Woman, Life, Freedom: All In On Iran — Iran Women’s Bill of Rights with Mona Tajali

[00:00:00] Intro: In the name of the God of Rainbows, welcome to Woman Life Freedom, all in on Iran, a podcast series in which we’ll go deep in conversations with experts on various aspects of the revolutionary uprising that began in Iran in September when 22 year old Mahsa Jina Amini was killed in morality, police detention. In each episode, we’ll unpack an important aspect of the unfolding of this historic moment in Iran. I’m your host, Nahid Siamdoust, an assistant professor of Media and Middle East Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Our intention is to quote unquote, archive the important insights of our experts here and now, both in their capacity as professional observers, as well as humans living through these momentous times.

[00:01:04] Intro: Stay tuned.

[00:01:12] Nahid Siamdoust: This week we’ll be speaking with Mona Tajali. She’s associate Professor of International Relations and Women’s Gender and Sexuality studies at Agnes Scott College in Atlanta, Georgia. She’s also the chair of the Political Science Department and the Director of the International Relations and Human Rights Programs at the college.

[00:01:29] Nahid Siamdoust: Uh, Mona has a lot of experience and deep research in women’s political participation in post-revolutionary Iran, based on her first book Electoral Politics, as well as her new book from 2022, women’s political representation in Iran and Turkey. Um, so I’m looking forward to this interview , stay tuned..

[00:01:58] Nahid Siamdoust: Now just the timeline in which we find ourselves. It has been , quite a few weeks since we’ve had our last interview, and podcast episode. Lots has happened in the meantime. too much perhaps to point to, but, I guess some of the more important events that have happened that we should be.

[00:02:19] Nahid Siamdoust: Briefly mentioning is that , over the course of the last few months since International Women’s Day on March 8th, several very strong manifestos have been published by women’s groups, uh, feminist groups, both inside and outside of Iran, as well as transnational collaborative manifestos and Bill of Rights.

[00:02:36] Nahid Siamdoust: And this is something that we will be talking to Mona about. another,important event,ongoing event has been the issue in discussions over the enforcement of compulsory hijab. this seems to be a very dynamic and fluid situation where the, police chief, back in April commented that women will be dealt with severely, and so, the issue over hijab has been, an ongoing situation where some Basijis or otherwise,entitled people have taken the enforcement of hijab upon themselves, through their, what they believe to be their enactment of, Promoting good and prohibiting evil.

[00:03:22] Nahid Siamdoust: And so we saw that viral video of the man pouring yogurt on the heads of two women in Mashhad, uh, a deli in Mashhad, which really created an uproar about that situation. And both the attacker and the women were subsequently apprehended and, are going through the legal processes, I suppose.

[00:03:42] Nahid Siamdoust: as far as the political coalitions are concerned, we’ve seen the coalition of, Hamid Esmaeilion, Reza Pahlavi, Masih Alinejad splinter and, really fall apart. That’s been a bigger story in terms of the coalitions that have formed, at least abroad. Not sure how big of a story that is, for the movement happening in Iran, given that.

[00:04:04] Nahid Siamdoust: On the ground in the country. I think these are really the more, prominent stories that have happened, very recently.

[00:04:11] Nahid Siamdoust: Last week, of course, we also had another very important, development whereby on top of the four already, executed protestors, following the uprising in Iran. Iran also executed three more,who, the state. Claims were involved in the Khaneh Esfahan in the events that happened, during the protests in esfahan.

[00:04:39] Nahid Siamdoust: Of course, leading up to the executions, there was a lot of organizing both internally and support from human rights groups from the outside trying to prevent the execution of these three men, Saleh Mirhashemi, Saeed Yaqoubi, and Majid Kazemi,

[00:04:55] Nahid Siamdoust: who were very tragically executed on Fri Friday, May 19th, 2023. That brings the count of those executed, in direct response to the woman life freedom uprising that started in September 22, to 7. Those are the official counts of executions. They, of course, do not include the many hundreds who were killed in the streets or in subsequent events and processes that happen.

[00:05:29] Nahid Siamdoust: Okay, now let’s move on to our interview with Mona Tajali.

[00:05:41] Nahid Siamdoust: Well, a very warm welcome to Dr. Mona Tajali. Hello.

[00:05:47] Mona Tajali: Hello. Hi.

[00:05:49] Nahid Siamdoust: Hi Mona jan, It’s very nice to have you on this podcast. Dr. Mona Tajali is an associate professor of International Relations and Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Agnes Scott College in Georgia, Atlanta. It’s a historically, women’s liberal arts college, and she’s also the chair of the Political Science Department and the director of the International Relations and Human Rights Programs at the college.

[00:06:14] Nahid Siamdoust: Her research and teaching and activism have ha focused on women’s rights and empowerment as they have resisted gender discrimination. And, the opportunities are limited opportunities arising out of the patriarchal structures in the societies she studies, most prominently Iran, but your newest book published in 2022, Women’s Political Representation in Iran and Turkey: Demanding a Seat at the Table draws comparisons to the Turkish context.

[00:06:43] Nahid Siamdoust: And I’m very excited about having a conversation, about your new book as well. Not least because of course there’ve been lots of changes happening, lots of, transformative political, changes happening in Turkey over the last, 20 years or so. And of course we’ve had the elections there most recently.

[00:06:59] Mona Tajali: That’s right.

[00:06:59] Nahid Siamdoust: And so this is a very hot topic right now. you really do believe in, crossing the academic practitioner divide. And so your, expertise is often sought out , by different organizations and different collaborations. And you, offer interviews and have appeared in mainstream media.

[00:07:18] Nahid Siamdoust: And something else that I really wanna talk to you about, and we’ll get to it, is, your participation in a manifesto that was published back in March. Uh,I believe it was published actually on International Women’s Day. Right.

[00:07:31] Mona Tajali: That’s right

[00:07:31] Nahid Siamdoust: . So we have lots to talk about. Thank you so much for giving us, some of your precious time today.

[00:07:38] Mona Tajali: Thank you. Thank you as well for this invitation. I think like you, we are academics and scholars who are super passionate about the type of work that we’re doing, so it’s really good to come together whether, virtually, or in person to talk about some of the topics that are really critical and at the same time to deserve a lot of attention and dialogue, right?

