SAEDNEWS: Prominent Iranian economist Masoud Nili has warned that a growing obsession with global confrontation is pulling Iran away from urgently needed domestic reforms. In a sobering editorial, he called for a return to pragmatic governance, warning that “the true battle is not external, but within ourselves.”
According to Saed News, Masoud Nili, a veteran economist and former advisor to the Iranian government, has issued a stark warning in a recent editorial published in Donya-e-Eqtesad, reflecting on Iran’s latest 12-day political and security crisis. Nili argues that while geopolitical tensions have once again engulfed the country, the real existential threat to the Islamic Republic may lie within its own governance model — not beyond its borders.
“The sun that rose on 4 Tir (24 June) felt different,” Nili writes, alluding to the symbolic dawn following recent turmoil. “It seemed to beckon us to reflect — not just on grief and loss, but on the long and bitter lessons of our history.”
According to Nili, two fundamentally divergent worldviews have long competed within Iran’s corridors of power. The dominant view, he asserts, treats governance primarily as a battlefield — a struggle against external enemies, especially Western powers. This camp perceives global injustice as a justification for relentless confrontation, defining domestic politics as a “rear front” in a larger ideological war.
In this worldview, national development, welfare, and prosperity are subordinated to the need for resistance. Concepts like “development” and “modern governance” are dismissed as Western constructs. Social and cultural uniformity are imposed in service of ideological purity, and policy is crafted from the top down, largely ignoring the real needs and diversity of the population.
Such a governance model, Nili warns, has become increasingly untethered from public accountability, data-driven policymaking, and economic pragmatism. “It refuses cost-benefit analysis, it views compromise as betrayal, and it glorifies hardship while dismissing public welfare as base or even immoral.”
In contrast, the alternative worldview, though long marginalized, is rooted in public service, accountability, and inclusive governance. It sees government as a facilitator, not a battlefield, and insists on evaluating leaders by their ability to improve economic growth, reduce poverty, and ensure equitable access to opportunity. “This perspective recognizes that the cost of running a country is paid by its people, and therefore the people must have the right to hold their rulers to account,” Nili writes.
He adds that Iran’s structural imbalances — fiscal, environmental, and demographic — now pose a greater threat than any foreign enemy. The 12-day crisis, he warns, may have further entrenched the dominant faction’s worldview, emboldening calls for renewed external confrontation. “We may again hear the war drums sounding louder,” he cautions.
But Iran’s mounting challenges require consensus, not confrontation. Solutions to the country’s deepening economic and environmental crises will be “painful and arduous,” he admits, but they demand public trust, international cooperation, and a pivot away from isolationism.
“The reality is that some of Iran’s most vital capacities have been damaged in the past 12 days,” Nili writes. “What lies ahead is more difficult than what we leave behind.”
He concludes with a quiet but forceful plea for moderation and forward-looking governance. “Iran stands at a crossroads,” he warns. “One path is fuelled by resentment; the other by the pursuit of public good. Everyone will eventually leave — what remains is Iran, its people, and the good name of those who wished it well.”
