The Pezeshkian Paradox: Iran’s New President and the IRGC

Almost a month has passed since Masoud Pezeshkian, the new so-called ‘reformist’ president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, delivered his first speech at the UN General Assembly in New York, where he started a charm offensive. In his efforts to flirt with Western media, the new president has even raised the idea of de-escalating tensions with Israel, suggesting that the regime in Iran could disarm if Israel did the same. But while Pezeshkian’s comments captured his target audience in the West, less reported was the fact that the new president received a huge domestic backlash from some elements of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its hardline constituency.

Pezeshkian’s message of ‘peace’ in New York is detached from those who control his fate: the supreme leader and his all-powerful ideological armed force, the IRGC. This begs the key question: what will the new president’s tango with the IRGC look like? A lot can be said from the Guard’s nature and its ties to past administrations. 

The IRGC’s rapid expansion of power took place from the moment Ali Khamenei, the now 85-year-old ayatollah, assumed the mantle of supreme leader in 1989. Khamenei effectively used the IRGC as a vehicle to expand his authority and quash any threat – either from elites or the Iranian people – to the key fundamentals of the regime and his power. 

To cultivate the IRGC as his vanguard, Khamenei would gradually divest more power to the Guard in return for blind obedience (velayat madari): a process that would be achieved through rigorous ideological indoctrination and access to greater resources. 

If the past is prologue, two key factors will ultimately determine Pezeshkian’s relationship with the IRGC and how his presidency will unfold: the ideological alignment of his administration and the level of protection he offers for the IRGC’s economic interests. 

The IRGC is, without doubt, the most ideological organ of the Islamic Republic. This is precisely why Khamenei regards it as the ‘main pillar of the Islamic Revolution’ (amood-e kheimeh-e enghlab) and has not once criticised the Guard. 

Its worldview can be best described as militant Islamist extremism, with various overlapping domestic, regional and global core values. Domestically, this hinges on Islamic morality policing and Islamising society. Across the region, it is centered on eradicating the state of Israel and supporting its so-called ‘Axis of Resistance’ militia network. And finally, at the global level, it is driven by eternal enmity towards the US and the liberal world order.

The past has demonstrated that the Guard will support any administration – regardless of the president – if it sticks to its core ideological framework. The IRGC’s support of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Ebrahim Raisi’s hardline governments and its unfriendliness to the Mohammad Khatami and Hassan Rouhani administrations can be understood through this lens. Khatami and Rouhani's governments’ efforts, if only in rhetoric, to limit ideological social and cultural policies were the main reasons for the IRGC’s criticism of these administrations. The IRGC’s demand of Pezeshkian is simple: do not challenge or abandon any of the regime’s key ideological pillars.

Remarkably – or perhaps not – Pezeshkian’s administration has already gone out of its way to demonstrate its commitment to the above, from the new president’s over-the-top embrace of ‘Axis of Resistance’ leaders – including hugs and kisses for the late Hamas leader Esmail Haniyeh – to his foreign minister nominee Abass Araghchi explicitly declaring the administration’s ‘policy towards America is about managing hostilities, but not to end hostilities’. Pezeshkian has even backtracked from his outspoken presidential campaign on morality policing, suggesting that he has no problem with the practice but wants to change its form of implementation. Even Rouhani – who was not as aligned with the so-called ‘reformist’ elite faction – went further on this issue rhetorically, stating, ‘You can’t take people to heaven by force or through lashes’. 

But simply aligning with the IRGC’s worldview is not enough for the new president to keep the Guard sweet. The other fundamental factor determining his relationship with the Guard will be the level of protection his administration provides for the IRGC’s economic interests. 

The IRGC’s kleptocratic economic pie can be divided into three. The first slice derives from government rentier capital, whereby state contracts and projects are awarded to the Guard; the second slice comes from de facto running Iran’s lucrative sanctions evasions business; and the final slice stems from its role in managing the regime’s nefarious black economy, which includes its role in the global trafficking of narcotics. From the time former President Hashemi Rafsanjani opened the door of the economy to the Guard and since the creation of its investment fund, Bonyad-e Taavon, the IRGC’s economic activities have grown significantly. During the Ahmadinejad administration (2005–2012) and under the name of privatisation and the implementation of article 44 of the Constitution, which called for the privatisation of government corporations, the IRGC bought many state companies at discounted rates. During the Raisi administration, the IRGC further expanded its business ventures, leading to significant control over more than half of Iran's economy through its commercial and economic enterprises. 

