This week we talked about Khatami and the reform movement in Iran. For this post, you will need to answer one or more of the following three questions:
1. Describe some of the impediments Khatami experienced during his presidency. Why did the reformists "fall," so to speak?
2. Do you feel that the "dialogue of civilizations" is an idea that can succeed in the world we live in? How does it deviate from our Western mode of thinking? Use citations from Khatami's text, located in the reader.
3. Do you think Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999?
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For the past two days I've been reflecting upon Khatami's presidency and the videos that were shown in class. It is true that he was restrained in his power by the supreme leader Khamenei, surely he was not able to achieve all that he wanted. I also accept that he did soften to some extent the rules that his predecessors established. However, I can't help but reject the idea that he was a "good" leader (for lack of better word). It is not just him I am attacking, it is all reformists. In a political system ruled by corruption, trying to "reform", to "change", to "soften" its laws is not only in vain, it is deceiving. All that Khatami "softened" in reality was Iranian anger, resentment; the very emotions that could have led to a possible revolution. The idea that I'm trying to convey is that Katami provided a minuscule fraction of what Iranians wanted, this appeased hostility against the government, and hence strengthened a dishonest and criminal regime.
Khatami did experience many impediments throughout his presidency, and he made this clear when he said," a crisis every nine days." The crises he described were not the one's left by his predecessor, president Rafsanjani, but the ones that he had created for himself. Khatami promised far more than anyone in Iran could have possibly lived up too, and this became a reality for him, but not soon enough. His emphasis on human rights and civil liberties were noble, but were unrealistically drawn up, and the Iranian government could not maintain nor enforce them. This led to near anarchy and the collapse of the Khatami dream. Despite the acquisitions of several allies, Khamati's efforts to give Iran a high position in global politics was futile because of iran's instability in politics, which would just become another liability for surrounding nations.
I believe that Khatami was bound by the structure of his government. It seemed that Khatami was intent on bring many liberal and revolutionary ideas into the political structure of Iran as well as the every day lives of the Iranian people. But due to Khamenei's ability to veto any decree of Khatami's. Also, it was extremely difficult for a reformist like Khatami to negotiate with the highly traditional branches of parliment and the religious elite. Khatami was forced to play the fine line between his desire for reform and pandering to the religious conservatives in Iran. It appeared to me from the videos that Khatami tried extremely hard to bring reforms into Iran and was met with the challenge posed by the other sections of Iran's government.
Khatami was elected at a time when Iranians were still discontent about the Iranian Revolution and still suffering from the Iran-Iraq War, which devastated the economy and caused over a million deaths. People hoped that Khatami would bring Iran toward democracy, and create an environment of tolerance.
Khatami did have some successes in the early part of his presidency. He eased social restrictions imposed by the clerics and encouraged Iranians to speak out. Hundreds of pro-reform newspapers sprouted and, for the first time, debates about democracy flourished at universities. But the hard-liners attacked the democracy movement, closing dozens of reformist newspapers and arresting hundreds of intellectuals and students. And Khatami did not challenge the hard liners.
After last class, I do understand now that Khatami was restricted. Iran's theocratic system, which grants final say in all matters to its supreme leader, restricted his ability to make major changes. I think he would have liked to make more changes but fell short because of how complex the government is.
His biggest failure as president was not siding with the student reformers and keeping them from being attacked. This caused a collapse in his presidency.
I would like to believe that a "dialogue of civilizations" could be possible in the world we live in. We should be able to solve disputes by negotiation and dialogue and not by "guns and rifles." Khatami's program stressed the importance of mutual respect and equality that Iran was willing to tear down "the wall of mutual mistrusts." Khatami also stressed the importance in understanding Western culture and not simply avoiding it all together. Khatami argued that Iranians should become familiar with Western civilization and embrace its achievements in development and modernity. While Khatami argued that certain parts of Western civilization should be embraced, he also argued that the West and other nations should treat Iran and an independent nation capable of resolving their own internal affairs.
This sort of dialogue seems to be one-sided. It's hard to imagine a case in which the U.S. for example would want to adopt any sort of Eastern ideals. The West and the U.S. in particular constantly involve themselves in other nation's internal affairs, ignoring their independence (the 1953 Coup, for example). It seems as if the Western mode of thinking in intent on exporting its own ideals to other nations which isn't really a dialogue of civilizations.
