Talk:2003 Tehran City Council election

Summit of Freethinkers as a major player?

Hi User:Benyamin, Rooh's piece for Hamshahri is emphasizing, in a rhetoric sense, that Rasoul Khadem (i.e. the only winning candidate who was not on the Abadgaran list) could not be linked to the reformists (suggesting the big defeat), rather than meaning that the Summit of Freethinkers had influence, if any, on his election. He was (and probably still is) widely known as an athlete, not a politician; and the Summit of Freethinkers had never been an important group, listing only a few minions and completing the rest of list with a combination of known names (I don't wonder if Ali Fathollahzadeh and Amir Abedini turn out to be on their list too). That does not mean any name on their list is necessarily affiliated with them. In this election, major players such as Islamic Iran Participation Front, Mojahedin of the Islamic Revolution of Iran Organization and Executives of Construction Party had separate lists, among others. Yet their candidates are collectively labeled under 'Reformist' banner in the table, due to lack of enough information on the lists. Given this situation, I think adding Summit of Freethinkers would be misleading, because shows it as a major player, and the fact that Abadgaran was the sole list of conservatives (who were perfectly allied in this election) is undermined. So I suggest counting him as before, Independent. Pahlevun (talk) 22:34, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Pahlevun.

Hmm, it's fair. Summit of Freethinkers was a poor-organized coalition (1, 2) so probably had not influence for a famous wrestler. You are right. However, the coalition may be mentioned in the body of the article. Benyamin (talk) 12:13, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely, I think every election article deserves a thorough description of political groups contesting in them and this article is no exception. Maybe for this cetain election, it is even more important, because it was the one and only election since 1980 that groups outside the traditional right–left/conservative–reformist rivalry (such as National Coalition of Freedom-Seekers, Freedom Movement of Iran and Council of Nationalist-Religious Activists of Iran) actively participated. Pahlevun (talk) 22:24, 23 April 2020 (UTC)