Once again Iran has seen a brave mass movement against hardship, oppression and a rotten elite. Thousands have been killed. The turn of the year saw a new upsurge of resistance against the impact of an economic downward spiral and opposition to dictatorship met with a new wave of repression by the often-brutal theocratic Iranian regime. The exact casualty numbers are yet unknown but reports of those killed start at over 3,000, overwhelmingly protesters and bystanders. Ali Khamenei, Iran’s unelected ‘Supreme Leader’, cynically blamed the protestors when he spoke on January 17 of “several thousand” being killed. The numbers arrested seem to be over 20,000.
The regime’s ferocity can only be understood against the background of an unpopular dictatorial regime ruling a country in economic, social and political turmoil.
The latest protests were the seventh time in eight years that the regime has faced spontaneous movements, albeit in differing sizes, composition and duration. This time, triggered by the announcement of the government’s 2026/7 budget and the continuing slump in the Iranian currency’s value, in a matter of days protests rapidly spread across the country, The trigger for this spontaneous action was when, on December 28, traders and workers in Tehran’s Bazaar protested, co-incidentally eight years to the day from when protests against an increase in fuel prices broke out in 2017.
Soon this became the biggest protest since the ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ movement that erupted in 2002 after Mahsa Amini’s murder while in the custody of the ‘morality police’. She was seized for dressing ‘improperly’. The end of 2025 and the start of 2026 saw this new movement rapidly develop as students, workers and others joined in the demonstrations. While not initially mass protests, they quickly spread to many cities and towns across the country.
An important factor in Iran’s economic crisis is effect of the sanctions levied by the US in 1987 and then expanded by the UN in 2006, to make Iran halt its uranium enrichment programme. The 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal between Iran and the major world powers led to a cut in some of the sanctions. But then in 2018 Iran’s economy was again hit when Trump, during his first term in office, increased sanctions as he withdrew the US from the JCPOA deal. The Democrat Biden presidency continued this policy. Then last year Britain, France and Germany led the way in the UN to reimposing the sanctions lifted after 2015.
Currently inflation in Iran is rampant; in 2025 it officially was 42% overall and 72% for food. Unemployment is formally over 8% but over 20% for young people. But these latest protests were not simply over economic grievances. The powerful ‘Woman. Life, Freedom’ movement showed that demands for social and political freedom are also key issues for large numbers of Iranians.
A particular factor in Iran’s current crisis concerns water supplies. The combined impact of climate change and weak infrastructure has been severe water shortages in different parts of the country. There has been recent discussion of whether a new capital should be built in the south of the country because of the falling water supply in Tehran. A few months ago, the president was talking of evacuating some of the Tehran’s 10 million inhabitants if a drought did not break. Fortunately, some rain fell but the basic problem remains.
The regime knows it is unpopular, in some senses isolated and rejected by many. In the last presidential election in 2024, under 40% voted in the first round and, of those who voted, over a million spoiled their ballots.
At the same time, the regime does have an ideological basis of support; a religious base mixed in with an ‘anti-imperialist’ populism. In an attempt to boost its support the regime has added a recent addition of Persian nationalism. The loyalty of the ‘Revolutionary Guards’ is partly rooted in belief in the regime’s ideology and also a fear that, should the regime fall, members of the Guards and the Basij, the volunteer militia who are formally part of the Guard Corps, would face vengeance.
Internationally, the regime has also become more isolated, as what was called the ‘axis of resistance’’ fell apart after the overthrow of the Assad regime in Syria and the massive military weakening of Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza following relentless US and Israeli military attacks. The Houthis in Yemen have also taken big blows.
Tehran’s leaders divided
Faced with these problems, and aware of their relative weakness, the Iranian regime’s leaders are divided. It is significant that immediately after the suppression of the movement Khamenei called for a halt in criticism of the government’s economic policies while admitting, “the economic situation is not good, and people’s livelihoods face serious problems”.
The Trump administration has been in on/off talks with elements within the Iranian regime and could still attempt to reach some kind of accommodation with parts of the regime, in a similar way to what has happened in Venezuela.
Such a move would help meet the fears of Saudi, Qatari and UAE leaders that, despite their own past clashes with Tehran, a complete overthrow of the Iranian regime now would destabilise the region and could pose threats to their own dictatorial rule. These fears, along with those apparently expressed by the Netanyahu government in Isreal, were factors in Trump not following through with his threat to intervene if demonstrators were killed. But such arrangements and ‘deals’ are not permanent or solutions to the underlying issues.
At this moment, it is not yet clear if the regime’s success in repressing the protests marks a decisive setback for the opposition, whose effects will last for a significant period. Or are they an important defeat that, however, does not rule out a new movement, in some form, in the not-too-distant future? While events do not exactly repeat themselves, the 2019 killing of up to 2,000 anti-fuel price hike protestors in ‘Bloody November’ was followed, three years later, by the huge ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ movement.
However, to prepare for the success of future movements it is necessary to look at the lessons of past protests.
Iran shows the importance of spontaneous actions igniting significant protests, This has been the case in the bigger movements against the regime. Such movements can gather momentum and, in some cases, see the development of grass roots organisations. This happened in Sudan few years ago, with the development of the Neighbourhood Resistance Committees during that country’s revolutionary movement against military rule.
