To download a PDF of this piece click here. Iran will hold a presidential election June 12 in which the country's ultraconservative president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, will face powerful challengers in trying to secure a second term. To a significant degree, the results of the election could determine the outcome of the Obama administration's efforts to diplomatically engage the Islamic Republic. Limits to the power of the Iranian presidency, and the fact that policymaking in Tehran is a function of consensus among various stakeholders, underscore the complexity of the Iranian political structure and how it functions. The Islamic Republic of Iran was founded in the aftermath of the country's 1979 revolution, which deposed the Shah of Iran. The new republic is a kind of hybrid between a Western parliamentary democracy and a Velayat-e-Faqih (a state ruled by a jurist, a concept developed in the 18th century). In Iran, this hybrid is a peculiar system that includes clerics as well as politicians and technocrats, and over the years it has evolved into a complex web of institutions and players stretching between the supreme leader and the president, the two most prominent posts in the country's political hierarchy.

Key Institutions

Supreme Leader

At the apex of the Iranian system, and undoubtedly the most powerful individual, is the supreme leader. This position has thus far been held by two individuals. The first was the founder of the Islamic republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who held the post from 1979 until his death in 1989. He was succeeded by his key aide and a former two-term president, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been supreme leader for the past two decades. The supreme leader is directly elected not by the public, but by the Assembly of Experts (AoE), which also has the power to hold him accountable and to remove him. Nevertheless, the supreme leader enjoys vast powers, as he serves as the supreme commander of the country's armed forces and appoints the leadership of the country's most powerful political institutions, such as state broadcasting, the Joint Staff, Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), Guardians Council (GC), Judiciary, Expediency Council (EC) and Supreme National Security Council (SNSC). All SNSC decisions require the supreme leader's approval. Despite this overwhelming authority, the supreme leader does not call the shots alone; rather, he rules by consensus. According to the Iranian Constitution, if the supreme leader dies, resigns or is removed, a council consisting of the president, the head of the judiciary and a member of the GC takes over temporarily until the AoE selects a new leader. While this is only an interim arrangement, many Iranian power brokers, including Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, former president and current EC chairman, have proposed that the office of the supreme leader be replaced by a council of jurists, a move that would require a change to the constitution. This would not be unprecedented; shortly before he died, Khomeini ordered a change to the constitution so that it would no longer require the supreme leader to be a marjaa taqleed (a senior cleric who has reached a level of scholarship so that he can be emulated by laypeople, a requirement in Shiite Islam).

President

While the supreme leader exercises far greater authority, the Iranian president also wields considerable power given that he is head of the executive branch and makes all key government appointments (i.e., to the Cabinet and the SNSC). Because the country's premier intelligence service, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, and the regular armed forces under the Ministry of Defense are headed by Cabinet members, the president has a lot of say in security matters. Popularly elected every four years, a president can serve two consecutive terms and is the one taking the lead on policymaking, with other institutions providing guidance and oversight. The fact that former President Mohammad Khatami, a reformist, was able to pursue policies that did not sit well with the conservative establishment, while his successor, Ahmadinejad, is able to resist strong opposition to his policies from fellow conservatives, speaks volumes about the power that rests within the office of the presidency.

Guardians Council

The authority to vet presidential candidates as well as those seeking membership in parliament and the AoE makes the GC one of the most powerful institutions in the Iranian state. It can approve or reject parliamentary legislation if it deems it not in keeping with the constitution. As the ultimate interpreter of the constitution, the GC also serves as the country's constitutional court. The GC is a 12-member body consisting of six theologians appointed by the supreme leader and six jurists appointed by the judiciary chief but confirmed by parliament. Members serve six-year terms on a phased basis so that six members change every three years. Since 1988, the GC has been led by Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, a key ultraconservative and supporter of the current president. The GC has earned notoriety because of its moves to disqualify thousands of reformist candidates seeking to run in parliamentary elections. In the case of the presidential election, the GC has been more lenient (largely because there is only one position up for grabs, and there usually are not many serious hopefuls).

