Hamid Taqvaee
First published in Farsi on July 20, 2018
It was on the news that a coalition by the name of the Council of Advocates of Democracy in Iran has held its second conference in the German city of Cologne. A look at the composition of the participants and the declaration at the end of the conference shows what kind of “democracy advocacy” we are dealing with here. Attending the Conference to discuss “democracy” in the “multinational” country of Iran werethe Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan, the Democratic Guarantee Party of Ahwaz, the Cultural-Political Association of Azarbayjan, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (of Iran), the People’s Party of Balouchestan, the Turkman Cultural-Political Association, the United Front of Balouchestan, the Unity Party of Lorestan, Kohkilouyeh and Boyerahmad, as well as a number of other similar organisations. They were there to declare that “for the first time in the history of national political organisations in Iran” they recognise “the ethnic identities in Iran as reflected in nationalities and ethnic groups”, and are asking for equal rights for nationalities and ethnic groups in a federal government.
This is not a recipe for “democracy” by any definition. It is, rather, a scenario for turning the society into a mosaic, and whipping up ethnic, nationalist, tribal and religious conflicts. A scenario, whose catastrophic consequences we are clearly seeing today in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria.
Democracy: from the French Revolution to the New World Order
“Democracy”has never, even during the French Revolution and at the very beginning of the formation of nation states, in the confrontation of the young European bourgeoisie with medieval states, meant freedom for members of society, even in the judicial sense of the word. For instance, the right to vote of 50% of society, i.e. women, was recognised in Britain, the U.S. and many European countries only after the October Revolution and under the influence of that revolution (France, the cradle of the Great Revolution and the wellspring of civil society, recognised women’s voting right only in 1944). Throughout the cold war period “democracy” served as the banner for confronting Communism and the Soviet bloc. It was another name, not only for the Western bloc against the Eastern bloc, but for suppressing left and communist movements and organisations, and any voice of protest and any demand for rights and freedoms against the sway of capital everywhere. The most savagedictatorships, that of Pinochet in Chile or the Shah in Iran as well as military juntas in Latin America and lifelong presidencies in Africa and Asia, were regarded as part of “democracy”.
From the last decades of the last century, and specifically after the collapse of the Soviet Union, “democracy” found a new reactionary meaning and usage. This was the period of the unleashing of free market capitalism and the export of “democracy” by means of military assault with bombs and missiles on Iraq and Afghanistan. Also in terms of its substance, democracy was officially assigned a new reactionary meaning: amplification of ethnic-religious identities and the creation of some kind of socio-political balance among different tribes, ethnicities and nationalities in society. This was the finishing shot, not only in the head of any illusions about democracy and its connection to freedom, but to civilisation and civil society as a whole.
On the theoretical level, this kind of ethno-religious democracy had its roots in postmodernism and multiculturalism. Civil society, at least in theory, is based on the concept of the citizen and one-person one-vote. The intellectual leaders of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution defended civil society and the nation state based on the recognition of citizenship rights of all members of society (albeit, as mentioned, to the exclusion of women), irrespective of religion, ethnicity and race, in critique of and in opposition tothe ethno-religious and tribal societies of the feudal era. Postmodernism retreated from all these theoretical and intellectual foundations and adopted religious, ethnic and tribal identities as the basis for the definition of society and state.
The roots of postmodernism and ethnic democracy
Socially and politically, this retrogression from bourgeois civilisation into medieval barbarity was caused by two factors: first, the domination of capital over the entire world and the dissolution of pre-capitalist systems throughout the world, and, second, the objectives and interests of the world bourgeoisie in the post-cold war period.
The first factor explains the postmodernist political economy. As long as parts of the world, especially in Asian and African countries, in the so-called Third World – i.e., countries like Iran prior to the land reforms – were still under feudal and semi-feudal systems, Western capitalism needed a single, universal blueprint in the name and banner of progress, development and civilisation. To conquer new markets of labour and capital in the remotest corners of the world, the bourgeoisie had to spread Western cultural and social values globally. To export commodities and capital, first the political philosophy and values of civil society had to be exported. Against the feudal and semi-feudal systems of the Third World, happiness, freedom and liberation had to be defined and infused,modelled on the Westand on values of civilisation, civil society and democracy in the French Revolutionarysense. But when, from the middle of the last century, capital invaded the whole world, and the living conditions of the Third World people who had newly joined capitalism turned even worse than before, raising the banner of Western civilization was neither necessary nor desirable for the bourgeoisie.
