i don't know that this is in fact the case. the recent (or rather broadcast) protests began as demonstrations against the censorship of a newspaper, but i doubt if they would have spread so quickly and become so defiant had there not been some decidedly class issues boiling away alongside.
I would add also that reports of provocateurs in the midst of the protestors, of the 'dangers of protests becoming unruly' to the 'reform' process sound either (or both) like attempts by the more conservative sections of the student movement to disavow the more radical elements (I suspect the young workers and unemployed who joined the protests far outnumbered the theocrats posing as protestors), and/or spin by the US State dept to confine the protests to those supporting the so-called 'moderate' govt against the clericy, since the more radical students seem to be claiming that Khatami is unable and unwilling to deliver on election promises unless pressed to do so, and the US State Dept seems to be fashioning Khatami as 'pro-western'.
below are: an article on unpaid wages; an article on the oil workers; and an interview on the class character of the election of Khatami.
Angela -----------------------------------------------
Protest against the destitution enforced on workers in Iran http://www.wpiran.org/NewsRelease/FALAKAT.html
Unpaid wages should be paid immediately! Minimum pay must be set by the true representatives of workers! Unrestricted freedom of organisation and expression must be established immediately!
The Islamic Republic has enforced an unprecedented destitution on workers in Iran. Workers in Iran have been pushed to the depths of poverty and the physical being and emotional existence of workers' families is on the brink of destruction.
Non-payment of workers' wages has become a general phenomena. Even Mahjoob, Secretary of the Islamic Republic's Workers' House, admits that nearly 400 factories with 400,000 workers have not been able to pay the workers' wages, and the wages of another 400,000 has been halved. The textile industry is almost at a stand still. The building industry is in the same state. Thousands of workers have been made redundant, and tens of thousands of workers at cement factories and related industries are facing late payments and are under the threat of being made redundant. Many local government employees face late payments, and the government itself has announced teachers and some of the pensioners have not been paid. Workers' protests are taking place everyday. These struggles encompass strikes within a factory to marches and occupation of governmental buildings and pickets in the streets.
Determining the minimum wage by the Islamic Republic is in fact a means of reducing wages in real terms. The regime increased the minimum wage by only 18% in 1998, when the rate inflation was 60%. At a time when the poverty line, based on the 1997 statistics and according to the definition of the Central Bank of Iran, is at 113,000 Tomans per months, the Islamic Republic set the minimum wage at 30,000 Tomans. According to the department of Social Security, almost 60% of workers covered by the Labour Code, live under the poverty line. This year's rate of inflation, according to the Central Bank, is announced to be 52%, but the real rate of inflation is well above 200%. However, this is not the whole picture. Of the whole population of 10 million workers in Iran, only 2.4 million are covered by the Labour Code, and the rest are not even covered by the so-called minimum wage.
In Iran there is no right to strike or organisation. Workers' protests face oppression all the time. Arrest and execution of workers activists, military invasion of work places to break strike actions, threatening and sacking of workers are well-recognised methods of the Iranian regime. ...
Worker-communist Party of Iran 28 February 1999 ----------------------------------------- from the Organisation of Revolutionary Workers of Iran http://www.rahekargar.org/
Labour unrest intensifies
Oil workers strike warning.
In early June Oil Refinery workers in Abadan, Mahshahr, Bandar Abbas, and Masjed Soleiman warned president Khatami's administration of strike action if he does not increase wages in accordance with inflation and is prepared to accept group negotiation. Teheran refinery workers added their support.
The regime had accepted both demands in January last year after nation-wide strikes and demonstrations outside the oil company headquarters in Teheran. Instead hundreds have been arrested. More ominously, a number of oil workers have died under mysterious circumstances, suggesting extra-judicial execution. [Atlas June 4]
On August 15 oil refinery workers from Abadan Oil Refinery staged a demonstration in protest against the delaying tactics of the authorities of the Islamic regime. In a resolution at the end of this demonstration the workers summarised their main demands: Implementation of national negotiation, and wages in line with inflation. They warned the regime once again that if their demands are not met they will organise mass demonstrations and protests. [Committee for the Defence and Support of Iranian oil workers].