Judiciary

The Iranian state's judicial branch consists of an elaborate web of different courts and is headed by a judiciary chief who must be a mujtahid (a cleric qualified to interpret religious texts and issue rulings) and is appointed by the supreme leader to serve a five-year term. The current judiciary chief is Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, who has held the position since 1999. His current term expires this year, but he could be reappointed to a third term. The judiciary chief has a tremendous amount of power. He directly reports to the supreme leader and, in turn, appoints the Supreme Court chief justice and the public prosecutor, both of whom also have to be mujtahids. Even the minister of justice, who plays a key role as a legal interlocutor among the three branches of government, is chosen by the president from a list of candidates proposed by the judiciary chief. Furthermore, the judiciary chief gets to nominate the six jurists who form the powerful 12-member GC (although they have to be approved by parliament). While the judiciary chief enjoys vast powers, two key functions do not fall under his purview. First, the Special Clerical Courts, which try clerics accused of violating the law, operate separately from the judicial system and are under the direct control of the supreme leader. Second, the judiciary is not the ultimate authority to interpret the constitution, a power exercised by the GC.

Parliament

The legislative branch of Iran's government consists of a 290-member unicameral parliament known as the Majlis, whose members are elected by popular vote every four years. The Majlis has the power to approve laws, ratify international treaties and impeach the president. But the powers of the Majlis are greatly circumscribed by the GC with its oversight powers, which has led to tensions between the two institutions — especially during the years when Khatami was president (1997-2005), when reformists were in control of the Majlis and the presidency. While the conservatives regained control of the Majlis in the 2004 elections, the election of Ahmadinejad the following year led to problems between the legislative and executive branches. Very early on, the Majlis began opposing the president by objecting to several of his Cabinet prospects, rejecting three consecutive nominees to head the Oil Ministry. In subsequent years, the Majlis became a key arena for opposition to many of Ahmadinejad's maverick policies. Though an intraconservative rift between hard-liners and pragmatists noisily played out, the parliament was unable to play a major role in checking the power of the president until after the 2008 elections. Rival conservative factions competed for seats, with the conservative bloc opposed to Ahmadinejad gaining some 50-odd seats and former national security chief Ali Larijani (a bitter opponent of the president) being elected Majlis speaker. Under Larijani's leadership, the Majlis is playing a far more assertive role in keeping a check on the government's policies through the revival of certain parliamentary committees. These include the national security and foreign policy committee and those related to the economy and energy sectors. In other words, the Majlis is fairly malleable in accordance with the political rivalries of the day.

Expediency Council

When it was created in 1989, the original purpose of the EC was to arbitrate in disputes between the Majlis and the GC in the event the Majlis was unable to satisfy the GC's objections on a given piece of legislation. In addition, the EC has served as a strategic advisory body to the supreme leader. At the time of its formation, the EC had a dozen or so members, but since then its composition has increased threefold. Rafsanjani has headed the EC since its creation, first as president of the country and then as a formal chairman of the EC. The EC also has a secretary, a position held by former IRGC chief Mohsen Rezaie, a retired major general who is a candidate in the current presidential race. After Rafsanjani lost his bid for a third term in the 2005 presidential election, Khamenei, in keeping with his power of delegation, gave Rafsanjani oversight over all branches of government as head of the EC, which further enhanced the council's power. More recently, the EC has focused more on strategic planning and oversight than on arbitration.

Assembly of Experts

Not to be confused with an earlier body that went by the same name and drafted the constitution of the Islamic Republic in 1979, the AoE, founded in 1983, is perhaps the most powerful institution in the country, given that it elects the supreme leader, monitors his performance and can even remove him. It consists of 86 clerics, vetted by the GC and then directly elected by the public to eight-year terms, who meet twice a year. The current AoE was elected in December 2006. In September 2007, Rafsanjani, who had long held the deputy chairmanship of the AoE, was elected chairman after the death of his predecessor, Ayatollah Ali Meshkini, who had led the assembly since its inception.