This is the point at which the doctrine of postmodernism and cultural relativism becomesdominant in the political philosophy of the bourgeoisie in the West. Postmodernism is the doctrine and socio-political philosophy of the world bourgeoisie in the era of its total dominationof the world – a bourgeoisie that no longer, in any part of the world, has to deal with pre-capitalist systems and therefore does not need to export its philosophy and cultural values. On the contrary, in order to maintain its dominance, it has to define and advocate civilisation, happiness and liberation as something relative, regional, and, therefore, tribal, religious and ethnic. The bourgeoisie’s advocacy of civilisation and civility aimed to prepare the conditions for the export of commodities and capital. Now that this is already achieved, when all societies have turned capitalistic and there is no trace of civilisation, happiness and liberation, then civilisation and people’s expectation of freedom and happiness should be reduced to the level of their local traditions, customs and cultures. To globalise the economic system of capitalism, modernism spread the criticism of, and opposition to, medieval culture and values, while postmodernism, to maintain the reign of capital over all countries, defends medieval culture and values. Postmodernism is the re-emphasis of thisundeniable fact that the banner of defence of civilisation, freedom, happiness and universal human values is now squarely in the hands of the working class.
The second factor for the ascendance of postmodernism is the global political conditions after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.The bourgeoisie of the Western camp started its savage assault, not only on communism and socialism, but on the entire ideal of freedom and equality. The cobelligerent forces and the main instrument of the bourgeoisie in this crusade against humanity were the most vicious and reactionary religious, ethnic, nationalist and tribal forces and movements. From Yugoslavia to the former Soviet Asian republics, to the Islam-stricken countries of the Middle East and North Africa, it became an open field for the onslaught of these forces, and thus postmodernism found a new arena to parade itself politically and in practice.
The atrocities committed during this period, from the neighbour-killing war in Yugoslavia, to the genocide in Rwanda, and the emergence of the ultra-reactionary movement of political Islam in the Middle East and North Africa are all the direct or indirect outcome of the ‘New World Order’, and this new order was justified theoretically and strategically by postmodernism. Economically, during this period postmodernism was the theory that corresponded to the Chicago School and Friedmanism, i.e. the economic school advocating the total and unbridled rule of capital, entrusting all to market mechanism, cutting social services, and economic austerity for all countries. Thistheory was translated into government policy from the Thatcher and Reagan era, and, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, became rampantthroughout the world.
It is during this period that, even in statement and theory, the idea of civil society and the principle of one-person one-vote is abandoned and replaced by a hotchpotch of national-ethnic-religious mosaics in society and in state. The example of Iraq, with the structural and predetermined distribution of power between Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites, is a ghastly instance of postmodern democracy. The running amok of Islamic terrorism and other varieties of political Islam, even in European countries, is another example. As long as the Soviet camp existed, the West guarded democracy with anti-communist dictatorships, and after the dissolution of the Soviet Union it did so by emphasising theethnic(religious-tribal-national-racial) identity of members of society and letting their head figuresto partake in power. This is the nadir of the savagery and reactionary character of the bourgeoisie of our time.
What do homegrown ‘democracy’advocates want?
The actions of the homegrown democracy advocates should be examined in this New-World-Order context. This is not the democracy advocacy at the time of the Constitutional Revolution or of the 1950s’movement at the Mossadegh era in Iran. This is the tribal-religious-ethnic democracy advocacy of the period of the New World Order. Take a second look at the names of the participant groups in the conference. The very names of these groups ending with the suffix of “Kurd”, “Balouch”, “Turkman”, “Lak”, and “Boyrahmad and Kohkilooyeh” indicate what jumble we are dealing with – a mixture of ethnic groups, each of which is claiming a share of political power in the ‘multinational’ Iran, and -following the current fashion -calls this power-seeking ‘democracy’. In the political developments of the last century, from the Constitutional Revolution to the 1979 revolution, the forces and parties that lay claim to democracy acted in the name of constitution, freedom, independence, justice, liberation of the nation and such like notions; and the reactionary forces supporting the status quo, from the defenders of Sharia against the Constitutional Revolution to Khomeini, appealed to religion, ethnicity, tribalism and sectarianism. Today, this ethnocentrism is no longer the monopoly of the ruling dictators. ‘Democracy in opposition’is also represented by this ethnic-religious banner. This is the peak of the decay of the bourgeoisie both in power and in opposition.