Fear of the spontaneous movement widening into a direct challenge to the regime probably led the top leaders in Tehran, possibly after some internal debate, deciding to act rapidly to crush the movement rather than risk waiting to see if it would burn itself out. They could still rely on forces, particularly the Revolutionary Guards and Basij, fight for them.
In such a situation, it is necessary for the movement to have a strategy of how to organize itself and to discuss and decide what policies and next steps need to be taken. Ideas can develop from below but in such a struggle a revolutionary force, a party, is needed to bring together the experiences, argue for a clear programme, and put forward concrete slogans and steps that need to be taken.
This was illustrated in this recent movement in Iran. There were many mentions of the need for a ‘general strike’, but often these calls were not made specific by starting a real campaign to prepare a strike call, mobilise for it and formulate what its demands should be.
Reza Pahlavi
In this situation, Reza Pahlavi, the son of the ousted Shah, attempted to take the initiative by calling on workers to go on strike; a call which did not appear to have an effect. This was linked to the increased presence of monarchists calling for Reza Pahlavi to be recognized as ‘leader’ of this movement. This was partly the result of a concerted attempt, backed by elements in the US and Isreal, to promote Reza Pahlavi. Indeed, for some time now, Reza Pahlavi’s supporters proclaim him “Leader of the National Uprising”. Yet it is very questionable, as even Trump indicated, how much support Pahlavi has inside Iran, especially given his open support for the Israeli and US bombing campaigns against Iran, last year.
Although it is 47 years since Reza Pahlavi and the rest of his family fled Iran, the brutality of corruption of his father’s rule is remembered by many. The fact that his family’s power was based upon the intervention of foreign powers strengthens the opposition both against foreign intervention and the restoration of the monarchy.
However, whether Pahlavi actually becomes a key figure when the Islamic Republic collapses or is overthrown, the current attempt to promote him is an illustration of what can lie ahead. Inevitably after a regime is overthrown a struggle opens as to which road is taken. For the local capitalists and the imperialists, the key issue is how to ensure the continuation of capitalism and holding back or suppressing movements that can or do challenge capitalism.
In a similar fashion in Iran, the leaders of the Islamic Republic will wish to maintain their power in some form or another, some because they and their families have become rich under this system while others may be more ideologically motivated.
For these elites, controlling and, if required, crushing independent movements, particularly those of the working class, are necessary to achieve their ends. Tragically this has been shown many times in history. Tunisia and Egypt, the key countries in the 2011 ‘Arab Spring’, are recent examples and warnings of how gains won in the immediate aftermath of the overthrow of a dictatorial regime can be challenged and then lost to counter-revolution.
This is a lesson of all revolutionary movements and why socialist revolutionaries argue against unity with forces that either defend capitalism or who delay taking socialist action until the dim and distant future. Without breaking from the capitalist system there can be no permanent solution to the social and economic crises or the defence of democratic rights. This does not mean, for example, that socialists would be neutral in a struggle between monarchists and republicans. But while opposing the monarchy’s return, socialists would argue for a socialist republic, a genuine and democratic ‘republic of the poor’, that many Iranians wanted in 1979.
Lessons of 1917
For socialist revolutionaries there are many lessons to be learnt from Russia in 1917 during the period after Tsarism’s overthrow in the February revolution, which ultimately saw the working class lead the majority of the population to carry through a second revolution in October 1917 that overthrew capitalist rule. That did not come about automatically. The Bolsheviks, led by Lenin and Trotsky, refused to join any government that rested upon capitalism and instead campaigned to win mass support for their programme of socialist revolution. They linked the immediate questions with the need for socialism; a policy summed up by Lenin in his pamphlet ‘The Impending Catastrophe and How to Combat It’. They argued for a popular and truly democratic form of rule, summed up in the slogan, ‘All Power to the Soviets’, which began to be realised in October.
Significantly the Bolsheviks’ refusal to participate in capitalist governments did not mean refusing to fight jointly with other forces against reaction and attempted counter-revolution. In August 1917, the Bolsheviks fought against an attempted military coup alongside supporters of pro-capitalist Provisional Government but still refused to join that government. Two months later, the Provisional Government was overthrown, and the Bolsheviks came to power.
Today in Iran there seems to be no socialist party or grouping putting forward such a programme. There are several different left groupings whose programmes include important points, like how to build grass roots popular support, but in general do not concretely raise the question of breaking with capitalism.
One party, the Communist Party of Iran (CPI), published the slogan ‘Long Live the Socialist Republic’ at the end of their January 5 statement. But this statement was silent on whether they would be prepared to join any form of government with pro-capitalist forces immediately after the Islamic Republic ends. Nor did it clearly pose, as an immediate objective, the struggle to win support for a workers’ government that could begin the socialist transformation of society. The danger in this approach was that the CPI saw the socialist republic as a long-term objective after a further period of capitalism. This approach, in a revolutionary period, opens the door to counter-revolution, as witnessed in many other countries.
Some may ask is such a socialist policy possible. Would a government carrying out socialist measures not be met by furious international opposition and possible interventions? Yes, that is likely, but it also must be seen that all the regional rulers fear both their own population and revolution. That is one reason why they asked Trump not to intervene against Iraq. It is why the new Syrian regime refused to hold genuine elections last October, where all the people could vote.
A genuinely revolutionary government would resist any intervention while appealing to workers, poor and oppressed in neighbouring countries, and indeed worldwide, to follow their example, as a socialist revolution’s expansion is the surest way to defeat reaction.