Execution in Iran: A Political-Psychological Tool, Consequences of Collective Trauma, and the Role of Resistance

Dr. Iraj Abedini, Psychologist, Sweden

Note: FISN research reports and papers may be used freely with proper referencing and credit to the authors and the Free Iran Scholars Network.

Introduction

Execution, as the most severe form of criminal punishment, in Iran is not merely a judicial tool but a display of state power. It is not solely a legal or penal act but a social-psychological phenomenon with functions extending beyond the elimination of an individual from society. In contemporary Iranian history, particularly in the 1980s, executions became a systematic tool for engineering collective fear, political discipline, and consolidating ideological dominance. The dictatorial monarchical regime and the criminal clerical regime, by employing demonization techniques, portrayed political opponents not as social actors but as “saboteurs,” “terrorists,” “Islamic-Marxists,” “enemies of the nation,” “hypocrites,” or “enemies of God,” thereby creating the psychological-social groundwork for mass executions.

Iran has one of the highest execution rates in the world (Amnesty International, 2023, 2024). Such executions have caused profound psychological-physical harm to survivors and families at the individual level, but more importantly, at the social level, they have led to the formation of collective trauma—a trauma that persists in the historical memory of Iranians and is reflected in their behaviors, sense of security, and social trust to this day.

The purpose of this article is to examine the psychological consequences of executions in Iran, with a focus on the 1980s. Adopting a psychological-political approach, the article analyzes the collective and individual trauma resulting from executions and evaluates the role of resistance forces in fostering resilience and preserving societal ethical values.

Theoretical Perspectives

Foucault: Execution as a Display of Body and Power

Foucault (1977) demonstrates that modern power is exercised not only through direct force but also through “discipline” and social control. In Iran, public executions, secret burials, and the demonization of opponents exemplify this disciplinary power. These actions, beyond physically eliminating opponents, created a social “panopticon” and institutionalized collective fear. Foucault emphasizes the relationship between knowledge and power; in this case, the clerical regime consolidated its power by producing demonizing narratives and controlling historical memory. From Foucault’s viewpoint, executions in authoritarian societies are tools for displaying power and dominance over the body and mind of society. This display of violence places society in a state of passivity and acceptance of repression, creating a sense of political legitimacy for the ruling powers. Execution, as a public ritual, sends a clear message: “Anyone who opposes will face a similar fate.” This display of power, beyond legal punishment, becomes a psychological tool for generating fear and public submission.

Tyler: Legitimacy and Legal Compliance

Tyler (2006) shows that compliance with the law depends more on a sense of the system’s legitimacy than on coercion. In societies where the government reinforces its legitimacy through widespread executions and violence, people obey laws not as ethical standards but due to fear and social pressure. This method delegitimizes the law, paving the way for continued repression and the creation of a “culture of silence.”

Alexander and Erikson: Collective Trauma and Cultural Wounds

Alexander (2004) and Erikson (1976) demonstrate that widespread violence, such as the massacres of the 1980s, affects not only direct victims but the broader society, leading to “collective trauma”. This collective trauma creates cultural wounds that generations carry, hindering the development of empathy and social trust.

Van der Kolk: Intergenerational Trauma

Van der Kolk’s studies (2014) show that experiences of severe violence are registered in the body, and suppressed grief creates individual and intergenerational PTSD. In Iran, families of survivors from the 1980s and their children still bear the psychological consequences of these violences, which impact social relationships, trust, and social capital.

Staub: The Cycle of Collective Violence

Staub (1989) emphasizes that collective violence is a self-repeating cycle. Political executions, in addition to creating fear, provide the groundwork for reproducing violence in society and increasing repression. This cycle, through the demonization of opponents, legitimizes violence and consolidates collective submission.

Viktor Frankl: Meaning and Resistance

Viktor Frankl (1963), in his theory of “logotherapy,” shows that even when external freedoms are completely stripped away and an individual is subjected to unbearable suffering, humans can still achieve a form of inner freedom by finding meaning in suffering. Frankl’s experiences in Nazi concentration camps revealed that survivors who connected their suffering to a higher purpose or collective meaning were more likely to endure and resist.