The politics of defending the interests of different social groups such as women, LGBT+, blacks, etc. is called identity politics. The identities of women, blacks or LGBT+are objective and real, and, therefore, identity politics in this sense can be quite fair and defensible. But those forces who base their politics on acquired and contrived identities, such as nationality, ethnicity, religion, race and so on, can lay no claim to being legitimate, rightful or progressive. Their very existence signifies a retreat from the civilisation and civility of our time and even from the very ‘democracy’ that they claim to advocate. Presenting Iranian society as a ‘multinational’ country including Kurdish, Persian, Arab, Balouchi, Turk, Turkman, and, recently, also Lak, etc., irrespective of any intentionof its advocates, is a retreat from civil society – what, over a hundred years ago, was championed by the Constitutional Revolution – into medieval, tribal societies. The name of thistribalsystem of governmenttoday is federalism.
Ethnic democracy and federalism
The ethnic-tribal forces in Iran call for federalism. Speaking as self-appointed representatives of ethnic-tribal groups, these forces regard the federal system as securing democracy and equality for thosegroups in ‘multicultural’ Iran.In the conditions of today, federalism has assumed a meaning different from the federalism of earlier times, such as during the formation of the federal republic of Switzerland or the Unite States of America, or federal Germany. In the past, federalism was an attempt to form larger societies or nations through the voluntary joining together and unification of smaller national and ethnic groups. It is the opposite now: federalism is a recipe for ethnic division and dissection of already existing societies, and, as in the case of Yugoslavia, the recipe for their disintegration. As in the case of democracy, federalism has no relation to the nation-state building projects of the bourgeoisie in its youth. It is now an entirely reactionary design, serving retrogressionto medieval systems.
As far as the specific conditions in Iran are concerned, federalism is a bashful form of self-determination plans by lesser nationalist trends including, and specifically, Kurdish nationalism. This is a scenario for the participation of these trends in local power without specifically mentioning the right to separation that, not only for Persian nationalism, but for all nationalist-ethnic trends is considered a taboo – and without mentioning Kurdish self-determination that limits the issue to a single region and reminds Persian nationalism of secessionism. Kurdish nationalism wants to include everybody to give its local power and government a nation-wide semblance of justification. It fills a prescription for all nationalities and ethnicities – from the Turks and Turkmans and Balouchis to the newly discovered identity of Lakestan and Kohkilouye and Boyrahmad – in order to avail itself of local power. Self-determination for Kurdistan is substituted with federalism for Iran, because it appears more modern and up-to-date, is inspired by the ethnic government in Iraqi Kurdistan, and, more importantly, fits into the postmodern strategy of the American government for concocting mosaic societies, particularly in the Middle East. In such a case, Persian nationalist trends can also relax and participate in seminars, conferences and coalitions about the federal society of the multinational Iran without worrying about the territorial integrity and the secessionism and waywardness of “the gallant frontier guards!”
This entire charade is taking place in the context of the post-cold war strategy of the American bourgeoisie and its allies.
Advocating democracyin the context of the policies of the Western bourgeoisie
Right-wing parties and forces, such as the royalists and the Mojahedin, and Kurdish, Balouchi, Turkman and other parties with ethnic identity, have always relied on Western governments and specifically the U.S. to achieve their goals.Their efforts for power sharing has, from regime-change scenarios to ‘creating crisis’ at the borders, to participating in regional groupings and blocs, have corresponded to Western policies at any juncture. They have thus tried to, within the framework of Western policies for the region, find themselves a niche in the current and future politics of Iran.
