World Day of Social Justice

Felicitations on this great day to all Human Rights defenders and the pioneers of the spread of justice in all human societies around the world, especially to my fellow countrymen. To those who fight for social justice against oppressors and looters, to those who draw the liberation of pain from their pens to the eyes of the world. To those who relentlessly stand in this battle, with their soul and their blood, to unceasingly sing out the prosperity of human being.

Social justice stands for the establishment of equal rights for all human beings so that everyone, without any discrimination, can benefit from all political, social, economic, cultural facilities and, in general, all the material and spiritual resources of any society based on national wealth and human thought, and [it means] providing the possibility of a peaceful life for all with respect to human rights that envisage the rights of all. However, there are factors that violate such natural and innate rights, one of the most important one being despotic governments that have no purpose other than looting and plundering the wealth of the country. Accordingly, they have to use violence and keep people busy with wasteful matters and ceremonial affairs and create euphoria for themselves so that nobody can stop them from plundering and looting. It is obvious that in every age there are smart minds that swiftly realize it and seek to prevent the looting of the national wealth and are consequently arrested and tortured to give out the names of other  like-minded fellows so that [the government] can get them out of the way. Therefore, in order to justify such acts, they are being labelled as vandals, foreign agents etc. so that the people cannot figure out the true story. This is how violations of social justice have been taking place in human societies throughout history and in many ways.

In general, social justice embodies a wide variety of implications and concepts, including the fair allocation of material and spiritual resources of a society in the service of the people of that society and the equitable distribution of national capitals, and the provision of the necessary conditions for the diversity of the people to equally benefit from the gross national income. This important matter plays a significant role in eradicating poverty, corruption, unemployment, prostitution, illiteracy, illicit jobs, etc. Having access to social welfare with the minimum expectation of national insurance will leave a great impact on reducing the social harms of addiction, divorce, child labour, homelessness, etc. Providing basic human needs can eliminate the economic factor of social harm and reduce its statistics caused by poverty to a great extent. Social harms are partially due to economic pressures because diverse people of society cannot benefit from their share of national income as a result of which they are not capable of playing an effective and constructive role in society.

The reason that people in Iran have always faced inequality in social justice and a majority of them do not have a share of their national income, apart from historical background and past oppressions, is that their share has been plundered and looted by the authorities in various forms in the past seven or eight decades. As a result, the majority of society has not been able to take any advantage of the material and spiritual wealth of the country.

As a consequence of social injustice in the past years, the notorious phenomenon of “deprived areas or deprived provinces” has emerged, an obvious result of the looting that affects deprived urban areas, slums, marginal and border provinces that have been left alone. In these regions, the breadwinners of the family have no way other than turning to illicit jobs in the capital city or turning to smuggling professions such as cross-border laboring (Kolbar), fuel smuggling, human trafficking, etc. in order to feed their families. Currently, affected by looting, many of them are in prisons in Iran and neighbouring countries, an additional reason that pushes their families to poverty and corruption.

Also, in the hegemonic and plundering systems, information rent-seeking allows statesmen and individuals related to the system to have access to the construction projects’ data and take advantages that are not accessible to other people. And it brings them windfall wealth. For instance, they already know about lands located in urban and industrial projects’ areas, so they can purchase those lands at a very cheap price and then sell them at a very high price after implementing the project. Or, by having connections with different ministries they manage to obtain various permits, buy industrial lands and their benefits, and sell those units and make huge profits. This also applies to urban and industrial loans and has been an ongoing issue in all parts of the country, aside from that governmental heads have always owned all the industries and vital economic arteries of the country through their own foundations for at least the past seventy years and have also possessed all related incomes that they have used or transferred abroad for their own benefit and as their assets (the list of these foundations and their functions is available).

In fact, one of the reasons that made the respectful nation of Iran fall into the grip of this dictatorship and its cancerous presence and caused the revolution of the brave Iranian people in 1979, was the lack of social justice in the former system apart from the issue of power. As a result, the economic arteries of the country, which belonged solely to the royal family (according to the existing historical documents), were cut off from the family of a thousand to fall into the hands of the current family of a hundred thousand who deceived the nation and take over the people’s revolution as historical evidence proves. Whereas they were supposed to back off and let the people themselves choose the system of the country’s governance according to their will, without any interventions.

Without the establishment of social justice, the Iranian nation must always be about making a revolution…

Mohammad Ali Taheri
Founder of Taheri Peace Organization/ Founder of the School of Erfan Keyhani Halgheh

20 February 2023