In the Iranian context, Frankl’s perspective is vividly echoed in the narratives of political prisoners and families of the executed. Resistance leaders, by redefining death and suffering not as an end but as an investment in freedom and a better future, enabled their comrades to link personal pain to a collective meaning. In this way, even in the face of death, life retained its meaning, and torture and execution could not break the mind and spirit of the resistance.

Antonovsky: Theory of Coherence

Aaron Antonovsky (1987), in his “Salutogenesis” theory, emphasizes that mental and physical health is rooted not merely in the absence of disease but in a sense of coherence (SOC). This sense of coherence has three key components:

Comprehensibility: The individual can interpret the world and surrounding events in a coherent and understandable framework.

Manageability: The individual believes that sufficient resources and abilities exist to confront challenges.

Meaningfulness: The individual feels that their efforts and suffering are purposeful and worth living for.

In conditions of political repression and systematic executions, the regime attempts to destroy all three components: imposing meaninglessness, rendering the world incomprehensible, and spreading a sense of powerlessness. However, the resistance and its leaders moved precisely against this strategy:

By producing clear narratives and exposing crimes, they made the world comprehensible for the people.

Through organization and solidarity, they demonstrated that collective suffering is manageable.

Fromm: Fear and Psychological Domination

Erich Fromm (1941) argues that repressive societies use fear, feelings of powerlessness, and social automation to compel obedience. The executions of the 1980s and similar fear-inducing actions created an “authoritarian personality” in parts of society. However, collective meaning-making and resistant identity, as fostered by resistance leaders, strengthened resilience and countered social anxieties. This is where Frankl’s and Antonovsky’s theories overlap with Fromm’s: resilience against systematic fear and the preservation of psychological autonomy.

Arendt: “Banality of Evil”

Hannah Arendt (1963) introduces the concept of the “banality of evil,” where many violent acts are performed by ordinary individuals without considering themselves “evil,” simply due to accepting roles and obeying power structures. Mass and public executions in Iran exemplify this phenomenon, where the execution of repressive orders was normalized by agents and even parts of society. Arendt’s analysis shows that confronting such violence requires creating collective awareness, critiquing power, and fostering resistant identity—precisely what resistance leaders provided through emphasis on meaning-making and collective identity.

Historical and Political Context of Repression and Demonization

With the consolidation of power in both the dictatorial monarchical and religious systems, creating an “Internal enemy” became one of the primary tools for social and political control (Abrahamian, 1989). From the 1950s to 1979 revolution, the Pahlavi government, using organizations like SAVAK, pursued political and cultural opponents, subjecting many to imprisonment and torture (Bakhash, 1984).

After the 1979 revolution, with the clerics coming to power in Iran, one of the first steps to consolidate power was continuing the monarchical dictatorship’s path of creating an “Internal enemy.” As Foucault explains, power needs display for survival. In Iran, this display took shape through minute-long trials, public firing squads, and broadcasting execution images in the media. In a short time, political opponents—from the Mujahedin-e Khalq to Marxist groups and even independent intellectuals—were reduced in the rulers’ discourse to “hypocrites,” “enemies of God,” and “counter-revolutionaries.” This labeling was not mere description but a demonization technique: real humans with histories, families, and political motivations were transformed into “Monsters” whose elimination was not only permissible but introduced as a “Religious duty” (Khomeini, 1979-198).

Minute-Long Trials: Elimination of Procedural Justice

Trials in the 1988 often lasted no more than a few minutes. The religious judge would ask only one or two questions: “Do you accept your organization?” or “Do you pray?” Answers to these questions determined life or death.

From Tyler’s perspective, this process was a complete denial of “procedural justice.” Procedural justice gives individuals a sense of participation, being heard, and respect—essential for legitimacy. In Iran, however, trials became symbolic displays of dominance.