The spectrum of royalist-republican forces, the People’s Mujahedin and ethnic forces have each in their own way aimed for the same, but the common denominator of all of them has been attracting the attention and support of Western governments and particularly of the U.S. The importance of claims to democracy, human rights and federalism in their political propaganda and discourse, more than having to do with the political import and meaning of these words, is related to playing the game within the legitimate and accepted framework of Western powers. Democracy is the code word for their allegiance to the Western camp and constructed alternatives supported by the West: democracy in its current post-cold war and postmodernist sense.
These policies and efforts of the right, particularly in the current situation of Iran, when the prospect of the downfall of the Islamic Republic by the people’s revolution is in sight,corresponds and adjusts itself to the constructed alternatives of Western powers, in particular the U.S. Mujahedin’s recent conference in Paris, the secret meeting between “brother Mustafa Hejri” and “brother Abdullah Mohtadi”, personalities of Kurdish nationalism, with Reza Pahlavi [the son of the late Shah of Iran], and the conference of advocates of democracy in Cologne are among such efforts. Ethnic-religious-nationalist forces constitute suitable material for the advancement of the policies of Western governments, especially in the Middle East.
As relates to the Islamic Republic, the West has always tried to use such forces as leverage to pressure the Islamic Republic and place it within the framework of its regional policies. In particular, as far as the nationalist Kurdish trends in the region are concerned, part of them are already siding with the U.S. and its allies in Syria, Iraq and Turkey, and another part have moved close to the Erdogan government and the Islamic Republic. These developments present a similar scenario to the American government and the Kurdish nationalist forces in relation to Iran following the dissolution or downfall of the Islamic Republic. The strategists of the U.S. and its nationalist-ethnic-religious allies in Iran and the region imagine that the post-Islamic Republic in Iran can be a mosaic society, a government consisting of ethnic-religious forces in a “multi-national” country. For bourgeois trends and governments this is a ready and tested scenario to confront the danger of the left and the surge to power of communist forces in the course of current developments and in the wake of the downfall of the Islamic Republic. It is therefore, from the point of view of the local, regional and international bourgeoisie, a highly attractive scenario. What is missing in such reactionary relations and designs is the other characteristic of Iranian society, that is, the active presence and the social influence of worker-communism. We will not allow such postmodernist scenarios to have any place in the future of Iran.
What do the people want?
No matter what ethnicity, nationality or religion the people throughout Iran may consider themselves to belong to or may have been labelled with, they want to be rid of the Islamic Republic, andseek freedom, equality and prosperity for all. The latest evidence for this is the current movement for the overthrow of the regime.
Since December 2017, a movement has taken shape in Iran, which is in the process of deepening and expanding and is directly targeting the entire present system of the Islamic Republic and its very existence. In the first upsurge, the people came out on the streets in more than ninety cities with the slogan “we do not want the Islamic Republic”, and today this slogan has turned into the core demand of the uprisings in the cities and theclashes with the security forces of the regime. Poverty, unemployment, the high cost of living, the disenfranchisement of women, the domination of religion over the social and private life of the people, the embezzlement and corruption by the authorities, the destruction of the environment, lack of water, land appropriations and forest appropriations, and stealing workers’ wages, as well as thousands of other social problems, make no distinction between Persian, Kurd, Arab and Turk. All these adversities are squeezing the lives of everybody in the entire political geography of Iran, and, therefore, have given rise to a united,vast movement throughout Iran.
From the point of view of the content of the demands and slogans, this nationwide movement is fundamentally left and radical, and there is no room for national-ethnic-religious identities or identity-manufacturingin this movement or in Iranian society as a whole. From this point of view, Iranian society is different from other Islam-stricken societiesin one radical and decisive way: In Iran the main material for mosaic scenarios and religious, ethnic and tribal governments and societies, i.e. political Islam, is already in power. Therefore, the profound anti-religious tendency and the demand for being free from religious, ethnic and tribal governments and forces is a vast and strong tendency in the society as a whole. Modernism, secularism and atheism, love of music, science and art, as well as progressive Western culture and universal human values have pride of place in people’s ideals and demands and in their protests. The prospect and realistic possibility after the Islamic Republic is not the Syriaization orIraqizationof Iran, but the opposite: the Iranization of Iraq and Syria. An Iran liberated from the nightmare of the Islamic Republic and the Islamic state would fuel and strengthen secular, anti-religious and freedom lovingmovements in the entire region. The 2009 movement in Iran was the source of inspiration for the so-called Arab Spring revolutions, and this time the revolution that is about to overthrow the Islamic Republic will deliver a mortal blow to all the ethnic-religious forces and governments in the region.