Strikes and arrests
Workers in Ahwaz power station have been on strike since May 16. The 450 workers had been promised some additional welfare payments such as travel allowance and job classification. They remained on strike by Early July. Also 400 workers in Ahwaz Tube Manufactor went on strike and demonstrations (Atlas 42)
Tabriz Tractor manufacture: Here too a strike began on June 7 with a pay rise as a central demand. The strike was crushed by security forces who arrested three workers. Yet the workers continued their sit in at the factory. Oil tanker drivers in Isfahan refinery refused to load oil until their tariffs were increased. The strike of these 400 drivers caused a fuel shortage in the city and the surrounding province. The security forces have arrested three drivers.
Three hundred workers from Iran Wood Industry, the largest and most modern in the Middle East, had a sit-in outside its central retail store in Teheran on August 25. They were protesting at non-payment of wages for five months. The factory had been privatised and returned to its previous owner 8 months before who then closed the factory without compensation to the workers. (Atlas 44) the sitdown protest contnued for several days [Iskra]
Closure threats
Many factory closures have left thousands of workers unemployed. Some are demanding their back pay: 200 workers are threatened with expulsion in the Isfahan Steel Smelting Plant, one of the largest industrial units of the country. To forestall potential strikes several workers suspected of left sympathies have been arrested.
Contract labour in the Abadan Refinery demonstrated outside the Governor's office on May 18. 1,200 such workers have been laid off, many after eight years' of work.
Asia Stocking Making factory workers, threatened with redundancy, went on hunger strike. Kar Thread making plant stopped work on May 25. The 540 workers had not been paid for 4 months and are under threat of redundancy. The workers have also been denied health care as the factory has a large debt to the Organisation of Social Security.
Bandar Abbas port custom officers staged a sit down in protest at poor facilities.
One hundred workers made redundant in Dezful attacked the labour office with stoned breaking its windows. In Ilam municipal workers demonstrated and Yazd Smelting Plant workers went on strike because they had not been paid for months. [Iran] Tabas coal miners protested outside the Governor's Office because they had been laid off without pay or compensation for 9 months. Teheran Chalk factory workers also demonstrated agaisnt expulsions. [Kar]
Four hundred students in the Art College held a protest sit in on June 7 complaining of insults by the authorities, and poor dormitory conditions. Protest moves by the nursing students in Teheran has spread to other colleges in Zanjan, Arak, Isfahan etc. Classes were boycotted because of changes in the system that increases pressures without any improvement in education or other facilities.
One hundred workers involved in the reconstruction of the Khorramshahr, a city almost completely destroyed in the Iran-Iraq war, protested at 4 months delay in pay and un-compensated expulsion of 80 of their colleagues [Kar].
Lay offs have been reported from Khaneh Gostar constructioncompany lainked to the ministry of housing [Kar] and Electric in Rasht [Kar va Kargar].
Closures
Four hundred manufacturing units, in textile, leather and shoes, machinery, food products, carpets, construction, etc have been totally shut down. These include: 57 industrial units, nylon an nylex making (25), textiles and carpets (28) filters (13), food products (46), clothes items (26) household goods (47), construction equipment (27), aluminium and cast iron (11), syringes (2) [Jame'h, Teheran, June 10]
According to Kar va kargar (published in Iran May 26) in Gilan province alone 20,00 contract workers are in danger of losing their jobs.
Nanshahr Company has laid off 64 workers and threatens many more. The following factories have also shut down: Pars Compressor in Shiraz, Kashan machine-made carpet. Bisotun Flour Mill (Kermanshah).
