National Front (Iran)

National Front
ChairpersonSeyed Hossein Mousavian
SpokespersonMohsen Frashad
FounderMohammad Mosaddegh
Founded
  • 12 November 1949 (1949-11-12) (original)
  • 14 July 1960 (1960-07-14) (second)
  • 29 July 1965 (1965-07-29) (third)
  • 12 June 1977 (1977-06-12) (fourth)
  • 1993 (1993) (current)
HeadquartersTehran
Parliamentary wingNational Movement fraction (1950–1953)
Ideology
Political positionCentre to centre-left[2][3]
Parliament
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Website
jebhemeliiran.org

The National Front of Iran (Persian: جبهه‌ ملی ایران, romanized: Jebhe-ye Melli-ye Irân) is an opposition[4] political organization in Iran. It was founded by Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1949, and it is the oldest and arguably the largest pro-democracy group operating inside Iran,[4] despite having never been able to recover the prominence it had in the early 1950s.[5]

Initially, the front was an umbrella organization for a broad coalition of forces with nationalist, liberal-democratic, socialist, bazaari, secular and Islamic tendencies, that mobilized to successfully campaign for the nationalization of the Iranian oil industry. In 1951, the Front formed a government which was deposed by the 1953 Iranian coup d'état and subsequently repressed.[6] Members attempted to revive the Front in 1960, 1965, and 1977.

Before 1953 and throughout the 1960s, the Front was torn by strife between secular and religious elements.[5][7] Over time its coalition split into various squabbling factions, with the Front gradually emerging as the leading organization of secular liberals[8] with nationalist members adhering to liberal democracy and social democracy.[4]

During the Iranian Revolution, the Front supported the replacement of the old monarchy by an Islamic Republic,[2] and was the main symbol of the nationalist tendency in the early years of post-revolutionary government.[9] It was banned in July 1981. Although it is under constant surveillance and officially illegal, it remains active inside Iran.[4]

  1. ^ Gasiorowski, Mark J.; Byrne, Malcolm (2004). Mohammad Mosaddeq and the 1953 Coup in Iran. Syracuse University Press. pp. 60–61. ISBN 0815630182.
  2. ^ a b Zabir, Sepehr (2012). Iran Since the Revolution (RLE Iran D). Taylor & Francis. p. 29. ISBN 978-1136833007.
  3. ^ Gheissari, Ali (2010). Iranian Intellectuals in the Twentieth Century. University of Texas Press. p. 64. ISBN 978-0292778917.
  4. ^ a b c d Kazemzadeh, Masoud (2008). "Opposition Groups". Iran Today: An Encyclopedia of Life in the Islamic Republic. Vol. 1. Greenwood Press. pp. 363–364. ISBN 978-0313341632.
  5. ^ a b John H. Lorentz (2010). "National Front". The A to Z of Iran. The A to Z Guide Series. Vol. 209. Scarecrow Press. p. 224. ISBN 978-1461731917.
  6. ^ Poulson, Stephen C. (2012). Social Movements in Twentieth-century Iran: Culture, Ideology, and Mobilizing Frameworks. Lexington Books. p. 4. ISBN 978-0739117576.
  7. ^ Houchang E. Chehabi (1990). Iranian Politics and Religious Modernism: The Liberation Movement of Iran Under the Shah and Khomeini. I.B.Tauris. p. 128. ISBN 1850431981.
  8. ^ Abrahamian, Ervand (1989). Radical Islam: the Iranian Mojahedin. I.B.Tauris. p.47. ISBN 978-1-85043-077-3
  9. ^ Antoine, Olivier; Sfeir, Roy (2007), The Columbia World Dictionary of Islamism, Columbia University Press, p. 146