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Political Behavior

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23.03.2020 | Original Paper

Electoral Participation in Iran’s Parliamentary Politics: Between Two Competing Explanations

verfasst von: Alireza Raisi

Erschienen in: Political Behavior | Ausgabe 4/2021

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Abstract

The paper uncovers determinants of turnout in Iran by studying the role of institutional and socio-economic variables in parliamentary politics since the 2000s. The paper argues that Iran’s electoral system has dichotomized the pattern of participation between center and periphery. The dynamic of participation in the center stems primarily from national shifts in the factional rule. However, in provincial peripheries, Iran’s electoral system promotes the personal particularistic demands of voters in the MP-citizen linkage. In this environment, the discretionary power of local state machinery over the daily lives of provincial citizens lays the ground for the role of local bureaus to influence participation. This argument draws on statistical analysis of parliamentary turnout and the study of several Iranian newspapers and official reports. The findings of the paper suggest a new mechanism by which institutional settings may shape the pattern of participation more generally.

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The average turnout in parliamentary elections between 1992 to 2008 was 60.92%. The data on election turnout are obtained from the portal of Iran’s Ministry of Interior.

Few studies of Iran’s parliament account for the factional politics and legislative outcome of the Majles (Baktiari 1996), the role of the Guardian Council (Samii, 2001), and the impact of the Majles on democratic transition in Iran (Saeid 2010).

Issa-gholi Ahmadinia, the MP from Khuzestan province, recounts the impact of tribal affiliation in a public session of the Iranian Parliament: AhmadiNia, Issa-gholi. 2003. Roozname Rasami. March 11.

Javad Eta’at, Official Newspaper (RooznameRasmi), 11 March 2003,

Chehabi (2001), Keshavarzian (2005), Moslem, (2002) discuss the dynamic of Iran’s factional politics in more details.

The average number of votes received by candidates who have been endorsed by at least one party or faction in a parliamentary election in Tehran is 437,459, whereas the average number of votes received by independent candidates in Tehran is 5524. The Research Center of the Majles, Mehdi Mohsenianrad. “A Statistical Evaluation of the 6th Majles Electoral Outcome in Tehran” (in Farsi). May, 2000.

e.g., transferring a conscript to his hometown, jobs, ombudsman-like services or minor favors like expediting a case in a local bureau, and joining local events like funerals and family fests in a district.

According to a report by the Research Center of the Majles MPs spend more than 80% of their time on personal particularistic demands, Yase no daily newspaper, 2003, “Electoral System Becomes Provincialized”. March 12.

Vote buying is illegal in Iran, and the Guardian Council is assumed to disqualify vote buyer candidates, yet vote buying has been observed in Iran’s parliamentary elections. Ardabil’s MP, Kamaledin Pirmoazzen explains some evidence of vote buying in an interview with Arman Daily newspaper. 2014, July 21.

Corruption and clientelism is interrelated (Kitschelt 2000)), and some consider the Corruption Perception Index as a proxy for clientelism (Manow 2002, cited in Muller (2007)). Iran is ranked 133rd by Transparency International as having one of the highest corruption indices in the world. (Transparency International. Corruption Perception Index 2012. Retrieved from https://www.transparency.org/cpi2012/results, accessed on 08/02/2014).

Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance. June. 2002. “The Result of Surveys in 28 Provinces of the Country: Values and Attitudes of Iranians”, (in Farsi) Tehran, Daftere Entesharate Tarhe Peymayesh, p64.

An official report indicates that jobs and unemployment, paving the urban and rural roads, and providing and distributing agricultural goods are the most frequent requests of MPs from the ministers and executive bureaus. Hossein Mozafar, Khaneh Mellat: Majles News Agency. 2014. June 10.

Urban districts in this figure are Tehran, Mashhad, Isfahan, Karaj, Shiraz, Tabriz, Ahvaz, Qom.

Seventy percent of Ilam’s population resides in rural areas or small towns with populations of less than 40,000 and the rest of the population lives in the capital of province, with 177,988 urban populations (Statistical Center of Iran, 2011 census), accessed on 03/04/2014).

Similarly, Huntington (1968) argues that parties rely on patronage politics in the early stages of modernization.