Supreme National Security Council

Created in 1989 as a successor to the original Supreme Defense Council, the SNSC brings together the civil and military elite of the Islamic Republic to deal with national security affairs. The SNSC is led by a president-appointed secretary who is also the country's de facto national security chief. The SNSC chief has played the role of lead negotiator in talks with the West over Iran's controversial nuclear program. Members of the SNSC include the president, parliamentary speaker, judiciary chief, head of the Supreme Command Council of the Armed Forces, chiefs of the army and the IRGC, head of planning and budgetary affairs, two representatives of the supreme leader and the ministers of foreign affairs, interior and intelligence. In accordance with the constitution, the responsibilities of the SNSC include (roughly translated): crafting defense and national security policies within guidelines provided by the supreme leader; implementing those policies through the coordination of political, intelligence, social, cultural and economic activities; and utilizing the intellectual and material resources of the country in order to deal with domestic and foreign threats.

Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps

Separate from the regular armed forces, the IRGC is an elite, ideologically driven military institution with its own ground, air, naval, intelligence, strategic and special operations forces that reports directly to the supreme leader. It was created in the aftermath of the revolution with the initial mission of protecting the nascent Islamic Republic and its leadership. Since its pivotal role in the 1980-1988 war with Iraq, and given its political, economic and social influence, the IRGC has become far more powerful than the regular military, which serves under the Ministry of Defense. Though primarily geared toward external threats, the IRGC has a significant domestic law enforcement role through its control of the Baseej, a paramilitary force. The IRGC also controls the country's defense industry and is believed to be running major civilian enterprises in various other sectors, including energy. Because of its economic clout, the IRGC has emerged as the second-most powerful group in the country after the clerical elite. The IRGC's most important role is serving as Iran's main instrument for projecting power beyond its borders in accordance with Tehran's regional ambitions. Its main approach is the cultivation of nonstate proxies primarily in (but not limited to) the Arab world, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon and Shiite groups in Iraq. The IRGC has a dedicated unit for this purpose, the Quds Force, which the United States has accused in recent years of being the principal Iranian entity supporting a variety of terrorist groups from North Africa to Southwest Asia.

Prominent Players

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei An ethnic Azeri from his father's side, Khamenei, 70, has climbed to the highest post in the Islamic Republic. At the time he became supreme leader, Khamenei was neither a marjaa nor an ayatollah; he was given the title of ayatollah almost overnight. At the time of Khomeini's death, the problem was that the senior-most ayatollahs were unacceptable to the clerical leadership of the Islamic Republic because they did not subscribe to the republic's founding principle, the "rule of the jurist," which dictates that the most learned jurist among the Shiite clergy should govern. Since Khamenei had served two terms as president, the clerical leadership rallied behind him, and he succeeded Khomeini when the AoE elected him supreme leader. While not enjoying the same status as his predecessor, the current supreme leader has successfully held the position by carefully balancing the state's various factions.

Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani

Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani Being a key player in the Islamic Republic since the days of its founding, Rafsanjani, 75, has held several positions that have allowed him to consolidate both political and economic power. He was a student under Khomeini and quickly became a key player in his revolutionary movement. After the shah was overthrown in 1979, Rafsanjani was part of the Revolutionary Council that served as the interim ruling body of the new Islamic Republic. In 1980, Rafsanjani also was elected as the first speaker of the Majlis, a position he held until 1989. After Khamenei became supreme leader, Rafsanjani succeeded him as president and served two terms, during which he was also head of the EC. In 1998, he assumed the formal chairmanship of the EC, and after years of being deputy head of the AoE, he was elected chairman of the assembly in 2007. Rafsanjani's three-decade career as a politician and a pragmatic conservative has allowed him to work with rival factions within the Iranian political establishment and navigate his way to becoming the No. 2 man in the clerical regime. Rafsanjani's moderate political views have also manifested themselves on the foreign policy front, where he has played a key role over the years in back-channel negotiations with the United States. Although he is in position to succeed Khamenei as supreme leader, Rafsanjani's tarnished public image due to allegations of corruption and the accumulation of massive wealth will likely be an obstacle.

