Iran's most important challenges in 2025

The year 2024 was a very eventful year for Iran, from the death of President Ebrahim Raisi in a plane crash to the presidential election and the election of Massoud Pezeshkian, and then the successive assassinations of the leaders of the Islamic Resistance, including Haniyeh, Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah, and Sinwar, who had the closest relationship with Iran, and finally the collapse of the regime of Bashar al-Assad, which was in power for years with the support and support of Iran. Now the question arises as to what fundamental and challenging issues Iran faces in 2025. In this article, we will mention the most important ones.

In the new year, Donald Trump will be installed in the White House as the new president of the United States. Iran's most important concern in the international arena is the unpredictable policies and actions of the new US administration, which include negotiations and deals up to a military attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.

This concern stems from the fact that during the previous term of Trump's presidency, Iran suffered heavily from Trump's hostile policies, the most important of which was the intensification of economic sanctions against Iran, the decline in oil sales, and the depreciation of the national currency.

At the regional level, the new year is a completely different year for Iran: Iran no longer has powerful proxies such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Syrian government, and Iran's biggest enemy, Israel, has been able to establish its position, at least militarily, since last year by waging war and genocide against the Palestinians and attacking southern Lebanon and Syria in the past weeks. Therefore, in the new year, Iran will either renew its proxies in the Middle East or reconsider its regional policies, which is the most likely option given the views and policies of the Supreme Leader.

Iran's total economy with a population of 85 million is ranked 86th in the world, but the welfare situation of Iranians has decreased significantly compared to the past 10 years, for example, the per capita income of Iranians with 380 billion dollars of GDP has decreased to about 4500 dollars. The dollar rate has skyrocketed and the national currency has weakened sharply.  Iran's inflation rate of 32% is among the 10 countries in the world with high inflation.

According to Masoud Pezeshkian, the share of each Iranian in public services has decreased from $23,000 10 10 ago to $700 this year. Iran needs an annual investment of $250 billion to develop its infrastructure in the supply of energy, which is not currently being done due to international sanctions, this situation, taking into account the 10 percent unemployment rate and the increase in the population below the poverty line to about 20 million people, the country can face social challenges in the coming year.

Frequent power outages and the closure of schools, offices, and universities in these days due to the lack of sufficient gas are signs that if not managed, it can turn into a social crisis.

In the political and social sphere, next year we should witness more confrontation between the radical and traditionalist minority in power and the majority of Iran's modernist and transformational society. For example, for the time being, the strict hijab law passed by the conservative parliament has been stopped due to the intense pressure of public opinion and the intervention of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, but it is very unlikely that hardliners will back down from their positions to impose their views on the modernist society.

After the events related to Mahsa Amini two years ago, this movement has become very sensitive to women's social freedoms, whether they wear the hijab, sing, or attend sports stadiums, and try to restrict them, but women and girls have also shown that they are not willing to give up their rights, and this confrontation can lead to conflict and social change.

In any case, it seems that the most important and pivotal factor influencing the developments in Iran in the coming year in the political, international, cultural and economic sectors is the high, high-pressure, and necessary demand of the middle class for change in Iran with the aim of improving the lives of citizens in interaction with the world and the stubborn resistance of some government institutions to this demand. It seems that in the midst of this contradiction and confrontation, we should witness a variety of events in Iran in the coming year.