The 1988 Massacre: The Peak of Collective Trauma

The summer 1988 massacre was the climax of this process. Thousands of political prisoners, many of whom had completed their sentences, were sent to the gallows with a few-word questions.

From Alexander’s viewpoint, this massacre is a “cultural trauma”: an event that shatters a nation’s collective memory. In victims’ families, nameless bodies and mass graves (Khavaran) marked not only the death of loved ones but the death of shared humanity.

Denial of Burial Rights and Memory Engineering

One of the lesser-seen layers of political executions in Iran, especially in the 1980s, is not just the mass killing and physical elimination of opponents, but the deprivation of families from the right to mourn and proper burial. The clerical regime, in many cases, did not deliver bodies to families or buried them secretly in mass graves. In some cities, cemeteries like “Khavaran” became symbols of this crime, but the reality was far more widespread. Numerous reports indicate that families were even forced to bury their loved ones secretly in home gardens and yards, as the regime denied not only death but also soil and memory.

From a psychological perspective, such an approach goes beyond killing the individual; it is what Foucault in Discipline and Punish calls “display of power over bodies.” By destroying the possibility of burial and mourning, the regime seeks to discipline and silence not only the body but also memory and history. Here, the “nameless body” becomes a tool for perpetuating social fear; as families, facing the absence of a body, enter a kind of “frozen grief.” As van der Kolk describes, such grief has neither processing nor closure; it becomes a permanent wound in the body and psyche.

This deprivation of burial rights in Iran is part of a global pattern. In Argentina during the military dictatorship, thousands of abducted youths became known as the “Disappeared” (Desaparecidos), as their bodies were never returned. Mothers of Plaza de Mayo gathered weekly with photos of their children, recreating collective mourning rituals in the streets because the government wanted to make death nameless and traceless. In Bosnia, the Srebrenica mass graves remained unknown for years, leaving thousands of families trapped in the same frozen grief. In both cases, denying burial rights became a cultural trauma affecting generations.

In Iran, a similar mechanism operated. Khavaran became a symbol of this forbidden memory, but the tragedy’s scope was not limited there. Thousands of families had no gravestone, no place to shed tears, and no permission for mourning rituals. Some buried their children’s bodies in home gardens; this was not merely a burial act but silent resistance against the regime’s effort to erase memory. As Alexander (2004) terms it, we are dealing with “cultural trauma”: a wound that transcends the individual level and ascends to culture, identity, and collective memory. The psychological consequence of this situation was not limited to direct victims’ families. The broader society also faced “social fear” and “prohibition of remembrance.” Secret burials sent a clear message to others: Any protesting voice will not only be silenced but its memory destroyed. This is where demonization and execution act as complementary mechanisms: First, victims are labeled as “hypocrites,” “counter-revolutionaries,” or “traitors” (demonization), then their deaths are erased in nameless graves or home gardens (memory elimination). Thus, the clerical regime elevates violence beyond the body, turning it into memory engineering.

However, as experiences in Argentina and Bosnia show, this type of memory-killing never achieves complete success. Just as the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo or Srebrenica victims’ families rebuilt collective memory, in Iran, places like Khavaran and families’ oral narratives have become points of memory resistance. Gardens turned into hidden graves today transform in the memories of children and subsequent generations into symbols of resistance and martyrdom.

In the end, it can be said that one of the important consequences of political executions in Iran is not only individual and familial trauma but the formation of a “wounded memory” on a national scale—a wound still open after four decades. Denying burial and depriving the right to mourn was part of a broader repression of memory project, but this very injury became the focal point of resistance. Families who buried their loved ones in garden silence unwittingly became guardians of national memory—a memory the clerical regime has not silenced after 46 years.

Continuity and Resilience of Resistance

Despite intense pressures and repressions, Iran’s resistance, particularly the Mujahedin-e Khalq, maintained its resilience. Key factors include:

Collective Meaning-Making: Transforming pain and sacrifice into part of a larger goal reduced feelings of individual emptiness and despair (Antonovsky, 1987).

