Another presidential election is unfolding in Iran. Many observers expect a low turnout as many ordinary Iranians are either discouraged or disillusioned. However, those in power seem not to mind.

The political elite of the Islamic Republic of Iran had once considered elections a source of the regime’s legitimacy. According to them, Iranians who voted in the past polls approved the system and wanted to participate. However, it all changed when Iranians increasingly voted for the candidates not endorsed by the hard-liners. In 1997 Iranians surprised the political establishment by voting for the Reformist Mohammad Khatami. In the years that followed, presidential elections remained a point of dispute.

The hard-liners have begun moving away from a system in which all are encouraged to vote to one in which only the righteous do so. If only the “right” people vote in Iran, hard-liners and their acolytes can maintain the majority necessary to occupy political offices throughout the government. They have found a model political system that accommodates both the principles of Islamic governance and the need for legitimacy: the Communist Party of China.

Iranian hard-liners’ fascination with the Chinese model of governance is nothing new. However, it has gained new momentum in recent years. Hard-liners envy the dominance of China’s Communist Party and its centralized ability to act without objection. “Not every bum can vote in China; only the members of the Communist Party can vote,” said Ali Akbar Raefipour, a hard-line preacher whose lectures are often praised by news agencies controlled by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).