[00:07:59] Mona Tajali: I think that’s what’s really important.

[00:08:01] Nahid Siamdoust: That’s right. Yeah. And,I know we are,today being May 22nd, we are at, it seems at a juncture, in the woman life, freedom movement in Iran, where, a lot of activism and activities still happening for sure, supporting the movement.

[00:08:18] Nahid Siamdoust: But, on a general level, sort of, you know,among the wider,populations, both in Iran and outside of Iran, the diaspora who care about what is happening in Iran, there’s a bit of a moment of pause, wondering where this movement is, is going. , but I wanna take us back first because your first book, which, was published in 2011, alongside with Homa Hoodfar.

[00:08:43] Nahid Siamdoust: titled Electoral Politics: Making Quotas Work for Women,this is really about addressing women’s historical exclusion from electoral processes. And I wonder if you can tell us a little bit about your own background.

[00:08:56] Nahid Siamdoust: What brought you to the work that you ultimately ended up doing, which, culminated in this publication. Can you tell us a little bit about what brought you to the issue of women’s rights and electoral participation and,and this book?

[00:09:09] Mona Tajali: Yeah, sure. So, yes, my,undergraduate studies, at University of Florida and my sort of graduate studies with a Masters in human Rights at University of Manchester.

[00:09:19] Mona Tajali: I was always interested with questions of inequality. political representation, women’s rights movements, sort of social justice movements. And as you said, I’ve always also, I didn’t really know where to position myself earlier on. I always wanted to have a foot within the activism world as well as one maybe in the academic and research world.

[00:09:40] Mona Tajali: I guess those are the two areas that have always fascinated me and I always wanted to bridge the gap between the two. And it just so happened that, for my master’s work at University of Manchester in England, I happened to, this was at the height of the reform era.

[00:09:55] Mona Tajali: The woman’s movement was really active in Iran, and I happened to have a British supervisor who mentioned that, he’s had many,Iranian students who are doing fantastic work, one of whom was Homa Hoodfar. and he put me into the, onto the route to go ahead and research some of the work that’s been ongoing.

[00:10:13] Mona Tajali: So, when I first went to Iran to put this research lens on off, just to try to figure out, what are the women’s movements saying? What is the reform era? What are some of the opportunities that the reform era. But by the reform era, I’m really talking about the 1997 to the 2005 era.

[00:10:30] Mona Tajali: Between the presidency of,of former president, Khatami, to really see what are some of the opportunities that have presented and why are we seeing such a vivacious, women’s rights movement. I mean, if you might remember, this is when, Islamic feminism was very much on the rise. within the government, there was a center for Women’s political participation, which was linked to the office of the presidency.

[00:10:51] Mona Tajali: They were doing, really interesting work in terms of research in particular on women’s rights issues. So I actually entered some of those spheres just as a graduate student, just researching, just to try to figure out for my own interest and understanding, obviously as an Iranian American, I grew up mostly in the United States, but I did come from a political family, particularly a political family in which women, where they really saw themselves as political actors and political agents. like I would say most other, Iranian families have had female and male members, experience imprisonment, experience harassment, experience, different types of things for their political activities.

[00:11:31] Mona Tajali: So I always had that sort of, curiosity of how are the gender relations when it comes to politics, when it comes to decision making, whether it’s at the community level, whether it’s at the national level and anything in between. And when I entered that sphere, it was really interesting and I got to, maybe get my foot in with some of the interesting work that the women’s rights movements was doing.

[00:11:52] Mona Tajali: And from that time, I also recognized that one of the key demands of the women’s movements, particularly in the post 1995 era, Was women’s greater participation in the political sphere in Iran in particular, and I would say in the larger Middle East. what happened internationally on the international level was that, the UN held a pretty important, world Conference, which is the Beijing World Conference for Women in 1995, and Iranian women participated in that, and some of the women that I later got to meet that were associated with the Khatemi presidency. They were there. And, so it was really interesting to see how there was a dialogue or a discourse between the local and the national women’s movements and the larger international human rights sort of dis discourses that I, as someone who has been studying political science and international human rights law in US and in England had been exposed to.

[00:12:43] Mona Tajali: So that’s where that book really came from. And later on for my PhD studies, I happened to, apply to do my PhD with Homa Hoodfar in Canada. and that just ended up,establishing a collaboration between the two of us. first obviously a graduate student and a supervisor, and then later on, a co-author.

[00:13:01] Mona Tajali: And then to this day we, I’m very fortunate to be able to call her a colleague. And so that book really came out from a demand that the women’s movements themselves made, particularly women who self-identified as part of the secular camp, as well as those who were, who identified as part of the reformist camp that they were really interested on.

[00:13:21] Mona Tajali: the notion of gender quotas. Gender quotas are basically these affirmative action measures that are temporarily put in place in order to create a little bit more of a level playing field to allow women to enter the political sphere. And their request from us was, could you just tell us about the pitfalls and the opportunities that gender quotas could offer? And when we wanna go ahead and negotiate these from our governments, how do we go about it? So that’s where that book came from, where we looked at six case studies across the world with a successful gender quota case and a not so successful gender quota case. To be able to see that the best quota case is basically one that best fits your electoral system and your context and so on and so forth.

[00:14:05] Mona Tajali: And it was really interesting. So it was really written for the women of the Middle East, particularly women of Iran. But at the same time, it drew from cases from across the globe. And it was great that the book was published by WLUML, which is an organization that we’re support, we’re part of what WLUML stands for Women Living Under Muslim Laws.

[00:14:21] Mona Tajali: It was published as open access. And just within the first few years we were able to get the book translated into Arabic and Persian. Again, both of those translations available as open access and we’ve helped a couple of, workshops around it. Unfortunately, while the book, did bring about some of the really core debates around gender quotas, The women’s movements, as we know, they faced, extensive crackdown, so they weren’t really able to push for this with, at the national setting, particularly with the election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

[00:14:52] Mona Tajali: but nonetheless, I think the level of agency that they had and the level of organizing and how consciously they went around about this particular tactic is quite valuable.

