‎

Hossein Mohammadi

Alireza Rajai is an activist who helped form the Iranian opposition movement known as ‎the National-Religious group. We spoke with him about the forthcoming presidential ‎elections in Iran in June 2009. Here are the excerpts.‎

Rooz (R): Have reformers who have been driven from power for four years now, done ‎anything to strengthen civil society in the country?‎

Alireza Rajai (AR): Changes in come slowly. Many, who had the goal of creating a civil ‎society, including many of us journalists who heard these goals, were under the ‎impression that creating a civil society was similar to launching a dam or some project ‎that had to take place within a defined period of time. But activities that take place within ‎a civil society are at the root level and comprehensive, and they are not as visible. ‎Something like the rotation of the earth that we do not feel at a given time.‎

R: If we wanted to engage in a form replication, what country in the world has similar ‎conditions to those in Iran? In the beginning of the reform period, many compared Iran’s ‎conditions with those in the Soviet Union.‎

AR: From the structural and ideology-driven perspective, similarities with the Soviet ‎Union were not wrong. In economic terms, however, Iran is a more underdeveloped ‎country. It is a single commodity economy with not very healthy activities. But from a ‎political perspective one can say that the process of democratization is partly in conflict ‎with an ideologic regime which tries to prevent the entry of new forces into it or to push ‎back older forces that are already inside the regime for whatever reason.‎

R: What about from the economic perspective?‎

AR: We are a single-commodity economy with reliance on oil, which to a large extent ‎allows the government to make unilateral decisions, and because of which its civil society ‎too is very weak. On the other hand, I must say that since we have already passed one ‎stage of capitalism in Iran, civil society in Iran is relatively more open than that in the ‎Soviet Union. This means that our forces are more dispersed while each is very weak in ‎its own sphere. So we have more diversity. Even if Iranian society is closed, its civil ‎society has always had its protesting dimension.‎

R: Can these diverse forces have a common foci?‎

AR: Do you mean a specific person?‎

R: Yes, something who is accepted by all the forces. Someone like Nelson Mandela.‎

AR: In view of conditions in Iran and those of the ruling regime which carries the weight ‎of a major revolution, in which all groups and classes have participated, our changes too ‎must be consistent with the peculiarities of the revolution. This is because there are still ‎many people who support the revolution. If we wanted to find a common denominator, ‎perhaps one can name Mr. Khatami to be that person.‎

R: Can Mr. Khatami’s presence in the regime be constructive?‎

AR: The presence of a pro-democracy person in the regime can be constructive.‎

R: Can this pro-democracy person be somebody else, Mr. Karubi or Mr. Nouri, as ‎examples?‎

AR: If they really believe that they can get the votes, then they should participate. But by ‎that I mean so many votes that if what they say happened in the last elections and votes, ‎including rigging, would not affect it. The number of votes must be much higher than the ‎competitors.‎

R: So one main reason you support Mr. Khatami is that you think he has the greatest ‎chance of victory?‎

AR: Mr. Khatami will definitely get the vote.‎