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati As chairman of the GC since 1988, Jannati, 83, has emerged as a key stakeholder in the system. He has been at the forefront of policymaking by leading the group that decides who can hold public office and what kind of legislation will become law. A key supporter of Ahmadinejad, Jannati is perhaps the most senior hard-line cleric in the Iranian political establishment.

Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi

Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi Judiciary chief Shahroudi, 61, who was appointed head of the judiciary in 1999, has an unusual background. He is of Iraqi origin and at one point was a leader in the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq when the party was still based in Tehran in the 1980s. (Now known as the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, it is Iraq's largest Shiite political party and the one most closely aligned with Iran.) More recently, Shahroudi became a mentor to radical Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr in the latter's quest to reach ayatollah status. Though a cleric and head of a very conservative institution, Shahroudi has pragmatist leanings, as evidenced by his move to impose a 2002 moratorium on stoning as a form of capital punishment. Last November, in a rare statement on political issues, Shahroudi came out and praised the U.S.-Iraqi security agreement a day after it was signed. His senior position and his tempered ideological position suggest that he could, at some point, become supreme leader.

Ali Larijani

Ali Larijani The son of a prominent ayatollah, Larijani, 51, is perhaps Iran's most influential nonclerical political figure after the president. All four of his brothers occupy key positions in the state, with one being a member of the GC. Larijani served as minister of culture and Islamic guidance during Rafsanjani's presidency and later served as head of state broadcasting. He competed in the 2005 presidential race but did not perform well — it was his first run for elected office and there were many stronger, more experienced candidates. After Ahmadinejad was elected president, Larijani was appointed head of the SNSC and, as such, handled all four key Iranian foreign policy portfolios: the nuclear issue, Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian conflict. In late 2007, he abruptly resigned as SNSC chief after serious disagreements with Ahmadinejad over policy issues, but Khamenei quickly appointed him as one of his two representatives on the SNSC. Though a technocrat and a pragmatic conservative, Larijani enjoys great influence among the clerical establishment because of his background and family ties, which is why he successfully ran for parliament in 2008 from Qom, the headquarters of the Iranian clerical establishment. Larijani was quickly elected speaker by the new Majlis, a position he has used to energize the parliament as a policymaking body. Given his background and connections, Larijani is expected to play an increasingly critical role as a senior Iranian official in the coming years.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Undoubtedly the most controversial of all Iranian leaders — both at home and abroad — Ahmadinejad, 52, is a member of the ultraconservative group that seeks the return of the hidden 12th Shiite Imam, the Mahdi. He is the protege of one of the most hard-line clerics, Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, a member of the AoE who is seeking to defeat the old clerical elite surrounding Rafsanjani and assume the leadership of the clerics. Ahmadinejad's hard-line policies have their roots in Mesbah Yazdi's mentorship. Despite having been the main driver behind the intraconservative rift that has widened over his domestic and foreign policies (worsening economic conditions and bellicose foreign-policy rhetoric), Ahmadinejad continues to enjoy support from key hard-line institutions such as the GC, IRGC and Baseej, as well as from a significant segment of the clerical establishment. Though he disapproves of the way Ahmadinejad has stirred the pot on the domestic front, even Khamenei is not willing to completely abandon the president, because of the support he enjoys from these powerful quarters and because Khamenei, in many ways, sees Ahmadinejad as a means of securing his own position as supreme leader. While facing strong opposition, Ahmadinejad could still end up securing a second term, especially because of the support he has from the country's rural poor.

Mir Hossein Mousavi

Mir Hossein Mousavi Mir Hossein Mousavi, 68, a current EC member who served as the Islamic Republic's prime minister from 1981 to 1989 (when the post was abolished), has emerged as the most promising contender in the current presidential race. If Ahmadinejad is defeated, it will be at the hands of Mousavi, who ideologically straddles the gap between pragmatic conservatives and reformists. Blending his credentials as a former regime insider with a reformist manifesto, Mousavi has garnered the support of conservatives who are opposed to Ahmadinejad and is riding a wave of anti-Ahmadinejad sentiment across the country. Mousavi is remembered for his effective governance during the 1980-1988 war with Iraq, which did considerable damage to the Iranian economy. Though he reportedly has had a problematic relationship with Khamenei that goes back to the days when Mousavi was prime minister and Khamenei was president, the two have recently mended their relations. All things being equal, Khamenei would prefer to have Ahmadinejad win. Should that not happen, he could live with a Mousavi presidency by resorting to his traditional approach of playing different factions and institutions off one another.