[00:15:01] Nahid Siamdoust: That’s really fascinating. And, you have been part of the trans, the WLUML that you mentioned, transnational feminist Solidarity Network, since 2007, and I know in 2019 you were elected to serve as part of its executive board. And so you’ve been doing this work for a while. I’m curious if we can, if you can give us a,some details about,just the processes and the quotas that you discussed. Can you place Iran for us? within the, at least the comparative context that you have in the book.

[00:15:26] Nahid Siamdoust: How are they faring in terms of, and I know things, have been in flux, but, at the time of your research, and we can take it forward a little bit too, but at the time of your research, how did Iranian women fare in terms of their, gender quotas? Like what, what was in place, what was not in place?

[00:15:42] Nahid Siamdoust: how would you place them comparatively to, let’s say, other women in the region? And certainly, you have some examples beyond the region, but,how are they doing what was in place in order to,secure them, some kind of participation in the, political process?

[00:15:55] Mona Tajali: Yeah, that’s a very good question. So when it comes to political participation, women across the Muslim world usually rank lower than other global regions, lower than Africa, lower than, the Asia-Pacific, and so on and so forth. And then, and af of course, I’m a comparativist, so I see a lot of value in comparative research just to be able to see what has worked and what has not worked right or what are some of the tactics that some can look at and some cannot look at. And when you look globally, nearly all of the countries of the world that have had some sort of a, what we call meaningful descriptive representation, which is maybe 30% and above, nearly all have gone there thanks to gender quotas or thanks to these affirmative action measures. The only exceptions would be Cuba, which ranks, quite high, which obviously the communist ideology has allowed, this to take place. But the highest ranking country is Rwanda with 64% female representation. That is a hundred percent thanks to their gender quotas that they have. very close to Rwanda is United Arab Emirates, which just suddenly jumped into the top five in the world and that’s a 50% and that’s thanks to their 50% gender quota where they have gender parody.

[00:17:08] Mona Tajali: so, so yes, I think comparatively it’s really interesting when it came to the Middle East and when we looked at the literature particularly,the post nine 11 literature on this area, a lot of it was blamed on the role of religion. On Islam, that it’s really Islam or in the patriarchal Muslim culture that’s keeping women out of politics.

[00:17:26] Mona Tajali: And that’s where my research tried to address, I tried to compare two countries, Iran and Turkey. They have a lot of similarities with one another. in terms of population wise, they’re both Muslim majority countries. They have active women’s rights movements, but they still rank lower than the global average.

[00:17:44] Mona Tajali: In terms of the rate of women’s political representation, though to different degrees, when I started this research in fact Iran and Turkey were quite similar. They were both, below the 10% and then Turkey suddenly increased. Turkey suddenly increased with the coming to power of the Pro Religious Justice and development party, which has been in power for the past, two decades. and so what became really interesting for me is that I saw that women in both countries across the ideological spectrum, so both conservative religious women, and when I’m saying conservative religious women, I mean in Iran, like women that identified as Usulgara or principlists and also women of the conservative faction in conservative parties in Turkey, like the Justice and Development party women, they all pushed for greater political representation.

[00:18:32] Nahid Siamdoust: You were talking about how, you talked to a lot of principlist women who from these very you know,conservative political circles believed in their, rights or, had aspirations to, even serve as president or even supreme leader.

[00:18:46] Mona Tajali: Yes, exactly. yeah, so it, it was really interesting for me to hear firsthand from them that their gender, played no role whatsoever in terms of their aspirations for political leadership. And so this was in direct conflict with how, the conservative gender ideology of the state, or even of their male peers contradicted what they believed, they should be. And again, this is not all of the women, a lot of them, a lot of the ones that, that, would speak to me. They would say, we run our households, we run the budget of our households. How is running the country any different? And in fact, we bring some qualities that maybe some of our male peers do not in terms of. us really knowing what the, what our community needs us. our motherhood itself could be a major, a major quality.

[00:19:35] Mona Tajali: and then the other thing that happened was,many of the women, again, both in Iran and Turkey, particularly those within the conservative faction when they’re male elites held a very conservative gender ideology. They also began to see just. Flat out discrimination. In the sense that you had women who devoted decades of their lives to,fostering the party, to nourishing them to maybe, work at the lower echelons of the party. And then when it came to recruiting them to high level political decision making positions, such as recruiting them to become a member of the parliament, then suddenly men who were less qualified . Or had less years of devotion to the political party or to the faction were suddenly recruited, at their cost.

[00:20:19] Mona Tajali: And this is where a lot of that disappointment actually was channeled by the women to really organize and really begin to, push back. I think one great example of this is when a group of conservative women,within, with the Usulgarayan, , for the Tehran district, they really wanted to have, 10 out of 30, they wanted to have, at least 10 women out of the 30 member districts.

[00:20:41] Mona Tajali: And the party just the male elites just resisted. So then a whole bunch of women, 10 of them resigned from the party and then they put out their woman only list. and this was a very public way for them to say, Hey, we are being silenced. And, we’re just gonna put out our woman only list.

[00:20:56] Mona Tajali: And the woman only list was actually borrowed from. From England, right. Or from other contexts where we had, women only lists where it was sort of aa protest. And I think these, ways of resistance were quite valuable that we rarely hear from in the larger discussion of gender and politics.

[00:21:11] Mona Tajali: So these were some of the gaps that I wanted to fill.

[00:21:13] Mona Tajali: That’s super interesting. And so currently, I mean, I know, for basically decades, the number of representatives in the Iranian ‘majles’, female representatives, I don’t think

[00:21:24] Mona Tajali: it’s ever goneit’s never really gone beyond more than, let’s say, 15 or so. Am I

[00:21:29] Nahid Siamdoust: right? yeah. It’s never been into the double digits. the record that Iran holds is right before the 1979 revolution, which is that 7% female representation in the Iranian Parliament. and then the 2006, parliamentary election, which was the list of hope, that’s when they entered.

[00:21:46] Nahid Siamdoust: that was the closest that it got, which was at around, 5.9% or 6%. Currently it’s at 5.6%. Yes. So it’s very dismal. It’s among the lowest in the world. Right. Um, in terms of women’s Parliament, two presence, Turkey is different though.

