For me, the recent elections in Iran and their perception in the West are an example of how the Iranian system has found ways of survival.
Walter Russell Mead has made the most insightful analysis of the Iranian system (in his American Interest blog). Mead has convinced me that this system has succeeded in building mechanisms that allow its self-reproduction through regime change. This system resembles Russian matryoshka–doll—you open one doll and there is another inside. In the Iranian case, the first matryoshka—the regime embodied by the presidency—is the subject for beating and for doing unpleasant things. Inside the shell is the real power—the authority of the Supreme Leader. The recent Iranian elections meant a regime change from the rule of the loud and seemingly uncontrollable Ahmadinejad who looked as the personification of evil to the West, to the moderate and sophisticated Rowhani who only broadens the area of maneuver for the Ayatollah power and lets off the steam in the society.
The system that can function through regime change making the government responsible for all problems and “cleaning the garbage” (as Jonathan Tobin put it) is more clever and adaptable than the Russian personalized power that can’t allow the matryoshka principle. For one reason—the Russian system does not allow duality of power—real or virtual. The Russian system comparing to the Iranian is more rigid and prone to implosion.
I don’t want to say that the Iranian matryoshka is sustainable in the longer run—it is losing its resilience as well. But the fact that the population, even dissatisfied, is ready to play the electoral games, proves that it can still keep itself on the surface.
The most important question is: will Rowhani’s leadership be softer? Most certainly. The Iranian Ayatollahs today will try to use the gloves.
Will Rowhani be ready to cancel the nuclear program? Why should he? The nuclear program is not only the Ayatollah’s strategy—it has the legitimization of a significant part of the Iranians. I would trust Vali Nasr who says, “Iranian position on its right to have a nuclear program is unlikely to change.”
The most interesting question is: will Obama and the West try to rethink their default strategy regarding Iran that helps the Iranian matryoshka survive?