Clearly, under such circumstances ethnic forces holding the banner of ‘New World Order’ democracy and their mosaic federalism will have no relevance. Emphasis on ethnic identities, the multi-nationalism of society, federalism, democracy, territorial integrity, etc., are the preoccupation and discourse, not of the people but of right-wing opposition forces. The experience of the 1979 revolution is very telling when we speak about the tendencyof the masses of the people. In that revolution people’s councils formed everywhere, in the factories, universities and even in government offices and the army. People associated freedom and liberation with the councils, not with parliament and parliamentary democracy. Today, when resorting to democracy has sunk to the level of compromise and wheeling and dealing among ethnic forces, and society has moved far more to the left and become far more radical, this is true even more than four decades ago.
Nonetheless, one should not write offthe efforts of right-wing forces for manufacturing ethnic identities. Nationalism is a virus that can become active under favourable conditions, and within a short period of time bring about a horrific catastrophe and bloody neighbour-killing, as it did in Yugoslavia, which, whatever problems it had, national, ethnic and religious animosities were not among them. The way to neutralise this virus is the constant criticism and exposure of nationalism in any form and manifestation, and putting emphasis onuniversal human values and ideals. This is a priority of our party, particularly at the present moment.
What can be done to eradicate national oppression?
No doubt national oppression and national-religious discrimination is rife in Iranian society. But the solution for eradicating these injustices is recognition of equal rights for all citizens, not to manufacture identities and emphasise ethnic, national and religious identities. The solution is recognising absolutely equal rights irrespective of identities and manufactured national, ethnic and religious identities, for all members of society and recognition of secession in conditions when the national problem has become so extreme that peaceful co-existence of the members of societyhas become impossible.
This is the only civilised and humane solution to national oppression and discrimination in Iran and any other country in the present era. Other scenarios, from federalism to self-determination and self-rule, irrespective of the intentions of the supporters of such plans, not only fail to solve national discrimination and oppression, but make it institutional and structural. Against the sanctity of territorial integrity upheld by the Persian bourgeoisie, and the suppression of every protest against national discrimination in the name of separatism and endangering the integrity of Iran, the taboo of independence and secession should be broken. Wherever a national problem exists(in present-day Iran these conditions only prevail in Kurdistan) a referendum should take place under free and democratic conditions, and if people of the region vote for secession their vote should be recognised. The answer to the dominant nationalism, with its bludgeon of territorial integrity,is not federalism and plans for a mosaic government; it is, rather, the recognition of the right to secession.
Worker-communism’s plan to solve the Kurdish problem is the demand for a referendum under free conditions. It would therefore recognise whatever the outcome of the referendum may be, and would strongly oppose any use of violence and military attack against people who wish to separate. Meanwhile, under the present conditions, we recommend the co-existence of the Kurdish people with the rest of the Iranian people. Objectively and realistically, the common cause, being part of the same struggle and sharing the same destiny with the rest of the Iranian people, are far deeper for the Kurdish people to want to make their liberation and freedom contingent on separation from Iran. The future of the people of Kurdistan lies not in nationalist groupings and activities in the region, but in the nationwide revolution of the Iranian people for pulling down the Islamic Republic. The experience of the Iraqi Kurdistan, and working-class and civil struggles in the cities of Iranian Kurdistan clearly show that the way for the liberation of the working people of Kurdistan, like that of the rest of the people of Iran, goes, not through mosaic scenarios that groups like the Council of Democracy Advocates seek and preach, but through the unitedstruggle and common destiny of all Iranian people. We witnessed this clearly in the 1979 revolution; and in the revolution that lies ahead we will certainly witness, even more than before, the common struggle of the entire Iranian people. Worker-communism guarantees this.
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