A Study of Challenges and Strategies for Informed Political Participation in the Election System of the Islamic Republic of Iran

The purpose of the present study is to review challenges and strategies for informed political participation in the election system of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The research method is descriptive-analytic and it relies on the hypothesis that the election system in Iran, in the lack of political parties, is often under the influence of cultural, ethnic, and religious fads and is finally conducted without awareness and in a massive and wide spread way. Some of the proposed strategies in this article include the necessity of referring to other institutions and gatherings such as shopkeepers, mosques, journals, and mass media which can somehow perform special functions of parties like giving information, enhancing political perception, decreasing fads, and removing political indifference among people. The results indicate that as for voters, political participation in Iran faces predicaments such as nativism, ethnocentrism, lack of information, and unawareness. The predicaments related to candidates involve the high number of volunteers, dishonesty in speech, and injustice in campaign procedure.