In these systems, personal preference votes (instead of entire party lists) promote personalized exchanges. In the same way, single-member districts experience higher clientelistic exchanges.

Ahmad Tavakoli, 2014, Interview with Iran’s state-run TV, Channel 5, Barname Shabe Aftabi, October 8.

Drawing on existing studies (cited in Baktiari 1996)) of the occupational background of Iran’s MPs, the average percentage of landlords in the parliament between 1907 to 1960 was 42%, not to mention the MPs who were not from the feudal class but endorsed by the landlords. Ashraf (1991) estimates that the feudal landlord class controlled two-thirds of parliamentary seats before the 1979 revolution.

Majles Shurayeh Islami, Iran’s Electoral Law: Retrieved from https://www.parliran.ir/index.aspx?siteid=1&pageid=229).

The Research Center of the Majles, Mehdi Mohsenianrad. “A Statistical Evaluation of the 6^th Majles Electoral Outcome in Tehran” (in Farsi). May, 2000.

This is a recurring phenomenon from the prerevolutionary era to the present time (Westwood 1961).

In the conservative 9th Majles, some MPs proposed an amendment to provincialize the electoral rule. Iran’s electoral law has also been evaluated in the Expediency Discernment Council. It appears that the factional leaders in the conservative camp have realized the inefficiency of the electoral system in Iran. However, the Guardian Council maintains the candidate-centered electoral system.

BBC Persian, 1 Feb 2004, Retrieved from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/persian/iran/story/2004/02/040201_a_mps_resignation.shtml

In particular, the urban turnout estimation in the 2004 election is significantly lower than the turnout in rural areas, demonstrating the impact of factional competition on the participation in urban areas; i.e., the urban turnout in the absence of factional competition (i.e., the 2004 parliamentary election) is significantly lower than the turnout in the presence of factional competition (i.e., the 2000 election).

See Saeed et al. (2002).

Imam Khomeini Relief Committee,

Ali Yari and Abdoreza Heydarizade, two MPs of Ilam district (the capital of province), used to be the Head of IKRC (Imam Khomeini Relief Committee) bureaus in the province. Bureau of Culture and Public Relation, Majles Shurayeh Islami, “Acquaintance with Members of Islamic Consultative Assembly, the 6th Term”, November, 2000.

AhmadiNia, Issa-gholi. 2003. Roozname Rasami. March 11.

Ahmadinejad dismantled the Management and Planning organization, but the Rouhani administration has planned to revive this important organization.

Panahi, Ali. 2001, The Research Center of the Majles, “An analytic evaluation of MPs’ proposals on Annual Budget, 137, 2001.

This higher budget results from a rule which allocates 2% of the value-added GDP produced by a given province to the annual budget of the same province.

Ethnographic studies demonstrate the resemblance between the patron-client linkage in a modern context and the landlord-peasant relation in traditional agrarian societies (Piattoni 2001), and the transition in local power in Iran through land reform and postrevolutionary local state-building recreated this relationship in a new arrangement.

Qasemi et al. (2011) also highlight the role of bureaucratic resources in shaping MP-citizen linkage.

In a newspaper article, a MP publicly argues that failure of ministers’ confidence votes partly results from ignoring the MPs’ expectations of influencing the appointments of local officials. Mohammadreza Tabesh, 2013 “The Lessons from the Failure of a Confidence Vote”, October 28, Shargh daily newspaper, October 28. Similar remarks by Haddad Adel, Gholamali, 2013: “Rouhani Complains of the Majles” Donya-E-Eghtesad Daily Newspaper. January 4. There is an ongoing struggle between Majles and the executive branch for control over bureaucracies. Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, denounced illegal requests by MPs of the ministers and emphasized that ministers should not be threatened by MPs BBC Persian, May 09, 2013, Retrieved from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/persian/iran/2013/12/131231_l12_iran_rouhani_majlis_questions_minister.shtml.

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Titel: Electoral Participation in Iran’s Parliamentary Politics: Between Two Competing Explanations
verfasst von: Alireza Raisi
Publikationsdatum: 23.03.2020
Verlag: Springer US
Erschienen in: Political Behavior / Ausgabe 4/2021
Print ISSN: 0190-9320
Elektronische ISSN: 1573-6687
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-020-09605-6

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