Resolving disputes through a “dialogue of civilizations” is theoretically possible. Yet, practically speaking, it is very often ineffectual, especially when the issues are deeply rooted in the ambitions of the involved parties. As exemplified by recent American-Iranian relations, religious and historical factors often render non-coercive methods of political pressure futile. Khatami writes, “We have vacillated between the equally harmful extremes of either being taken in and entranced by the West, or loathing and rejecting it”. When the sentiment of the government resembles the latter, the influence of reason and diplomacy will be limited. Although the current Iranian government probably does not “loathe” the United States, it is undoubtedly dubious of the latter’s motives when it comes to addressing concerns such as nuclear development and human rights in Iran. It will therefore be less inclined to abide by the desires of the Americans, especially if there are no concrete consequences (e.g. sanctions) of defying them. Khatami himself proclaimed, “…we shall stand firm against any power who may seek to impose its will on us”.
In response to the second question, I do not believe that resorting to force is unique to Western political ideology. The United States simply has the resource and tactical capacity to address threats – however distant or improbable – so it chooses to prioritize force over prolonged and often futile dialogue. Especially because the United States government is operating within this “war on terror” paradigm, it has the tendency to be intransigent about achieving its ends. Such a tendency deters it from compromising and makes it believe that is holds the moral high ground in all situations. There are cases in which force is a necessity, but establishing the exact criteria for when it is justified is difficult. It is, however, safe to say that in the contemporary world force is too readily employed.
It would be fair to say that Khatami's power, at the end of the day, is nominal in comparisons to the supreme leader. If this is a fair statement, then it is very difficult to argue either for or against him as a successful president. It is true he enjoyed various accomplishments during his terms as president, but these accomplishments must all be qualified. To respond to the criticism Khatami was taking at his goodbye speech. I think it would be fair to assume those student understand the political apparatus of Iran. I also this it would be fair to assume they they care greatly about their country (from their willingness to treat their former president in such a rude manner). If both of my assumptions are correct, I have two arguments to make. First, the students are acting irrationally and absurdly. The reason I say this is simple, they know Khatami holds very little power, they know any president of Iran will hold very little power. Knowing this and then taking advantage of Khatami's patience makes me wonder what the motive is. If they are truly revolutionary and are fed up with the system why not mobilize against the supreme leader? If one were to say well thats dangerous, I would dismiss that as an unfounded justification (a.historically students of Iran have undertaken action and b. very little change is going to come if you go after a figure head who holds little power). The second point, we have to appreciate the fact that his goodbye speech was not given in-front of a representation of the population of the country. These were students, like any students of any nation, they get "excited" easily, they are mobilizable. Im curious to know what the wide spread perception of Khatami was during and now after his presidency.
Khatami was condemned by one of the great flaws of human nature: inability to accept a changing agenda. The people heard Khatami declare that he would change their lives. He set goals and had ideas for their future. Once he was in his position, however, he was restrained by the supreme leader Khamenei. The president can only do so much; in his case, Khatami could not change everything. He was a reformer in a time when people wanted and expected results that could only come from a revolution. Therefore, people eventually rejected Khatami because he had to change his position; he could not change everything that he wanted to. People do not like that. It is evident in every government; citizens do not like to see a leader go back on his word. Would we rather have leaders that adapt to situations and ability, or leaders that stick to their initial proposal no matter how unlikely they are to succeed? I am in no way trying to support Bush, by the way, but I think we all need to realize the irrationality with which people judge political leaders.
3. Do you think Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999?
I think that the student uprising of 1999 revealed how paradoxical Khatami's stance was.
He was elected with a program that advertised for much of the ideas that the liberal students (and the very large share of the iranian people that voted for him ) supported, but failed to enforce it. As we've seen in class, it was largely because he was restrained in his powers.But I think there was no chance that Khatami was going to support the students and/or push much harder for reform anyway, given his deep attachement to the principles of the Islamic Republic.
To prentend to be willing to take action to reform this regime from inside, one had to be either hypocritical or trully naive, given the pattern of the regime (no actual power for the president) and the political context of the time (no strong coalition around Khatami). Furthermore, why would Khatami have supported a movement that was not broadly supported by the iranian people (as we saw, only students in cities were involved).
Thus I think that Khatami's decision not to support the students made sense according to both his hypocritical/naive stand towards reforming the regime, and to the context of the time.
I think in some ways, Khatami could not avoid denouncing the student protesters. Considering that his main goal was to change the system from within, leading another revolution would, to his mind, probably have been counterproductive. Khatami probably also recognized that having another revolution might lead to much the same amount of bloodshed the original revolution caused, with reprisals, different progressive factions fighting, and the leader having to exercise a firm hand in all affairs. Khatami denounced the students on principle. By working within the system, democracy and freedom would have legitimacy. Democracy, for Khatami, could not come from violent revolution.
Do you think Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999?
Revolution and change are words that resonate stronger in younger minds. It is beautiful when it happens and something positive comes out of it. However, at least in the Latin American case it just meant disappearances, extraditions, broken families and the spill of blood from brothers.
