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Last week’s Iranian elections were billed as the most significant in decades as reformist, moderate, and conservative candidates vied for seats in the nation’s parliament (called the Majlis) and its Assembly of Experts, the body that selects the nation’s Supreme Leader. The elections appeared to be a triumph for moderate President Hassan Rouhani, with reformist and moderate candidates sweeping all of the seats in Tehran and returning to the Majlis for the first time since 2012. Moderate candidates also did well in the Assembly of Experts elections, apparently winning fifty-one of the eighty-eight available seats. In a campaign that was marred by accusations of Western interference by the nation’s conservatives, Rouhani successfully rallied Iranians around the benefits of the recent nuclear deal and appears poised to push for more economic and social reforms before Iran holds its presidential election next year. This could make Iran a growing superpower in the Middle East, but extempers should be cautious of reading too much significance into the elections as hardliners continue to control the Islamic Republic’s primary institutions.
This topic brief will provide some background information on Iranian politics, discuss the brief election cycle that led up to the recent elections, and then analyze the significance of the elections.
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