In 2002, the European Union (EU) announced that it would enter a Trade and Cooperation Agreement with Iran. The deepening of economic and diplomatic relations between the EU and Iran was, however, linked by the Commission to progress in four areas: human rights, non-proliferation, terrorism and the Middle East Peace Process. This article argues that the current focus on efforts to find a solution to Iran's nuclear ambitions has overshadowed the dynamics of EU human rights diplomacy towards that country. Unlike diplomatic pressure on the non-proliferation issue, the EU-Iran Human Rights Dialogue did not only enjoy great support by politicians and human rights activists, but did indeed result in changes in legislation and policies aimed at the protection of human rights. Europe's multi-track strategy allowed Iranian activists and members of the legal profession to approach the notion of human rights from within the Shi'a notion of justice and rationality and thus managed to assert Islamic roots for human rights and uncovered the very secular realities of human rights violations in the Islamic Republic. The Dialogue was launched at a critical juncture in Iran's reformist movement and helped likeminded politicians, particularly the executive and parliament, to gain momentum domestically and credibility internationally. While efforts at reform were and still are often impeded by the country's competing centers of power, this article argues that efforts to promote and protect human rights in Iran must not be sacrificed for concerns over the nuclear issue.

Numerous observers have noted that a feminist generation of educated young women appears to be emerging in Iran, despite the anti-feminist discourse of the Iranian government. Evidence from three surveys conducted in 2000–2003 confirms and complicates these observations. Educated young women are significantly more likely to espouse feminist attitudes of various sorts than other Iranians, including educated young men. In addition, educated young women are significantly more likely to work outside the home, marry later, give birth later, have fewer children, and have more egalitarian marriages than other Iranian women. However, surprising proportions of older Iranians also espouse feminist attitudes, and a majority of respondents in one nationally representative sample of urban Iranians identify themselves as proponents of women's rights.

Contemporary Iranian cinema has enjoyed wide success on the international scene—winning awards at film festivals, receiving praise by critics, and being screened in many countries around the world. But this success has another side to it: at home in Iran, the movie theater attendance is in decline and a range of players, including individuals, policymakers and government entities continue to meddle in shaping its future. Throughout the twentieth century and during the two decades of post-revolutionary successes abroad, Iranian cinema developed its own unique style and aesthetic. A cinema which was sometimes nurtured and financially encouraged by the government, yet at other times censored or banned by it. This paper provides a brief survey of the history of Iranian cinema since the 1900s in order to reveal the paradoxical issues both propelling and bedeviling its development and the role of principal actors involved in fashioning an Iranian national cinema.

Accounts of the Constitutional Revolution in Iran have tended to ignore the role of the Baha'is in that event. This paper looks at the case of Sari, capital of Mazandaran province, where the Baha'is of the city played a major part in initiating the move towards Constitutionalism and in educating people about the reforms envisaged and about the modern world. They also led the way in carrying out some of these reforms. In particular, the Baha'is established the first modern schools in the town. In this process, they were opposed by the Muslim ‘ulama in the town, who equated Constitutionalism and the Baha'i Faith, and persecuted the Baha'is of the town relentlessly for both reasons, leading eventually to the killing of five of the leading Baha'is of Sari in 1913. A brief account is also given of the attitude of the Baha'i leader ‘Abdu'l-Baha (1844–1921) towards the Constitutional Movement and the role of the Baha'is in it. This paper follows the events of the seven years 1906–13 in Sari and describes seven swings of the pendulum of power in the town alternating between the Baha'is and Constitutionalists on the one hand and the ‘ulama and the royalist forces supporting Muhammad ‘Ali Shah on the other. It points out that the neglect of the Baha'i aspect of these events by historians has led to a failure to account adequately for some of the events of these years.

This article includes part of the linguistic material we documented in 2002 from a galesh ranch in central-eastern Mazandaran. It transcribes, translates, and glosses two texts related by a patriarch on his long, eventful life: the dramatic elopement with the girl he married, his successful family life and career as a pastoral nomad, and his long resistance against the laws forcing the galesh families to evacuate the forest for good. Notwithstanding our dialectological purpose, namely documentation of the largely understudied language of Mazandaran within the long-standing tradition of Iranian philology, the article may also provide raw material for the anthropologist, sociologist, and historian, as it relays an unrecorded tradition just before its total disappearance.