[00:22:01] Nahid Siamdoust: And, can you, I wanna get to Turkey in a little bit, but can you explain to us why through your research and the field work that you’ve done and all of that, given that there’s so much,political activism and aspiration even among principlist, conservative women to have more participation in the political process, can you just explain to us, as, as well as you can, I suppose, why you think

[00:22:22] Nahid Siamdoust: participation is so limited.

[00:22:24] Mona Tajali: Yes. And that’s where the comparative research was really helpful. I mean, one thing that Iran Iranian women are absolutely disadvantaged in is, institutions. Institutions that can truly foster political representation and are run in a way that are gates towards, towards greater inclusive representation versus, acting as gatekeepers.

[00:22:50] Mona Tajali: and perhaps the first institution would be the role of political parties. Iran has had. very weak political party systems. we had a couple of experiments in recent decades with the ‘Mosharekat’ Party. Mm-hmm. Oror the ‘Mojaedin’ party. These were really good experiments.

[00:23:06] Mona Tajali: In fact, some of the women, and men, who were running it , mostly women who were involved within in these parties, they had really good ideas, really good plans. For instance, one mechanism that has been really influential and I write a lot about in my book, is the role of women’s chapters in political parties, which is a way to have women join the party that have their sort of, Women’s chapters, this is their way they’re fully formally integrated within the party structure.

[00:23:32] Mona Tajali: Then whenever it comes to a time to recruiting members for the parliament, a specific number have to be recruited from the women’s chapters. And that’s exactly what ‘Mosharekat’ was trying to do. It was trying to do this at the provincial level, not just in the major cities. they had a mandate to make sure that at every single party level, women compose at least 30% of the representatives, and then suddenly the party closed.

[00:23:56] Mona Tajali: Right. and we know that any single one of these changes takes decades in the making, right? It’s never that one individual comes and then they say, Hey, let’s make sure 30% of, every administrative across the party is women. That suddenly it, it, it’s implemented overnight, but.

[00:24:10] Mona Tajali: We know that it takes, a lot of trainings, a lot of dialogue, a lot of efforts, a lot of lobbying to make this happen. And they were on their way until 2009 when suddenly, post,green movement revolutions, the party was closed, and then all of these women were either pushed, to the sidelines.

[00:24:26] Mona Tajali: And then eventually they, when they wanted to bring, bring it back to the same level as it was, it took a long time. Whereas when you compare to Turkey, they have a very long history of political party organizing. Women’s chapters have been pretty much considered the engines of any major election, including the most recent election.

[00:24:43] Mona Tajali: One of the key issues of why women of Iran have such a hard time is because the institutions have not been prepared, and they have not been prepared in a truly democratic inclusive format. And I’m not saying that in Turkey. it’s been fantastic either, but at least some of these sort of bare minimums that we need in order to allow greater participation has been missing.

[00:25:05] Mona Tajali: What we have in Iran is basically what we call factions, where people rally around an individual. And I think that’s what’s quite, quite problematic because individuals come and go, whereas institutions can stay. Institutions if they’re fully well formulated, they can stay. and that’s where, the test of time can tell,what are some of the major institutions that, that, that can last this way?

[00:25:28] Nahid Siamdoust: And so it it seems like the, women’s advancement and progress in terms of political participation sort of mirrors the larger national one, where there was some progress underway and, with the, elections of 2009 and the green uprising and the closure of some avenues of participation for reformists at large, was also deeply reflected,or affected women’s participation and the processes that were in place.

[00:25:56] Nahid Siamdoust: And so when we look back from this vantage point today, from the women Life Freedom Movement and the uprising that’s been happening, can we look at that point of 2009 as a,turning point or,change of course, or would you characterize it in that way in terms of the progress for women’s participation?

[00:26:16] Mona Tajali: Yeah. One thing that’s very critical, and I think you pointed to this exactly, is that one cannot talk about democracy or justice without. Meaningful participation Of, of all members of a particular society and women just compose half of any society, right? So I think that’s where women’s political participation and meaningful participation is part and parcel of the larger discussions for democracy, for social justice.

[00:26:43] Mona Tajali: and yes, if there is systemic discrimination happening against women, then we know it also is happening in, in, in other contexts, right? Ideologically, against ethnic minorities, against religious minorities. So yes, that is, that’s what I meant by, my emphasis on institutions is that if we have institutions like gender quotas as an institution, the Iranian constitution is an institution.

[00:27:04] Mona Tajali: If we can actually go ahead and formulate institutions that have an inclusive,motivation behind them that, regardless of your gender, regardless of your ethnicity, regardless of your ideology, you should be able to be an active participant or at least feel that you can have your interest represented within political decision making.

[00:27:24] Mona Tajali: that is basically one of the minimums. and unfortunately within the Iranian context, we are not so used to this. A lot of this is new. A lot of, what I see happening with the woman life freedom movement, which worries me, is that a lot of emphasis is around which individual should we follow or which individual do we feel,represents us, versus speaking about how should the Iranian constitution , look like.

[00:27:48] Mona Tajali: I mean, again, these conversations are being had, but I think largely we need to just shift our focus from individuals because individuals come and go. I mean, Ergon was an individual that was absolutely favored by many. He did represent the voices of many. And that individual, as we see is now, at least 49% of the population do not agree with him, right?

[00:28:09] Mona Tajali: So this is where this is where,putting all of our eggs in the basket of individuals is pretty risky business.

[00:28:15] Nahid Siamdoust: I really wanna take it forward to Turkey and your newest book,comparing Iran and Turkey. But before I do that, I just wanna ask you a quick question on, some of these, regulations that really define or frame the.

[00:28:28] Nahid Siamdoust: Vistas or, the possibilities out there are quite ambiguous, right? So I know every four years when the presidential elections take place, there are many women who come and register as candidates. and they’re always disqualified. And it seems to be that , these disqualifications rest on a, on some vague terminology about who can be a ‘rejal’ sort of, a person of note, which seems to have been articulated to be male so far, during the Islamic Republic, and I’m mentioning this because you, you know,noted some conservative women who had even aspirations, not just to the presidency, but they said, they could even be a supreme leader. That’s right. but you know, these things are so ambiguous.

