In the waves of protest that have been sweeping over Iran for years – and that fill the streets despite massacres, arrests, computer blackouts and every conceivable repression – there is one figure who regularly reappears in the public space of the opposition, especially outside the country: Reza Pahlavi, son of the last Shah of Persia, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and for the monarchists the ‘crown prince’ in exile.

For some Iranians, he is a practical symbol: a recognisable face, an alternative flag, a name that ‘pierces’ the Western media more than many less famous dissidents. For others, it is a misunderstanding: the idea that, in order to overthrow a theocracy, a surname linked to another authoritarianism must be put back at the centre. In between is the most interesting – and most difficult – part of his political story: Pahlavi tries to present himself as a ‘facilitator’ of a democratic transition, not as a restorative ruler. But his surname carries weight, for better or worse.

A Biography of Permanent Exile

Reza Pahlavi was born in Tehran in 1960. His political life, strictly speaking, began early and without choice: the 1979 revolution overthrew the monarchy and the royal family left Iran. Since then, Pahlavi has lived mainly in the United States and has been moving for decades within the galaxy of Iranian opposition abroad, where monarchists, liberal republicans, leftists in exile, ethnic organisations, human rights activists and groups with incompatible histories and agendas coexist (often badly). This fragmentation is one of the structural problems of the alternative to the regime.

In recent years, with the new season of protests linked to the ‘Woman, Life, Freedom’ movement , Pahlavi has tried several times to carve out a role for itself in international coordination and visibility. In 2023, a part of the opposition in the diaspora tried to build a common platform (the so-called ‘Mahsa Charter’), precisely to give a minimum of shared language to a dispersed front.

What to do: not ‘the return of the Shah’, but a referendum and a plan for a governed transition

The central point of Pahlavi’s political communication is simple: first the Islamic Republic is to be overthrown, then it is to be decided – with a vote – which Iran to build. He often insists on an idea: first a transitional phase, then a guarantee mechanism, and finally a referendum in which Iranians can choose between a ‘democratic monarchy’ and a ‘democratic republic’ (or, more generally, between alternative institutional arrangements). This is a way to defuse the most common accusation: ‘he wants to put the crown back on’.

In terms of principles, Pahlavi has repeated over the years three pillars that also recur in the analyses of those who support him. The first is the territorial integrity of Iran (a sensitive issue in a multi-ethnic country and in an opposition that includes autonomist movements); the second is the rights and equality of citizens; the third is the separation of religion and state.

And in recent months, precisely in order to make the idea of a ‘governed’ and not improvised transition more credible, Pahlavi has also started to present an already structured working framework: theIran Prosperity Project, described as a research and planning campaign that brings together experts, activists and civil society figures to prepare both a public policy framework and a possible technical ruling class for the ‘day after’. The project includes, on the one hand, very clear economic principles – trust in people’s choices, protection of private property, market mechanisms where possible, an independent central bank to curb inflation, full participation of women in employment, Iran’s return to the global economy – and, on the other hand, a real emergency programme for the first 100-180 days after the fall of the regime, with operational indications on crisis management and reconstruction, as well as panels and contributions on banking and currency, privatisation, health and pensions, security, water, energy and technology. The underlying political idea is clear: if the regime collapses, a symbol is not enough, we need a ready-made ‘drawer’ of skills, priorities and people capable of withstanding the shock of transition.

These are deliberately ‘broad’ concepts: inclusive enough to speak to different parts of society, but also general enough to leave open the crucial issue – who really rules in the transition, with what guarantees and with what legitimacy.

Why we like it: a ‘usable’ symbol in a war of narratives

The expectations of a section of Iranians (especially in the diaspora, but not only) can be summarised as follows. One: recognisability. In a politics of exile full of acronyms and rivalries, Pahlavi is a name that the Western media immediately understand. In times of harsh repression, getting international attention is not a detail. Two: secular lexicon. His message is clearly anti-theocratic and focuses on a non-denominational state: he is a point of contact for many young people who, in the protests, have shown an explicit rejection of religious control over daily life. Three: promise of ‘orderly transition’. The trauma of Syria, Libya and Iraq weighs heavily even among Iranians: the idea of a chaotic post-regime frightens. Pahlavi presents himself as a figure capable of reassuring allies and markets, and of speaking to international institutions without seeming to be a leap in the dark.