Surveillance of activists
A special committee has been set up in Ray, South Teheran - called the Pol Siman Committee. Its job is to interrogate protesting workers in factories situated south of the capital. By June this committee had interrogated 50-60 workers [Iskra] ... ----------------------
The role of the working class in the May presidential elections
interview with Heshmat Mohseni
iran bulletin: while there are many reports of the dynamic participation of women and youth (and particularly students) in the elections of Khatami to the presidency in May 1997, there is little information on the participation by workers - especially in a form that defines their identity rather than as individuals among the shapeless mass of voters. Does this picture adequately portray the labour movement today, or is it a conscious or unconscious reporting bias.
Heshmat: The May elections were an extraordinary event. Its dimensions went way beyond the level of participation by women and youth. Therefore one cannot limit the involvement of people to the participation of these two groups. What brought Khatami to power was essentially a coalition of forces opposed to obscurantism, and by and large in favour of secular life, plus the mass of deprived toiling people who had become fed up with the nightmare-like structures of the Islamic Regime and its parasitic role in the economy.
...
The May elections was not a thunder in a cloudless sky. It fed from a preconditions which if ignored will reduce the validity of any analysis of the May events. The recurring nation-wide movement by the oil workers took shape before the elections and left their marks on the evolution of the latter.
When it comes to their social and political influence, oil workers are not a normal or unimportant layer among Iranian workers. They are the critical centre of that movement. Even a cursory look at the way oil workers organised nation-wide, and the nature of their demands shows that significant developments have taken place in Iranian society.
For the first time in many years demands are expressed which, though not as yet general among the various layers of the working class of Iran, are proposals that the Islamic Republic cannot accept. For a regime that does not even allow the tame Islamic Councils (shora) to be set up in the oil industry, the oil workers demands for collective bargaining, and for workers' association, shows that they have become aware of their collective identity, collective action and a collective personality. This awareness is gaining practical expression.
The demand for collective bargaining was not a normal demand made in normal circumstances. It took place under a regime that denies the independent identity of workers as workers, and has in practice turned them into a shapeless mass. Its expression was, before all else, an expression that in a conference table there are two "sides", each of which works for its own ends. The three large actions by the oil workers in the six month preceding the elections, and its broad echo in society at large undoubtedly influenced the result of the elections? A look at the mix of electors will clarify this question.
To understand what forces voted for Khatami we need to consider the class and cultural make-up of those who support the velayate faqih (the supreme clerical ruler Khamene'i). This social and support base is essentially made up of the well off layers with political privilege and the traditional middle class who have benefited form the velayate faqih [1]. Those who look for Khatami's votes among the middle classes, forget that if Iran had a middle class of this dimension [2] it would really be a very wealthy country; and even then what country do you know, no matter how rich, where 70% of its population are middle class.
In fact, even in official statistics, over 80% of Iranians live below the poverty line. It is enough to note that while the most recent Central Bank study shows that the average expenditure of an urban family is 350,000 rials, the minimum monthly wage for workers is 250,000 rials. Thus a large part of the 80% live, as labour activists inside the country aptly name, "below the line of survival". Again according to official statistics 94% of the country' s savings belong to 6% of the population. Translated into ordinary language, these statistics say that the Iranian middle class is very weak and compared
to the past, comprises a very small and shrivelling part of the people.
Despite some claims appearing in the Western press it was not the middle class who won the vote for Khatami. The enormous dimensions of his vote belonged to the camp of work and toil, which was obviously cast in protest at the whole system which was causing their destitution. Even if we zoom down on the social make-up of the women and youth, a large part of these also came from the camp of workers and the deprived in society.
iran bulletin: Since the presidential elections popular actions are increasingly focusing on political matters. They also increasingly seek the solution to their everyday problems in resolving the question of political power and mobilise to change the balance of power. Yet the labour movement appears to feed, as before, on everyday economic demands. To what extent is this the true picture?
