Mohsen Askari compares Iran’s 1979 revolution with the 2026 uprising to reveal a paradox about digital communication technology. Modern tech may swiftly mobilise collective action, but authoritarian states with control over internet infrastructure can still interfere with the collective knowledge base
Revolutions don't happen just because people get angry. They happen because people recognise others’ anger, see that they are acting, and recognise that joint action is safer than acting alone. In 1979, communications among government opposition activists in Iran were slow compared with modern ones. Messages spread through sermons in mosques, bazaars and neighbourhoods; through cassette tapes, and leaflets. But one feature of these primitive means was politically significant: they were difficult to turn off.
In 2026, the Islamic Republic of Iran found itself in almost the opposite situation. Opponents communicated instantly over large distances, and shared images of their actions with millions of people in minutes. But the infrastructure of the internet also allowed the government to interrupt much of this communication by controlling a few choke points.
Authoritarian regimes often appear more popular than they really are. In Iran, people may hold anti-government views but refrain from expressing them publicly for fear of arrest, firing, beatings, or social isolation. Political scientist Timur Kuran calls this phenomenon 'preference falsification'. The critical factor is not the presence of private dissatisfaction, but the awareness that many others are dissatisfied too.
In Iran, people may hold anti-government views but refrain from expressing them publicly for fear of arrest, firing, beatings, or social isolation
The first demonstration may reveal hidden opposition. The second may make participation seem less exceptional. As crowds grow, people revise their expectations about what others believe, and how dangerous joining them will be. Thus, a revolution can appear sudden, despite the fact that discontent may have existed for years before that. However, the process depends fundamentally on information.
One demonstration in one city is not enough to spark a revolution. Information about it needs to reach other cities. People must know that it happened, and see that others know too. In other words, mass mobilisation requires common knowledge. And here lies the importance of the comparison between 1979 and 2026.
The Iranian revolution lacked the advantage of social media. However, as Annabelle Sreberny-Mohammadi and Ali Mohammadi note, it harnessed the power of 'small media'. Audio cassettes with speeches by Ayatollah Khomeini were distributed through informal networks. Mosques became meeting venues and dissemination channels. Bazaar networks connected merchants, religious institutions, workers and neighbourhoods. Mourning rituals brought people together. The Shah’s security services could arrest clerics, close mosques, confiscate printed materials and seize audio cassettes. But there was no central communications 'off switch'. The government might have been able to confiscate an audio cassette, but it couldn't turn the cassette network off.
Such decentralisation increased the resilience of opposition information against repression, and made local demonstrations a source of news elsewhere. Shared expectations gradually formed: the awareness that opposition was national, and growing – and that the regime might not survive.
The internet offers extraordinary advantages for protests. A video filmed in one district can circulate nationwide in minutes. Messages can coordinate demonstrations across cities, and images of repression can mobilise those not physically present. However, internet communication usually passes through infrastructure that is centralised to a much greater degree than an underground cassette-exchange network.
Internet communication passes through infrastructure that is centralised to a much greater degree than, say, an underground cassette-exchange network
The Iranian government learned to exploit this vulnerability. During the 2017–18 protests, it blocked platforms and throttled connectivity. During the November 2019 uprising, it imposed a nationwide internet shutdown while carrying out a deadly crackdown on protesters. Later, during the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests, it applied regional outages, app blocking, and restrictions timed to protest activities.
With the intensification of nationwide protests, the government imposed a near-total internet shutdown. According to independent measurements, connectivity dropped close to zero. Restoration was partial and uneven. The shutdown disrupted the process through which isolated acts of resistance become evidence of collective momentum. While a person in Shiraz might know that people nearby were protesting, what became difficult to know was whether people in Tehran, Mashhad, Rasht and many other cities were still protesting too. The government did not need to convince citizens that the regime was popular. It needed to make it difficult for opponents to know how numerous, persistent and coordinated they were.
This does not mean that digital activism is weaker than analogue activism.
Quite the contrary; digital communication may spread protest faster than any method available to revolutionaries in 1979 – provided the network remains open. Authoritarian regimes controlling internet infrastructure attack not only political speech, but also the connections between protesters. They may interrupt brokerage between cities, prevent information from becoming common knowledge and disconnect local mobilisation from national momentum.
Thus, internet shutdowns are not only censorship. They are interventions in collective action.
Demonstrations, grievances, and public anger are all important factors in encouraging activism. But to trigger a revolution, citizens also need reassurance that they are not acting alone
Demonstrations, grievances, courage, and public anger are important factors, but none automatically trigger revolutions. People also need to discover that they are not acting alone. In 1979, it was difficult for the Iranian government to prevent this process because of the decentralised nature of opposition communication channels. In 2026, the Islamic Republic had learned how to attack the infrastructure through which such discoveries took place.
The wider implication is that digital technologies have transformed political mobilisation, but not only in protesters' favour. These struggles have opened up new battlefields – around who will watch whom, who will coordinate with whom, and who will realise that this fight is happening. The politics of revolution has evolved to become the politics of connection.