In recent weeks (and generally whenever the repression escalates) Pahlavi often returns to call for diplomatic pressure and international support for the protesters, addressing Western leaders directly.

Serious criticism: representativeness, fragile coalitions, ‘one man’ risk

Objections to Pahlavi come not only from the regime (which describes him as a ghost of the past and a Western puppet), but also from sectors of the opposition.

The first is political: how much real consensus does Iran have inside? This is an objection also evoked by Donald Trump. It is obviously difficult to measure Pahlavi’s popularity with reliable polls and with a country where internal opposition pays huge prices. For this very reason, any claim to leadership is delicate.

The second is organisational: the Iranian opposition abroad has shown time and again how difficult it is to stand together even on minimal goals. Attempts at a ‘common front’ have often been unstable, plagued by bickering and cross-accusations.

The third is institutional: when Pahlavi speaks of transition, many ask him what counterweights and mechanisms are in place to prevent the ‘temporary’ phase from becoming personal power. It is a distrust that stems from Iran’s historical experience: improvised transitions create vacuums, and in the vacuums the most organised win (in 1979, the religious won, not the liberals who had also made the revolution).

The inevitable knot: the father, the Shah, and the shadow of repression

To write about Reza Pahlavi without addressing his father is to fail to understand why his figure is divisive. Mohammad Reza Pahlavi led a partly modernised Iran, certainly allied with the West and geared towards rapid economic and social transformation. But that modernisation also had a dark face: perceived corruption, inequality, political repression, torture and human rights violations, with a security apparatus (the SAVAK) that became a symbol of fear and arbitrariness. As early as the 1970s, Amnesty International denounced arbitrary arrests, torture and lack of due process in monarchist Iran.

This point is not a ‘textbook’ detail: it is the reason why a section of Iranians – even anti-regime ones today – reject the idea of monarchical nostalgia. Not because they want the Islamic Republic, but because they do not want to choose between two authoritarianisms.

Reza Pahlavi, on this, plays a complicated game: he has to maintain the support of the monarchists (who often do not want an ‘open’ referendum, but a return of the monarchy) and at the same time reassure the democratic republicans (who see a risk in his surname). His strategy has been to separate ‘historical memory’ and ‘political project’: to acknowledge the mistakes and faults of the past, but to say that the future must be chosen by Iranians, not inherited.

What many Iranians project on him

Within a protest that is often party-less and leaderless (because leaders are arrested, killed or silenced), Iranians end up projecting onto external figures what they lack internally: coordination, voice, communication channels.

Pahlavi embodies three fairly typical expectations: first, an international megaphone when the country is blacked out (internet shutdown, expulsion of journalists, propaganda); second, a promise of unity in a fragmented opposition; third, a post-theocratic ‘normality’: secular state, less toxic foreign relations, return of elementary civil rights.

But precisely because it is a projection, it is fragile. If the protests were to turn into a regime crisis (defections, fractures in the apparatus, irreversible economic paralysis), politics would suddenly become concrete: internal organisation, networks in the territory, negotiation between groups, security, transition of justice, minority management, constitutional guarantees would be needed. This is where a symbol risks not being enough.

A possible role, with a clear limit

In the context of the protests against the ayatollahs, Reza Pahlavi is – at the same time – an asset and a risk.

He is an asset because he brings visibility and a secular lexicon that is understandable outside Iran, and because his referendum proposal (if actually maintained) is a curb against the restorationist temptation.

It is a risk because his biography is inseparable from a past that many Iranians do not want to relive, and because the country’s history teaches that transitions are lost when they become struggles for leadership rather than pacts for rules.

The measure, in the end, is simple and ruthless: if Pahlavi succeeds in remaining faithful to the role he has assigned himself – that of guarantor of a democratic choice, not of automatic beneficiary of the post-regime – then he could be one of the few figures capable of holding together two needs that today seem incompatible: to unite without unifying, and to speak to the world without detaching himself from the real Iran. In a transition that will need credible faces, but above all credible rules,Pahlavi’s usefulness could be precisely this: to give time, space and international coverage to a process that will ultimately belong to the Iranians.