Mohammad Ali Jafari

Mohammad Ali Jafari Maj. Gen. Jafari, 52, is the commander of the IRGC and was appointed to the post by Khamenei in September 2007, replacing Maj. Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, who was made top military adviser to Khamenei. Initially affiliated with the Baseej, Jafari moved to the IRGC during the Iran-Iraq war and served as commander of IRGC's land forces from the early 1990s to 2005. He also has served as a deputy to Supreme National Security Council Secretary Larijani and participated in talks between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency and in negotiations between Tehran and Washington on Iraq. Jafari is the founder and former head of the IRGC's Strategic Research Center, which was created in 2005 to develop new defense and military strategies in the light of the U.S. military interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Jafari also is the architect of the IRGC's asymmetrical warfare strategies and has spearheaded the transfer of the lessons and experiences of the Iran-Iraq War to younger IRGC commanders. Given his experience, skills and age, and the fact that his immediate two predecessors headed the corps for 10 and 16 years, respectively, Jafari will likely serve as commander of the IRGC for years to come.

The Net Effect of Systemic Complexity

The Islamic Republic's political system was intended to be one in which the masses were not as alienated as they were under the shah, and one that would be dominated by the clerics. Trying to maintain a balance between these objectives has resulted in a state structure that has become increasingly convoluted and has exacerbated tensions among rival political personalities, factions and institutions. Though the supreme leader is the one with the most power, he clearly depends on support from other key stakeholders in the system to maintain his position at the apex. Likewise, policymaking has been a function of the supreme leader's ability to pull all the various forces together and achieve consensus. Although linking institutions together in a complex system was meant to facilitate policymaking, over time it has become a hurdle. It is because of this very complexity that the forthcoming presidential vote — perhaps the most important in the history of the Islamic Republic — will be significant, but only to a point. Despite being subordinate to the supreme leader, the Iranian president wields a certain degree of power, which is why the outcome of the vote is important. But presidential power is only one part of a complex equation. Making policy on major issues — from developing a nuclear capability to dealing with United States — is not driven by one figure or one institution in the state. Although not a democracy, the Iranian political system does have checks and balances, and these have been skillfully manipulated by various stakeholders to serve their individual and collective interests. That, coupled with the polarization of the political elite, will make it difficult for the collective leadership of Iran, regardless of the outcome of the presidential election, to formulate coherent foreign policy in the post-election period on crucial matters the state must confront. The Obama administration's move to seek a U.S.-Iranian rapprochement imposes time limits on Tehran to respond on the various issues in dispute. Washington likely realizes that it is not about to get Tehran to come to the table anytime soon, but it continues to extend overtures, which raises the question: To what end? The Obama administration is aware of the complexity of the Iranian political landscape, which is divided between those who are in favor of negotiating with the Americans and those who are reluctant. Therefore, by extending an unprecedented offer of negotiations, Washington has triggered a crisis in Tehran, which could tie up the system to such an extent that Iran's regional ambitions are stymied, at least for a time. The United States understands that it is not in a position to effect regime change in Iran. Therefore, it is pursuing the novel approach of inducing behavioral change through peace overtures. Despite the fractious nature of the Iranian establishment, regime change — even from within — is unlikely. Instead, what we can expect to see as a result of Iran's increasingly complex political system is a gradual metamorphosis of the Islamic Republic into a state where clerics, who have held sway since 1979, will have less leverage and will have to share more power with elected officials and the military. With the clerical establishment decreasingly cohesive, pragmatic conservative and reformist forces aligning against the hard-liners and the IRGC becoming more powerful, the Islamic Republic seems to be nearing a true crossroads.