Iran is the fourth largest producer of oil in the world, and its coastline stretches the entire length of the Persian Gulf, one of the world's most strategic waterways in terms of energy security. The establishment of the Islamic Republic after the 1979 Revolution paved the way for religious clerics to gain ultimate political control in Iran and to crackdown on political dissenters. The only subject on which differences of opinion were tolerated was the role of the private and public sectors. Indeed, the role of the private sector was at the center of discussions between the two main factions in the Islamic Republic Party and, later on, between the two main wings in the Majlis. Two decades later, Iran appeared to be entering another era of transformation with the election of reformist president Mohammad Khatami in 1997. But the reformists failed to deliver on their promises and, in 2005, Khatami was replaced by the ultra conservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who promised the Iranian...
