurrect reformism, despite the fact that even then there were major differences between the platforms of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi. The demands put forth by Mousavi lay within the realm of fundamentalism and reformism while Karroubi’s election platform had a more radical tone and content and was able to bring the opponents of the regime itself into the arena of the election struggle.

Following the election and the occurrence of violence at the hands of the regime’s leaders, Mousavi was forced to accept the stances of the reformists, but Karroubi acted outside the customary framework of the regime and the Constitution. Today, not even the most conservative segment of the Green Movement believes in the regime’s rhetoric and the possibility of effecting changes from within the existing constitutional framework.

If the freedom movement wishes to remain loyal to certain beliefs, such as negation of use of violence in any form and belief in progressive changes, it must remain --- structurally speaking --- as it stands now and, before it searches for more coherent leadership or organization or think tanks, it must take steps towards encouraging individual initiatives and towards strengthening the movement. If the slogan “Every soldier is a leader and every leader a soldier” --- which thus far, has been able to guarantee the pluralism of this movement --- changes, this will result in the movement’s disintegration.

Not negating and formally recognizing the existence of different viewpoints and actual differences within the movement as it stands now may be the way to guarantee the movement’s survival. Embracing the principle that meaningful change will take place only in phases and through the use of democratic instruments such as elections, referenda, and plebiscites is another of this movement’s features which must be emphasized in the coming months. Concurrently, it must be emphasized that even those who oppose the regime itself and demand fundamental changes will have the right to participate in the free elections called for by Mousavi and Karroubi. The chasm between “insiders” and “outsiders,” for 31 years a distinguishing feature of the current regime, must be excised from the political vocabulary of Iran, both rhetorically and actually, forever.

If we were to put forth a list-like action plan for the future of the Green Movement, we could put the following at the top of that list: the wearing out of the increasingly insupportable regime and creating schisms among the regime’s supporters, in combination with concurrent efforts towards the establishment and strengthening of national solidarity.

Needless to say, the Green Movement has had other shortcomings, which it must rectify as it enters its second year. At the top of the list of shortcomings is the need for the geographic expansion of the Green Movement. The lack of participation in the Green Movement by residents of regions within Iran which include other --- that is, non-Persian --- ethnicities is one such shortcoming. If not properly addressed, lack of attention to the specific needs and demands of ethnic and religious minorities is another issue which could place countless roadblocks in the path of the movement. The Green Movement must make allowance for the participation in it of ethnic minorities a priority. Needless to say, these ethnic minorities’ political representatives must have a realistic view of this process and not expect to accomplish in one day what would normally take a century to accomplish.

Giving due attention to heretofore marginalized social classes must be on the Green Movement’s agenda too. Inattention to such marginalized elements and postponement of the demands of the various ethnicities and classes within society, alongside negligence towards foreign policy, have been two important reasons why the freedom movement did not expand more quickly last year. Geographic expansion of the Green Movement is the only way for it to address the existing asymmetry in the balance of power between the regime and the people and to change it to its own advantage.