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Why the Ayatollah's Regime Is Not About to Collapse
(Telegraph-UK) Joseph Pavitt - Western analysis consistently misunderstands the nature of the Iranian state. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps is highly entrenched. Its control over security, infrastructure and local networks makes a rapid overthrow of the government extremely unlikely. Moreover, for a significant portion of the religious Iranian population, the regime's legitimacy is theological. Clerical governance is seen as divinely sanctioned. Opposition can therefore be paramount to heresy. The Islamic Republic invested extensively in rural electrification, healthcare clinics, roads and education. For many Iranians outside the major cities, the post-revolutionary state represented their first sustained encounter with public services and, as a result, won a degree of support. The assumption that Iranians have "nothing left to lose" is simply false. Many do - whether in the form of education, employment, housing or relative stability compared with neighboring states.