ABSTRACT
The urban street in Iran is not a place where political change can be achieved, or at least the price is extremely high – the number of people being killed, executed or arrested for political protest on the streets is proof of this. People continue to pour into the urban street, because it is the only space left for the public in which they can express discontent. It is such images of public agency that represent the creation of change. Pouring into the street can be traced to narratives surrounding the 1979 Islamic revolution, through which the agency of urban space in social movements was constructed. However, specifically since the 2009 Green Movement in Iran, the ongoing brutal suppression of street protests highlights the continuous failure of this kind of protest to empower collective political engagement. It is on the street that the crowd becomes a visible object that can be regulated and potentially killed. This chapter explores the role of urban streets in social movements through an analysis of the recent urban dissidence of 2019 in Iran. With the rising number of urban protests worldwide, it is increasingly urgent to investigate whether the urban street is a catalyst of meaningful political change.