[00:29:07] Nahid Siamdoust: Can you just help us understand why is it that women can’t become president in Iran, and where are the debates on even potentially, a,female Vilayat-e Faqih. is that, what are the possibilities within the given regulations?

[00:29:20] Mona Tajali: Yeah. Yeah. and the key word there is ambiguous. I mean, all of these ambiguities mm-hmm.

[00:29:24] Mona Tajali: Are Are quite intentional. when the, when the Constitution in 1979 was being debated, first of all, that entire debate of the constitution was quite gender unequal because there was one woman, Monireh Gorji. compared to 72 men. So, just in terms of that tokenist representation, obviously. That in itself was quite problematic. And that those are the stuff that we need to have learned from, right? Mm-hmm. To say that if the constitution is made by 72 people, 72 men are at the decision making table to draft it, and then only one, then obviously we know the results of that.

[00:29:57] Mona Tajali: and yes. And when the discussion around the president came of, some of the qualities of the president, yes, there was a big push to keep it,gender neutral that anybody could. And then there were some that was like, no,no, we need to close this to women. We cannot possibly, the Islamic Republic of Iran cannot possibly have a female president.

[00:30:15] Mona Tajali: And so the term ‘rejal’ was picked as, as a way to keep it ambiguous. And that is, that’s exactly what ended up happening. That to this day, the Council of Guardians has, has just said that, we don’t, when they feel like it, they say we don’t, we don’t discriminate based on gender or gender doesn’t play a role.

[00:30:32] Mona Tajali: Whereas in other cases, they’re saying no, gender, gender is not a factor as far as the women are concerned. Women across the ideological spectrum. And they’ve been pushing to have the term ‘rejal’, be clarified. obviously a key actor of that was Azam Taleghani. Who ran for the president not once, not twice.

[00:30:49] Mona Tajali: Mm-hmm.But three times,well into her seventies to specifically force the Council of Guardians to go ahead and say whether,whether, rejal is understood as male or female. And her main point was, am I not qualified? And why is my gender, I mean, me as a learned woman who’s been devoting her life to the Islamic of Republic of Iran, you refuse to qualify me.

[00:31:11] Mona Tajali: so obviously this is a quite discriminatory stance that you’re having against mm-hmm. Um, against women. In terms of the Parliament, you are completely right to say that a lot of women have been registering to run for the Parliament. And again, my research is one of the first that shows that although women compose only around 10% of the total, percentage of individuals who even register, so about 90% of those who register for the parliament are men.

[00:31:36] Mona Tajali: 10% of them are women. Yet women get disqualified at a slightly higher rate than men. So women dis get disqualified around 53%, whereas men get disqualified around 48%. So what shows that shows to me is that women are considered a major threat. To, the Council of Guardians or to those who wanna maintain the status quo, that just because of the way some women dress, just because of the way they present themselves off social media, these are all grounds that they could easily be disqualified.

[00:32:05] Mona Tajali: Whereas some of their male peers are not subject to the same sort of rigorous, forms of disqualification. And still with this, strict, disqualifications, we still sometimes have outspoken women that make it to the parliament. And then that’s when we see also their term there is quite limited because then they get disqualified for the next round of elections.

[00:32:24] Mona Tajali: So yes, it’s absolutely authoritarian and undemocratic the way it’s run. But what’s interesting is that at least until the recent elections, women have been resisting It’s really the past two elections that many. the same women that I used to interview that were seeing some opportunities for reform or for change Are now pushing for boycotts of the elections because they’re not seeing any hope from within those structures. And

[00:32:47] Mona Tajali: are these conservative women or,some conservative women? but yes, many of the reformist women, many of the ones who believed in the institution of elections to be able to deliver some change. And I think that’s a really interesting comparison. that I, that is very clear with Iran and Turkey, is that Iran’s past elections, there was extensive boycott, historic voter, low voter turnout in Turkey. Despite the authoritarian turn, we still saw an 88% voter turnout. so this is where you see that when I’m saying that institutions, even though Turkey is taking an authoritarian turn, just that, possibility of election made,was an opportunity in the eyes of a large section of the electorate to still want to participate in it. Whereas in Iran, I mean, we’ve had 48% voter turnout, which was historically low. Some cities like Tehran had 20% voter turnout. these are numbers that should not be taken lightly. And I think when we’re looking at the comparison between these two countries, and often the two do look at one another.

[00:33:44] Mona Tajali: I think we need to really try to explain why the voter turnout has been so low in I in Iran, whereas in Turkey, despite all the crises that they’ve been having in recent years, elections are still a vital route.

[00:33:55] Nahid Siamdoust: That’s really interesting. And it seems, if you, if we could actually engage a little bit more,your research for your book, women’s Political Representation in Iran and Turkey, published in 2022 by Edinburgh University Press,I mean, in Turkey over the last two decades, basically an Islamist, Erdogan has been able to, if I understand you correctly, really create more participation for women in the political process. and so then the comparison to Iran really holds, and can you explain to us, you talked about institutions and having structures in place that allow that, wh what can, what, I mean, we are talking in the midst of the woman life freedom uprising mm-hmm. which wants to sort ofdo away entirely with the Islamic Republic. but if we were for a moment to sort of, you know,put that on hold for a second and just, consider given that this is the system that is still raining,in the country today, what could the Iranian political system take away from what’s happening in Turkey?

[00:34:55] Nahid Siamdoust: I guess that’s the first question. the second question is, well, is there even, would you say the will, within the Islamic Republic to even take note from Turkey? I mean, who would be the stakeholders in a larger participation by women? Or would you say based on your research and your thinking and what’s been going on, that potentially there isn’t really, a will or interest for greater women’s participation politically, even perhaps even, among the conservative constituencies?

[00:35:25] Mona Tajali: Yeah. Yeah. And I think here I want to, make a quick clarification, in my research,in the book, I go into this a lot where I make a distinction between what we call descriptive representation versus substantive representation. descriptive representation refers to the number of women in the parliament, so that 5%, 5.6% in Iran, or that, 17% in Turkey at the moment.

