By Bruce Ackerman NEW HAVEN – French President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to dissolve parliament and call a snap election this Sunday will divert the world’s attention from another possible political earthquake. On Friday, Iranian voters will fill the vacancy left by President Ebrahim Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash last month. Even without the French vote, it would be tempting to trivialize the Iranian election’s significance.
After all, the Islamic Republic’s Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, is a bitter opponent of the West, and Raisi, his loyal follower, won decisively in 2021 . So, won’t Khamenei simply manipulate the upcoming vote in a way that will assure the victory of another extreme hardliner? Not so fast. Iranian politics has taken a decisive turn in the three years between Raisi’s rise and fall.
Under Iran’s constitution, candidates must be approved by the Council of Guardians, dominated by the clerical elite, before they can run for office. In 2021, Raisi owed his victory to the Council’s refusal to award a place on the ballot to any strong opponent of Khamenei’s militant anti-Westernism. But escalating public protest forced the Council to allow a leading opponent of Khamenei to enter the race this time – under conditions that make it very likely that he will win and revolutionize policy in a pro-Western direction.
As a consequence, if US President Joe Biden’s administration plays its cards right, the victory of an Iranian peacemaker cou.