Protecting and advancing the IRGC’s ideology and the economic interests of its oligarchy will determine the new president’s relationship with Khamenei’s ideological armed force. The problem for Pezeshkian, however, is that these same two factors are also among the core drivers of Iran’s societal and economic crises, alienating ordinary Iranians and bringing them onto the streets. It has been clear for quite some time now that most Iranians reject the Islamic Republic’s ideology and seek a secular and liberal state. This rejection is even more fierce in relation to the core tenets of the IRGC’s worldview. There are numerous indicators that evidence this: from Iranian society being one of the most pro-US society in the Muslim world to vehement opposition to morality policing – as demonstrated during the 2022 protests – and fierce condemnation of the regime’s support for groups like Hezbollah and Hamas. Similarly, the IRGC’s interference in, and consumption of, the Iranian economy has strongly undermined Iran’s private sector, which has, in turn, made the average Iranian poorer and had a devastating effect on their livelihoods.

While most Iranians boycotted the presidential elections and did not vote for Pezeshkian – he only received 54% of the vote from the 49% of the population who voted, according to inflated state figures – those who did (his constituency) did so precisely to stop and reduce the IRGC’s stranglehold over Iranian society, economics and politics. 

And herein lies the Pezeshkian paradox: if the new president seeks to advance his constituency’s expectations, he will lose the IRGC’s support, and if he decides to keep the IRGC onside, he will lose his constituency.

In the case of the former – namely, the alienation of the all-powerful Guard – the IRGC will use all available means to attack and undermine Pezeshkian’s administration, including mobilising its young and radical Basij militia and hezbollahi (ideologically hardline) thugs. Based on past experiences with Khatami and Rouhani’s administrations, the IRGC’s cultural and propaganda arm will also wage a relentless psychological warfare operation against the president. This will then feed the IRGC’s intelligence organisation with enough fabricated evidence for it to hunt down and arrest members and affiliates of the Pezeshkian administration. 

On the flip side, if the new president opts for staying in power by keeping the IRGC happy, he will have to undermine his presidential campaign promises and alienate his constituency – a move that would be the final nail in the coffin for the so-called ‘reformists’. Both scenarios produce lose-lose outcomes and produce an inefficient president: inefficient either because of the constraints imposed by the IRGC as a response to Pezeshkian’s opposition to their interests, or due to Pezeshkian failing to deliver for his constituency as a result of appeasing the IRGC.

This dilemma was also the puzzle for all previous Iranian presidents under Khamenei. The IRGC supported Ahmadinejad and the Raisi government, which promoted the regime's ideological pillars and allowed the Guard to have a strong influence on the economy. In contrast, the administrations led by Khatami and Rouhani tried to limit the IRGC's economic involvement and dilute Khamenei’s ideological policies, which led to conflict with the Guard.

So far Pezeshkian has opted to keep the IRGC happy rather than his own constituency. Ideologically, the new president has been explicit in supporting the IRGC’s attacks against Israel, endorsing its Shia militia doctrine and its antisemitic enmity with Israel, as well as consistently referring to the IRGC’s religious-ideological rhetoric.

Perhaps more importantly, Pezeshkian has also made it clear that he wants to keep the IRGC’s stomach full economically. Just before his trip to New York, Pezeshkian took his economic delegation to the IRGC’s conglomerate, Khatam al-Anbiya Construction Headquarters – a trip that shed light on his intention to satisfy the IRGC senior oligarchs’ economic greed. Immediately after the trip, Pezeshkian announced that Khatam al-Anbiya would be involved in some state projects, including building schools in underprivileged areas. But the scope of the IRGC’s lucrative gains from these projects is yet to be clear. If Pezeshkian’s offer is not as sweet as the IRGC wants – no matter if he continues to pay the IRGC’s ideology lip service – the Guard’s honeymoon period with the new president will be over.

The views expressed in this Commentary are the authors’, and do not represent those of RUSI or any other institution.

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