[00:35:47] Mona Tajali: Um, and then there’s the other type of representation, which is called substantive representation, and we understand that to be meaningful representation, that if you’re, a female representative, ideally you would be representing women’s interests. And one thing that is,in the literature of gender and politics is very clear, particularly in authoritarian context, is what we call instrumentalization of women’s rights, where Political parties, male political elites, including those that have,conservative tendencies. They’re very good at showing women’s political representation as a way to signal to the electorate, to their own electorate sometimes, or even to the international community, to say Hey, I’m not as conservative as you think I am, right?

[00:36:30] Mona Tajali: look at all these women that I’m showing and look at all these women that I’m recruiting. and that’s something that,it’s, we call it window dressing, basically. Right? It’s a very effective way. So when Erdogan first came to power, yes, he was very good at descriptively,allowing more women.

[00:36:45] Mona Tajali: and this was a very important tactic on his part. He had two goals with this. He wanted to show to the European Union that he was much more democratic and much more inclusive. And he also wanted to show to his electorate that he’s very different from the Islamis, the ultra islamis, groups that were basically the party’s predecessors, like the Like the Rafa party. and that worked to a large stent. and when you allow a lot of women come in, Again, women know where are monolith that sometimes you did have very outspoken women enter within the Turkish parliament. Um,aspects of violence against women really did. they had important bills happening within the first few parliaments in Turkey.

[00:37:20] Mona Tajali: So it’s not to say that it’s completely separate descriptive representation and substantive representation. Sometimes they do go hand in hand. And in fact, we hope that the more women you have, the more chances you have that women friendly policies are passed, except that parties who are not genuine or at least who are not genuine about empowering women very quickly realize who are the outspoken ones, and then they’re very quickly remove them from power.

[00:37:44] Mona Tajali: And then we see this happening in both countries, right? We saw this happen in Erdogans as soon as you were, Talking back to the party, you were removed from your post as well as in Iran. As soon as you become too outspoken, you are then disqualified by the Council of Guardians. Mm-hmm. So this is something that we’re seeing happening, if it comes to any lessons that are to be learned is that women are still a big part of the electorate that both parties feel that, or both countries or both, even conservatives or the reformists, they feel that they at least need to pay lip service to women’s demands, and that women , can really organize in an effective way to try to use these opportunities to their advantage to some extent.

[00:38:26] Mona Tajali: Right, right. And for instance, we saw this happen,with sometimes having, vice presidents for women’s affairs that were maybe closer to the women’s movement. Like we saw this with Shahindokht Molavardi, who actually came from the women’s movement and served in the first, half of Rohani,in his cabinet.

[00:38:42] Mona Tajali: So sometimes these opportunities happen. Unfortunately, they’re quite limited because we’re working from very limited structures. Right. that even when you had someone like Molavardi. Gain her seats. She couldn’t even finish that first term. She was forced to resign. Why? Because she was too outspoken in the taste of some of the hardliners. So, so I think women’s movements need to be really savvy to really recognize that, elections are an opportunity. You can push the parties or push the gender discourse to some extent, but at the end of the day, you really need to have those more, lasting institutional changes that, that truly are egalitarian.

[00:39:18] Mona Tajali: Like making sure that you have a constitution that’s truly egalitarian. Make sure that. Political parties are inclusive, make sure that you get rid of any sort of filtering mechanism that’s happening, like the Council of Guardians.

[00:39:29] Mona Tajali: That’s very interesting. And that kind of brings us to a con to the conversation on,the manifesto that you were part of, formulating and, which was released in, March of this year, March International Women’s Day 2023.

[00:39:43] Mona Tajali: I wonder if we can talk about it a little bit, because clearly what this Iran Women’s Bill of Rights feminist collectives proposal mm-hmm.For women life freedom, clearly what it’s trying to do is correct some of these issues that you’ve just brought up. Right. Um, structurally allow women to have more of, uh, more participation in the political system.

[00:40:02] Mona Tajali: And, can you tell us a little bit about this, because, following the, uprising in Iran, There have been several very interesting manifestos and, I think this is really, the most detailed that I’ve seen, from a women’s collective on advancing, women’s rights. Can you tell us a little bit about, how this came about? How did these, who, first of all, who is behind this bill of rights? Who are the, I assume mostly women, potentially only women. I’m not sure. who are behind writing this bill of rights. And what were some of the, if you can give us a little bit of insight into the conversations that went into producing,this great document.

[00:40:40] Mona Tajali: Yes. we call ourselves a group of feminists, from diverse tendencies, generations experiences, and fields of expertise, mostly composed of, activists and academics. Majority of us, have decades of activism from within the Iranian context, from the Iranian women’s movement that I talked about earlier.

[00:41:01] Mona Tajali: what’s important to keep in mind with the Bill of Rights? Yes. we wanted to give, as comprehensive as a draft. And we first published it on March 8th,2023, but as a living document, as a document to say this is something for the Iranian population, particularly for Iranian women to engage with, to try to improve.

[00:41:21] Mona Tajali: The other thing that’s really important to keep in mind is that this was not our draft. This was rather a draft that is built on decades of women’s organizing, particularly within Iran. so Iranian women, the same group that I talked about, the highly mobilized , politicized women’s organizing, women’s movements,at the grassroots, they had been working on women’s charters, women’s Bill of Rights.

[00:41:43] Mona Tajali: In fact, when I first started my research right before the 2009 presidential election, that’s when,when I was following the women’s movement, I saw them, actually putting together what they called the charter for women’s rights, which was in 2009. And the purpose of that was, To basically to the four presidential candidates.

[00:42:01] Mona Tajali: There were four presidential candidates. Ahmadinejad was running for reelection. There were other, two other reformist ones and then Mohsen Rezaee. And their purpose of that charter was to say that, Hey, the women’s movement is quite unified and we have some clear demands and we want these clear demands presented to the future president of Iran.

[00:42:19] Mona Tajali: This is where that opportunity of the election that I talked about, it presented itself. Many of them organized, it took them about a year, and they published this demand right before the elections. And then they met with every single one of the presidential candidates except for Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad would not meet with them.

[00:42:35] Mona Tajali: And basically this was, I wanna say a 15 to 20 article charter. It included things like making sure that women are part of the decision making process, making sure that there is, free and fair election,free and fair access to education. there’s no restrictions on fields of study.