Resistant Identity: A collective identity based on resistance, self-sacrifice, and dedication turned these into central life values, strengthening psychological and social resilience (Alexander et al., 2004).

Social Support Networks: Groups and families, by creating mutual support, prevented psychological collapse and provided space to cope with experienced trauma (Antonovsky, 1987).

These three factors, like complementary wings, prevented psychological collapse and created a resistant and living identity that has endured for half a century (Abrahamian, 2008).

Cultural and Social Consequences

Widespread repressions and executions confronted society with collective fear and silence, complicating historical memory with psychological intricacies. In contrast, collective resistance enabled the creation of hopeful narratives and strengthened collective identity. A society under military and political pressure, through experiences of sacrifice and steadfastness, preserved its psychological and cultural cohesion (Gheissari & Nasr, 2006; Abrahamian, 2008).

Conclusion and Recommendations: Addressing Collective Trauma and Strengthening Social Resilience

Recent contemporary Iranian history shows that systematic violence, political repression, and mass executions have been fundamental tools for reproducing dominance and creating fear in society. Dictatorial regimes, from the Pahlavi monarchy to the clerical regime, used these tools to solidify their political control and physically and psychologically contain opponents.

Political executions in Iran, especially in the 1980s, were tools for displaying the clerical regime’s power and legitimizing widespread repression. From Foucault’s perspective, these executions were a form of violent display against society’s body and mind, systematically institutionalizing social fear and passivity among citizens. From Fromm and Arendt’s viewpoints, mechanisms of dominance and violence led to unquestioning obedience and reduced capacity for empathy and social participation.

The psychological consequences of executions include anxiety, depression, PTSD, reduced social trust, diminished empathy, and increased self-centered behaviors (van der Kolk, 2014; Erikson, 1976). Children, adolescents, and subsequent generations, even without direct experience of violence, faced intergenerational trauma. This reality shows that executions harm not only direct victims but the entire society psychologically and socially.

On the other hand, the psychological analysis of executions and systematic violence shows that although these actions left destructive effects on individual and collective psyches, Iran’s resistance simultaneously managed negative consequences and strengthened resilience by creating meaning and reproducing collective memory. Iran’s experience is a living example of psychological and social power in resistance against repression, demonstrating that even in the most severe conditions of violence and injustice, human hope and steadfastness can be preserved.

However, Frankl’s and Antonovsky’s analyses show that even in extreme repression conditions, finding meaning, resilience, and resistance is possible. Resistance forces and victims’ families, by preserving victims’ memories and creating supportive networks, reduced the psychological-social effects of repression and kept collective resistance alive.

This article emphasizes that studying the psychological-social consequences of executions and systematic violence is crucial not only for understanding Iran’s history but also for comprehending human and collective resilience mechanisms in repression conditions. Recognizing these experiences can provide valuable guidance for societies exposed to violence and repression, as well as for psychological, social, and historical research.

Recommendations for Reducing Collective Trauma and Strengthening Resilience

Preserving and Recalling Collective Memory: Recording and publishing victims’ memories, documenting executions, and raising societal awareness of repression history help restore meaning and social resistance (Alexander, 2004).

Empowering Families and Victim Groups: Psychological support and creating social networks for families and survivors prevent emotional blockage and reduce intergenerational PTSD effects (Staub, 2011).

Training Resilience and Collective Trauma Management Skills: Offering workshops and educational programs for society, especially adolescents and youth, to increase psychological flexibility, empathy, and social skills (Frankl, 1946; Antonovsky, 1987).

Strengthening Social Capital and Mutual Trust: Establishing independent civil institutions and networks that enhance social trust and collective solidarity, reducing the psychological-social effects of repression (Putnam, 2000; Ferraro, 1995).

Examining and Critiquing Repression Tools: Psychological and social research on execution consequences and political violence clarifies regime operations, represents resistance, and provides grounds for societal reform and social policy-making.

Reference List