Heshmat: That picture on the whole reflects what is happening on the ground. However we should remember that the logic of a labour movement is not the same as that of a women's or youth movement when it comes to the way they manifest their protests and dissatisfactions.
Unlike the other two, the labour movement fights on a fixed ground, and this imposes certain restrictions, which if ignored can have undesirable effects for the workers. The labour movement rarely enters the political battle abruptly and without intermediaries. It is through immediate economic demands that the workers approach political struggles.
Moreover, there are a number of unfavourable elements that have joined hands to limit the labour movement within economic boundaries today. These could be summarised as the tensions between workers with a job and the huge mass of the unemployed, workers who fall under the umbrella of the Labour Code and those who do not, the relatively small industrial sector and the heavy load of marginal workers etc. All of these weaken the position of the working class and its bargaining position.
Moreover, at this moment Iranian workers are in a particularly fragile position. Today many of the larger industries are working at way below capacity, some as low as 25% of capacity. Under these conditions the nightmare of expulsion haunts workers. Many realise that their fate hangs on a string. At the slightest political protest they are out.
Moreover the primacy of the economic over the political struggle is not confined to these extreme conditions we face today. This phenomenon is seen even in revolutionary conditions. In the 1979 Iranian revolution we saw how right up to the final uprising [3], workers hid their political moves beneath economic demands. While there was a general strike, the majority organised these strikes under the banner of economic demands until the eve of the February uprising.
Finally one must not ignore the inner political content of the current workers' struggles. For example we have witnessed an increase in strikes, being illegal under the Islamic Republic, have the potential of bringing workers into open conflict with the regime. It is with this awareness that the workers go on strike. The demands may be economic, but given the specific conditions of the country, the methods chosen are clearly political.
...
Heshmat: What has been particularly special in the labour movement's recent acts of protest is the role of organisation in them, as well as the demand for association. Khatami's open defence of civil society has given a crucial boost to the issue of the right to independent association.
But the issue of independent associations was also brought up before Khatami's elections, specifically by the Oil Company workers. Indeed curbing this tendency has become an urgent preoccupation for the Islamic regime. An example is the attempts by the Labour House to set up a "worker's party". Clearly the issue of independent activity by the working class is on the agenda of the labour movement, and the Labour House, an official workers' organisation, is out to rein this in. The real meaning behind these moves to create a workers' party is to prevent the working class from forming its own independent organisations outside state institutions.
Finally I must mention the "independent union of Iranian Workers" inside the country. Regardless of the extent or otherwise of its authority within the labour movement, this is a sign of progress in this field. Prometheus in chains has woken up. We must wait for him to tear his chains apart.
Heshmat Mohseni has been a labour activist in Iran. Currently he writes on the Iranian labour movement for various publications of the left abroad.
... 2. Over 22 million, 2/3 of the electorate, voted for Khatami.
----------------------- Facing a stormy unstable and brittle future
While Khatami's allies try to find a united voice to keep promises the ruling faction hits out
Can he keep on smiling?
The overwhelming defeat of the ruling faction in the presidential elections last May unexpectedly upset the balance of power. This faction, led by the supreme clerical ruler (velayate faghih) Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is now doing everything to direct the stream back into its previous path. A new phase has opened up in the power relations within the governing bloc of the Islamic Republic of Iran which is best described as brittle and unstable. We will briefly touch on events and processes that illustrate this point.
Khamenei's faction employees two sets of tactics to repair the damage: one designed to wear down Khatami's support base, and the other to break up the coalition which the election process drew round him.
Wearing down
In order to erode Khatami's support base there is a concerted effort to dampen all hopes that his administration can effect any reforms. This is combined with a tactic to stoke a climate of fear and repression. A number of levers have come in handy.
The most important was to weaken the constitutional powers of the presidency and the administration. The power structure was refashioned by fashioning parallel institutions. The most substantial of these was the revival of the Assembly for Expediency1 with greatly expanded powers, and placing at its head a man of the stature of ex-president Rafsanjani.