[00:42:51] Mona Tajali: Like for instance, during Ahmadinejad, there were some restrictions placed on fields of study. So it was just a really clear way for the women to tell those elites that, Hey, we have our demands. It’s not to say that, there’s no unity among them. We have some of our common denominators and we wanna present this to them.

[00:43:07] Mona Tajali: And unfortunately, we know what happened after the 2009 elections. There was, extensive crackdown on the women’s right movement. Many of them were forced into exile. Many of the women that were forced into exile, they did not cease their activism, nor did they lose their contacts with Iran. Right. I mean, we’re talking about women who, decades of their lives was just devoted to doing multiple campaigns, whether it’s the 1 million Signatures campaign, whether it’s access to stadiums and so on and so forth. So when the Jin Jian Azadi protests took place. We again saw this as an opportunity to say, Hey, we already have some of this work done.

[00:43:42] Mona Tajali: we’ve done our homework. We know what are some of the key demands. Let’s make sure there’s no ambiguity around it. Let’s make sure that the women are again, feminists with no sort of ‘tarof’ We wanna directly come and say, Hey, this is what we mean by absolute gender equality.

[00:43:59] Mona Tajali: This is what we mean by equal access to political participation by equal access to the labor force, by equal access to fields of study, by women’s access to health by L G B T Q, rights, by women and the environment, and so on and so forth. So it ended up being a 19 article,manifesto or a bill of rights, and it was there with the intention that if we’re talking about substantial institutional change, hopefully with the future constitution of Iran, that when it comes to drafting that new constitution, someone can look at this document to say, oh, well, we see that the women’s movement already has one document here that is, that is to start a conversation. A lot of this was meant towards doing that.

[00:44:40] Mona Tajali: Not only that ‘farhang-saazi’ or, or, you know, sort of that, that that cultural sort of, building to let the younger generations, particularly those who are in the streets, to say, Hey, your mothers and your grandmothers, they fought for this. they’ve already done a lot of this work. Here’s, here’s a sample of that.

[00:44:55] Mona Tajali: And then at the same time, look towards the future to say, how can we avoid,suddenly having our fields of study taken away from us. Or suddenly not being able to travel abroad. When our husbands deny us, the ability to travel abroad. Right. So it was, so, it’s very, Iran is specific context, is specific where some of the bills are specifically speaking to that, while a lot of the inspiration is coming from feminist activism and feminist global movements, obviously women living under Muslim laws is one that positions itself as one that talks both to the international community as well as to local context.

[00:45:28] Mona Tajali: So we had legal scholars look through the documents to make sure that a lot of this was legally applicable. That’s why we called it a bill of rights versus a charter of rights, because we thought that the articles could be ready enough that it could be legally implementable, that could be integrated into the Iranian constitution.

[00:45:46] Mona Tajali: And then we also really wanted it to be inclusive. We made sure that ethnic minority rights were included in there, religious minority rights were included in there. even some of the areas that we rarely talk about at the legal level, while we know grassroots activism is a, is very active on. Such as L G B T Q, rights and the environment.

[00:46:04] Nahid Siamdoust: Yeah. And I mean, you said it’s a working document, so how does that work? I understand this is, feminists who’ve been working on women’s rights for, a long time. So this document basically was produced by women, both who are still residing in Iran and women who had, many years of activism who have since left or who have been part of the diaspora.

[00:46:24] Nahid Siamdoust: is that correct?

[00:46:25] Mona Tajali: that’s right. We had direct contact with some of those within Iran, including some within prisons, but obviously for security reasons. we didn’t wanna name any names and in fact, one of the reasons of, if you go on our website, which is,www.iwbr or Iranwomenbillofrights.org, you’ll see that our names are not there is because we really want the document to receive a lot of attention versus who is specifically behind it. As long as we know that, yeah, we call ourselves feminists,and representing women’s issues and demands in all their diversity.

[00:46:55] Nahid Siamdoust: And have you already received any kind of feedback on this bill of rights? I mean, it really is a substantive document that could very well, as you say, function as,a preamble or as part of, any kind of new constitution that would be drafted.

[00:47:10] Mona Tajali: Yes, that’s exactly your hope.

[00:47:11] Mona Tajali: So, yes, on March 8th is when we publicly announced it, and that’s when our website went live. Unfortunately, in Iran, it quickly became,censored or filtered. But then we came up with other ingenious ways to be able to put ’em out there, such as on our Instagram, we have the pages of the document, um, sort ofrunning as a video.

[00:47:29] Mona Tajali: Mm-hmm. Um,so yes, we have held two webinars thus far, public webinars, each of them having around a hundred to 200 participants from both inside Iran and outside of Iran, including some of our Afghan feminist, sisters to join us to really be able to discuss and debate and dialogue. And yes, there were many areas that should have absolutely been improved.

[00:47:51] Mona Tajali: Um, for instance, the earlier version, our women and environment articles were thin because we didn’t have that much of that expertise, but thankfully In version two and three, , we had. Some amazing experts to come and just tell us, like for instance, like agriculture and environment go hand in hand. It’s very women driven within the Iranian context. So that’s something that with the context of Iran, we had to reformulate some of those articles. So yes, the document is alive and it’s living and it’s always going to be open to feedback. We have a, an email contact, which is called contactiwbr@gmail.com, which is where We’re just asking for feedbacks to come in our Instagram, our Twitter is alive. our telegram channel is up and running. So yes, we actually have been getting lots of feedback. One thing that’s been quite surprising to me Is to see how many men are engaging with this, and particularly professional men, where many are like, thank you for this. Please, think of this and, and improve this. And so that’s been really good because as a feminist document and as a document that is, Towards gender equality. I think it’s also really important to recognize that many of our, populations, section of our population, they’re recognizing that if you have a women’s bill of rights, it does not mean that it only enhances women’s status and issues.

[00:49:04] Mona Tajali: It’s for the betterment of the entire society. And I’m really glad to see that many men, and in fact that’s nothing new for Iran. in fact we’ve had many men who are very willingly part of the feminist movement. But it’s really interesting to see them really engage directly with this document.

[00:49:20] Mona Tajali: So, yes. we welcome even more feedback and yes. So we will hold more webinars and we will Advertise them to just have more dialogue around it.