In this sense, although it sounds conservative, I think Khatami's decision was correct. With the accelerated overview of the history of Iran, it seems there was almost no rest for their people from international or national confrontations, and that this would have meant little support to potential revolution. Besides, there did not seem to leaders that could bring this to a solid and better state for the country which was another reason for the lack of support.
However, I must say that the spirit of this movement is changing Iran. I think that the resistance of the young to the social codes and their questioning of the system is what will be the force that will bring Iran to the equilibrium between conservative and reformist, if that equilibrium can exist.
Khatami, to me, seemed a great father. I really was touched by the video when he is in front of the student audience. I try to put myself in his position and it seemed that was something of great courage, something that reflects his original idea of reform.
3. Do you think Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999?
In his presidential inaugural speech Khatami relates that Ali (RA) had directed the people in 7 matters and goes on to list them. They consisted of the following:
“Do not praise me, so that I can fulfill the rights that are left unrealized and perform the obligations that are left undone.
Do not address me the way despots are addressed, and do not avoid me as the ill-tempered are treated.
Do not approach me with an air of artificiality, and do not think that I find the truth offensive.
I do not want you to revere me.
He who finds listening to complaints difficult will surely find administration of justice even more so.
Therefore, do not hesitate in telling the truth or in advising me on matters of justice.
I am neither above fallibility nor am I immune to error in my conduct, unless God safeguards me from the self, over which He commands more control than I.”
He then went on to say: “Such being the case in the eyes of Imam Ali (peace be upon him), the infallible (????) exemplar of justice of all times, undoubtedly it is much more difficult for common human beings like us.” (pgs. 84-85)
I can’t think of anything more pertinent to Khatami’s ordeal with the student uprising of 1999. Khatami acknowledges that he, being a common human being, is prone to error and so will not always do what’s expected of him. It’s evident that he didn’t make the right choice and had (rightfully) subsequently suffered for his mistakes. The fact that Khatami was a popularly elected official and that he had faced accountability for his actions, in my opinion, is representative of everything that is right with the Iranian government.
On the other hand, the presence of the grand Ayatollahs and their “supreme” rule is seemingly unnecessary, undemocratic and unIslamic. I can’t imagine any of the Ayatollahs ever being confronted like Khatami had been with the angry students and those who supported them. The Ayatollahs are common human beings yet their unreasonably high position in Iran would suggest they are considered otherwise. If the beloved Ali (RA) had advised the people to advise him on matters of justice, emphasized his fallibility and had encouraged the people to come to him with their complaints then the Ayatollahs should be expected to do the same.
I am not quite sure if Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999, but his decision does remind me of the Chinese Tiananmen Incident in which the Chiense government put down a student democratic movement. Today, people study about that event, but the debate of whether it was a "right" or "wrong" decision has cooled down because the Chinese economic growth to a certain extent prove the choice of stability correct (with reference to stagnation facing former communist country to name Russia)
Responding to one of my fellow classmate, I don't think a revolution will do much good to Iran. Economic growth and improvement of life come only when there is stability. Regardless of how minor the changes Khatami, I give him credit for starting the trend of reform. As we all know, what is most difficult is to get started.
I think Khatami faced impediments from both sides during his presidency because he was, in essence, the very definition of a moderate. The Islamic Republic hindered him because they thought he was too liberal and the students 'boo'ed him because he wasn't liberal enough.
He was trying to reform a system that was build to be unreformable. Almost anything he did could be vetoed by the Supreme Leader and, if he pushed too hard, he could be kicked out of office and he wouldn't be able to do any good for the people.
The reformists seem to have "fallen" for several reasons. First, the man they thought would change everything appeared to have deserted them. Second, they were angry about the two options they had for who to elect, and so, they decided to boycott. And third, Ahmadinejad seems to have launched a very organized campaign to mobilize the military personnel into voting for him.
I don't think there was a choice to be made, for Khatami, in 1999. He has never wanted to overthrow the government, he wants to reform it from within. Supporting an uprising in the streets would not have accomplished any sort of internal reform, or opened 'dialogue' which he supports. Based on his motives, the decision he made would have seemed to be the only rational one for him.
Khatami may not have been the answer that people were seeking for Iran. But he definitely provided a chance for the west to embrace him and his approach to softening the regime from a radical one to a more moderate one. The US has taken advantage of similar opportunities in the past regarding China and Soviet Union, if we look at this from a historical standpoint, regardless of the leader's political anchors. But the US had different goals in mind for Iran, and Khatami was trying to negotiate with a government that had little interest in arbitration and had more hegemonic concerns of ruling the region.