Almost as significant was the move to emasculate the Ministry of Interior by denying that post-holder - Hojjatoleslam Nouri - the command of the internal security forces (Revolutionary Komitees, Police, Gendarmerie). This had been normal practice in every single cabinet since the revolution, and until the recent elections both Ayatolah Khomeini and his replacement Khamenei' had handed over command over domestic security forces to the Interior Minister. Without such powers the minister is like a knife without a blade.
Moreover, there are rumours that the Information (security) Ministry is to be taken out of the hands of the president and placed directly under the control of Khamenei'. The powers of the "supreme clerical rulership"2 is being redefined and extended. The Majles (parliament) too is being brought in as yet another way to paralyse the administration. Ministers are constantly being questioned. The most important in this line was the savage questioning of the Interior Minister, Nouri, who was accused of giving permission for the Student Supporters of the Imam-line 3 to hold public meetings and demonstrations, to "create disturbances" and conduct "moves against the [Islamic] order". It should be recalled that the new president had been overwhelmingly voted in on the promise that he would open the political and cultural climate, and install "civil society".
Repression
A wave of repression has been launched from several angles. The dominant faction controls virtually the whole of the state repressive apparatus: the judiciary, the revolutionary courts, the Pasdaran Corps (revolutionary guards), the Komitees,4 other armed forces and security organs, and the secret and security services. They have unleashed a noisy, and well publicised, wave of arrests and allegations.
Prominent among their victims, have been a number of municipal mayors, appointees of Teheran's mayor Karbaschi, himself a supporter of Khatami. These have been arrested and charged with corruption. Karbaschi himself was called in for interrogation and released on bail. He has been ordered not to leave the country. More recently the head of the Freedom Movement, Dr Ebrahim Yazdi was arrested, and later released, accused of plotting against the security of the country.
Alongside these judicial arrests have been extra-judicial acts. Groups of thugs have been mobilised under the guise of the "hezbollahi people" (who are only doing their duty of religious guidance ) to attack and violently disrupt meetings and gatherings of Khatami's supporters.
Gangs of thugs attacked the office of the student paper Payam-e Danshju, savagely beat up and hospitalised Tabarzani, one of the leaders of the Office of Unity,5 disrupted the student meeting in Teheran University where Ebrahim Yazdi, Dr Peiman and a number of prominent critiques and opponents of the dominant faction were invited speakers, and smashed up of the house of Ayatollah Montazeri [see article this issue]. This last was so brazen as to provoke the protest of even some in the dominant faction.
All this is happening within a backdrop of an ever increasingly difficult daily life and little hope for an immediate improvement in living standards. In this atmosphere the dominant ultra-conservative faction hopes that the combination of Khatami's unfulfilled promises, police pressure and judicial insecurity will cause people to lose heart and become passive. The ultimate aim is to erode the president's ability to manoeuvre on the back of popular support.
Crack the alliance
The second front opened up by the Khamenei' faction is to split the coalition which gathered round Khatami during the lead up to the election. A key move was to humour Hashemi Rafsanjani (by making him head of the Assembly for Expediency), and some of those around him in an effort to break up the so called "Agents of Construction" faction. 6
Secondly they used the open criticisms of the supreme religious leadership (velayate faghih), voiced by of Khatami's allies, to create a rift between the more conservative supporters among Khatami's circle and those inclined to reform. For example the recent moves by the Student Supporters of the Imam-line, in dialogue with Islamic political currents outside the circle of power (such as the Freedom Movement), 7 or even Ayatollah Montazeri's criticism of the current interpretations of the system of velayate faghih, and in particular, its embodiment in the person of Ali Khamenei' was used to create rift among the pro-Khatami alliance.
Khatami's team: not with one voice
The opposing camp, which gathered round the candidacy of Khatami has reacted to these hostile and obstructive tactics. But these reactions do not add up to a coherent and co-ordinated policy.