[00:49:28] Nahid Siamdoust: That’s really great. And, thank you for mentioning the interfaces and platforms where people can engage with this document.

[00:49:35] Nahid Siamdoust: Um, you know, sort of in bringing it to a, to a close, I would like to ask you where you think we are now with, the Women Life Freedom Movement that started in September of 2022. I know there have been many conferences, many talks, one in particular that I believe tried to sort ofbring in a lot of the, different expertise on different aspects of this movement.

[00:49:57] Nahid Siamdoust: was the Gozar conference in, um, mm-hmm.At Stanford University not too long ago. I believe that was sometime in maybe April, of this year. Just about last month or so. Can you tell us a little bit about, where you think we are headed? we have different manifestos, we have this substantive bill of rights, we’ve had the activism, we’ve, had the coalitions, the many different conversations.

[00:50:19] Nahid Siamdoust: were you hopeful after the, Stanford conference and do you remain

[00:50:24] Nahid Siamdoust: hopeful?

[00:50:25] Mona Tajali: Yeah. So, it’s very difficult to predict. I am very hopeful with, all the work that you just listed, right? All these different charters and manifestos and Bill of Rights, these are all really important steps.

[00:50:37] Mona Tajali: I mean, this is not the first time that Iranians are, protesting. And, But this is really the first time that we’re seeing such substantive sort of thought and dialogue and process go into what I call sort of institution building, right? Or to very clearly want to outline some of their demands and some of their interests.

[00:50:54] Mona Tajali: I think that’s a really helpful, um, sort of momentmoment that we’re in right now. the conference that you mentioned was a specifically, meant towards creating that dialogue. In fact, the title of the conference was Dialogue on Transitions to Democracy on Iran. so recognizing that this is the moment where a large section of Iranians we.

[00:51:16] Mona Tajali: Are in agreement that it’s time to see something radically change, right. To move away from the theocratic regime. Where we differ is how to go about it, who should be in the leadership. what institutions should be there, what should, and that’s where the dialogue and the discussion are absolutely essential.

[00:51:33] Mona Tajali: and I think that’s where many of, particularly of our generation and many of I would say diverse generations, but particularly, I would say some of our generation are very interested in bringing about this dialogue. Many of us who are very familiar with some of the discussions within Iran, but at the same time we are also very well connected.

[00:51:52] Mona Tajali: Maybe we have access to research, to data, to analysis to institutions, to bodies, in the outside world. So I think we have a lot of important opportunities that it would give me hope that we continue these dialogues. Where it worries me. Is where if we want to rush some of these dialogues and exchanges Where sometimes we might get too desperate and then put our support behind an individual versus an institution building, right? right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Or, or, or, be at the cost of a particular section of our society, whether it’s ethnic minorities or whether it’s religious minorities. So that’s where some of the worry happens.

[00:52:29] Mona Tajali: And I do know that, you know, um, I, II know you talked to Asef Bayat recently mm-hmm.Where he has, the term like ‘refolutions’. I think this is where we are at right now, that we really need to think about it. Are we, after a revolution? Do we want something quick change, or do we rather want something that is much more thought through. In terms of the women’s movement, where I get a lot of hope and that’s where I can speak on behalf of because I’m better connected to them.

[00:52:52] Mona Tajali: Is that a lot of work has been done on behalf of the feminists and the women’s movement in Iran. Um, they’re very well aware of what they want and what trajectory the country needs to take. they do not need any particular expertise coming from the outside or coming from the UN or come, so, so I think that’s where one of my hopes is that because I know that they’re just so, Savvy and so aware and so well connected.

[00:53:19] Mona Tajali: Mm-hmm. Um, you know, they just need our support in terms of, yeah. In terms of continuing that work, it will probably take some time, but I would more rather have the more gradual substantive change versus something quick that might not, um mm-hmm.Lead into this, this radical, pluralist egalitarian, democratic change that we really wanna see in Iran.

[00:53:40] Mona Tajali: Yeah.

[00:53:40] Nahid Siamdoust: And I think, the Bill of Rights reflects that, the first three articles being, the first being Constitutional Assembly, making sure that there’s representation across the board. the second article, I suppose this is one,the more interesting one, I think,state secularism, which in, in all the, diverse thinking, on change in Iran, I think this is something that people, Mostly agree on, right? Yes. That there needs to be a separation between state and religion, simply because of the kind of experience that we’ve had, over the last 44 years. And the third being safeguarding human rights respecting all the great diversity of Iran in terms of territory, race, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, and other parts of identity. And I think this is, really worth sort of spending some time with this document. Uh, um, thank you so much, for this conversation. Thank you for giving us of your time and expertise.

[00:54:38] Nahid Siamdoust: It’s been really, wonderful talking to you and just learning more about these different vectors of, Iranian, politics as they intersect with women’s rights and, the women’s movement. thank you so much for being with us today.

[00:54:53] Mona Tajali: Thank you so much for doing what you’re doing and to playing a key role in really fostering these negotiations and these dialogues and these discussions, which are absolutely essential.

[00:55:03] Mona Tajali: And that’s another hopeful moment that I have where that the women life freedom,moment movement, whatever we wanna call it, is such an important opportunity that we need to really take advantage of and to really highlight,some of our key demands in terms of equality, in terms of justice, in terms of pluralism and hopefully, yeah, hopefully we will be a model just not for the region, but worldwide.

[00:55:26] Nahid Siamdoust: I very much hope so. Along with 80 something million Iranians. Yep. Thank you so much. Dr. Mona Tajali is Associate Professor of International Relations and Women’s Gender and sexuality studies at Agnes Scott College. she is the chair of the political science Department and the director of the International Relations and Human Rights Programs at the college.

[00:55:46] Nahid Siamdoust: Thank you so much again.

[00:55:47] Nahid Siamdoust: Thank you.

[00:55:48] Nahid Siamdoust: Thank you.

[00:55:52] Nahid Siamdoust: You were listening to an episode of Woman Life Freedom: All in on Iran broadcast to you from the University of Texas at Austin. I’m your host, Nahid Siamdoust. Until next time, Jin, Jian, Azadi. Zan, Zendegi, Azadi.