The Rise and Fall of the 1979 Iranian Revolution- Its Lessons for Today (original) (raw)

The February 1979 Iranian revolution was the largest urban mass uprising since the 1917 Russian revolutions. It was also a deep-going revolution in which working people and youth organized popular democratic committees called shoras (councils) in workplaces, in the countryside, by the oppressed nationalities, in universities, and briefly among the soldiers. The working people of Iran had a genuine opportunity to create a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. Yet, within a month after the February 11, 1979 revolution, an absolute majority of the population voted in an undemocratic referendum organized by Ayatollah Khomeini for an undefined Islamic Republic. Khomeini used this "mandate" to undermine and destroy all popular independent mass organizations and by the end of 1982, destroy the revolution and solidify a capitalist theocracy in place of the capitalist monarchy. The essay draws the lessons of the revolution and its defeat.