I don't think that Khatami was wrong for not supporting the student revolution. Though I think he probably agreed with what the students were fighting for, he had to look at the situation more rationally. The changes Khatami was making were coming more slowly than the students and I'm sure he would have liked but there was progress nonetheless. In order for the student protests to be effective, there needed to be a larger portion of the population involved. I believe that Khatami realized that the only way to continue progress was to keep on going through the system as he had been. In supporting the students he would have only condemned and alienated himself even further from those who really held the power. Ultimately I feel that the only good that would have come from supporting the students would have been their continued support of him. I don't mean to devalue their intentions but in the end I think that it was probably in the students' best interest that he did not support them for likely no good could have come of it.
1. Describe some of the impediments Khatami experienced during his presidency. Why did the reformists "fall," so to speak?
Although Mohammed Khatami was elected with a high degree of popular support, he faced an overwhelming amount of opposition from a number of key state institutions over which he had no influence, most notably the judiciary, state-owned television and radio and police/military forces. These forces opposed Khatami and his efforts to liberalize Iranian civil society and establish a rule of law (ala the constitution of the Islamic Republic). As Khatami himself put it, his presidency had to deal with one “national crisis” on average of every nine days. These national crises included the serial murders of political revolutionaries and the closing of 20 reformist newspapers by the judiciary. In many ways Khatami’s presidency represents a huge power struggle between the Iranian reformists and a coalition of anti-reformist forces. Khatami’s failures and the “fall” of the reformists is thus the result of Khatami having lost the power struggle which defined his presidency.
Yes. I strongly believe that a "dialogue of civilizations" is not only possible in our current geopolitical reality, but absolutely essential if any kind of meaningful or sustainable peace is to be achieved. Khatami suggests that true development and transformation can only occur with vigorous public participation, deep thinking, and a "mutual honesty, trust, and confidence" between the government and the people (Reader 90). This extends to his vision of international cooperation; Khatami believes that Iranian modernity is inextricably linked to Western thinking, values, temperament, and wisdom. Thus, he asks Iranians to "become familiar with Western civilization, to be in touch with its spirit...to incorporate [it's] achievements, instead of trying to circumvent them" (Reader 75). However, Khatami also makes clear that Western models of development have shortcomings and drawbacks that can be detrimental to the future creation of an Islamic Democracy. Thus, for Khatami, the West is not a blueprint for Iranian modernity, but a guide that reveals both valuable understanding and avoidable mistakes.
This clearly deviates from certain modes of Western thinking, especially those advocated by conservative political theorists such as Samuel Huntington. In "Clash of Civilizations," Huntington naturalizes tension between Islam and the West by positioning the faultlines of ongoing global violence and misunderstanding between Europe and the Middle East. He imagines this conflict to be deeply historical and cultural, and suggests that dialogue is impossible between nations whose interests are so diametrically opposed. This mindset has characterized much of U.S. foreign policy in the 20th and 21st centuries. In particular, it is hard to imagine the U.S. adopting any Eastern practices or values in an effort to improve inter- and intra-governmental dialogue. Further, the United States insists on a policy of expansion and export that only serves to aggravate diplomatic solutions to ongoing political conflicts in the Middle East.
Having said this, I am wary of monolithic constructions of Iran or the West, and am certain that Khatami's views have more in common with the average American than one might think.
As a leader, and in regards to his own benefit, I do not think it was in Khatemi's interest to not support the student interest. Since the students were in his interest in the first place, it does not make sense that he would not side with them. As a leader, if he did side with them early on, I feel that the riots would have taken a less harsh route. I feel that with his "political self" trying to be in tact, he lost an important battle.
Khatami made a mistake by not supporting the student uprisings in 1999. If Khatami had supported the students, he would have gained the upper hand in the struggle between the reformists and the conservatives. After failing to support the students, Khatami was seen as the president who had the capability to change the regime from the inside but instead protected the regime. Although Khamenei was the person who would decide the destiny of the reform movement,if Khatami had supported the students Khamenei would not have stood up agains him, since he had twenty million supporters.
3. Do you think Khatami made the right choice by not supporting the student uprising of 1999?
Khatami did make the right choice in not supporting the student uprising of 1999. Though a moving and influential group, the student population represented only a fraction of the entire Iranian people. A political leader can never please everyone, especially Khatami who at times had his hands tied behind his back by the power of the supreme leader. Khatami promised great changes and when those changes were not manifested, naturally an uproar occurred. However, in a country as unstable as Iran and with too many fighitng sides and opinions, a revolution from Khatami would have instigated even further chaos and revolts. He had to take a slower approach to changing Iran, and in doing so he had to reject the student protest.
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