The president himself and some in his circle rely on the weapon of "law" and "legality". They hope to use this to curb and overcome the gangs of thugs organised by the security organisations. Moreover, they hope to limit the illegal interference by numerous recently concocted institutions. Above all they hope to limit the supreme clerical ruler to act within his constitutional powers, which, in reality, he has far out stepped.
Others in Khatami's coalition go further. They see a need for constitutional change which limits the powers and jurisdiction of the supreme clerical rulership (velayate faghih). They have expressed these views in speeches, articles, open debates, demonstrations and resolutions. A demonstration 3,000 Student Followers of the Imam-line outside Teheran University openly demanded a revision of the Constitution. In their view the current system of power, and the absolute power held by Khamenei', wherein he has taken on himself the right to be answerable to no one and no organ yet retains the right to intervene in any situation and have the final say, leaves no room for policies different to the opinions of the dominant faction and of the person of Khamenei'.
There is, however, something new in the air. Despite the savage rebukes these groups have had to face, the actual principle of the velayate faghih and its current embodiment Khamenei', has become a subject for serious debate. This has not happened since the early days of the Islamic Republic. On this point the ruling faction has been manoeuvred into an uncomfortably diffensive position. The credit for this development must go not just to groups within the ruling bloc, but undoubtedly to the efforts of many tendencies outside the circle of power - people like the philosopher Surush, Ayatollah Montazeri and others.
How to keep the base
There is a third aspect to the policies of the Khatami coalition around which there is no broad agreement. Not only do they disagree as to whether they should be incisive and aggressive or passive and defensive in beating back the ruling faction's obstructive policies, but they also disagree on how to maintain their links with the millions who voted Khatami into the presidency, or the extent to which people should be involved and informed of current developments.
The president, in practice at least, shows that he favours positive and constructive criticisms, ones not openly critical of the leadership. In his reports to the people he highlights in a positive way his stress on the operation of the law and legality. The same policy is more or less being pursued by the pro-Khatami clerical organisation, the Majma' Ruhaniun Mobarez. 8
On the other hand, the Mujahedin Enghelabe Eslami, 9 another group in the pro-Khatami alliance, prefers to frankly expose the obstructive tactics of the organs of power and influence, and indirectly criticise those around the supreme clerical ruler and his apparatus. In a series of articles and leaflets MEE has denounced the intrigues of the opponents of the president and his promised reforms.
In this way some of Khatami's allies are criticising him indirectly for his caution and excessive flexibility. They remind him that time works against him and he is in danger of losing his present momentum.
Consensus on foreign policy
Yet criticisms for domestic policies aside, there appears to be broad agreement and support for Khatami's more aggressive foreign policy initiatives. Even those, within his coalition who, one might expect would have problems with overtures to the West and particularly to the USA, have apparently for the time being shelved their overt misgivings.
Cannot do it without them... but will Khatami take the plunge?
The president's clever use of the possibilities presented by the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) in December in Teheran is noteworthy. The OIC delegates decisively supported Khatami in his two speeches where he expressed his different, and in essence totally opposite, stance to Khamenei' in public without any concealment or compromises.
He presented an essentially reformist and modern understanding of Islam, as a culture which despite differences with Western culture and modernism, is not in conflict with it. Instead he proposed dialogue and a symbiotic relationship between the two cultures. He thus openly distanced himself from Khamenei' who, in a speech to the conference, attacked the West and the USA and proposed an Islamic alliance (from its Afghani to Lebanese and Sudanese varieties) to oppose the "West" which he painted as a uniform entity.
Moreover in the same conference, Khatami took the opportunity to frankly expound a large part of his domestic programme: the rule of law, respect for the legitimate rights of people in the framework of law and shari'a, and the acceptance of a civil society and cultural pluralism to a national and international audience. He even had much of it enter the final Conference communiqué. In other words he made foreign policy a weapon to isolate the ruling faction internationally and he used it decisively.
...