The Grand National Alliance ( fa, اتحاد بزرگ ملّی, etteḥād-e bozorg-e mellī) was a secular

electoral alliance An electoral alliance (also known as a bipartisan electoral agreement, electoral pact, electoral agreement, electoral coalition or electoral bloc) is an association of political party, political parties or individuals that exists solely to stand ...

contesting in the

1979 Iranian Constitutional Convention election Constitutional Convention elections were held in Iran on 3 and 4 August 1979. The result was a victory for the Islamic Republican Party. There were 10,784,932 votes cast in the elections, marking 51.71% turnout. Of all members elected, 68% were cl ...

. The candidates listed by this coalition mostly included communists and nationalists.

Parties in coalition

The groups named in the coalition's declaration of existence, were: * Revolutionary Organization (''sāzmān-e enqelābī'') and its youth wing the Revolutionary Youth Organization (''sāzmān-e javānān-e enqelābī''), a

Maoist Maoism, officially called Mao Zedong Thought by the Chinese Communist Party, is a variety of Marxism–Leninism that Mao Zedong developed to realise a socialist revolution in the agricultural, pre-industrial society of the Republic of Ch ...

group split from the Tudeh Party of Iran which was later merged into the

Laborers' Party of Iran The Laborers’ Party of Iran ( fa, حزب رنجبران ایران, Ḥezb-e ranjbarān-e Īrān, or simply Ranjbaran, ) is an Iranian Maoist political party in exile. An advocate of the Three Worlds Theory, the party supported Abolhassan Banis ...

* Iranian Women's Society (''jamʿiyat-e zanān-e Īrān'') * Justice Society (''jamʿiyat-e edālat'') *

Confederation of Iranian Students Confederation of Iranian Students National Union ( fa, کنفدراسیون جهانی محصلین و دانشجویان ایرانی – اتحادیه ملی; ''Konfederāsīūn-e jahānī-e moḥaṣṣelīn wa dānešjūyān-e īrānī ette� ...

(''konfederāsīūn-e jahānī-e moḥaṣṣelīn wa dānešjūyān-e īrānī'') * The Flag of Sattar Khan (''səttar xan bayrağı''), an Azeri-language publication which later became aligned with the

* United Campaign for Establishment of the Working Class Party (''etteḥād-e mobāraza dar rāh-e ījād-e hezb-e ṭabaqa-ye kārgar''), later merged into the

Candidates

The candidates endorsed by the coalition for Tehran Province, were: Of the ten candidates, only two won the election who were also listed by the Coalition of Islamic Parties. Four belonged to the coalition partners, who were all defeated. They included communists Ali Sadeghi, Majid Zarbakhsh, Farideh Garman and Hadi Soudbakhsh. Farideh Garman was an architect who had just returned to Iran after settling for 14 years in Italy. Majid Zarbakhsh (born 1940 in

Abadan, Iran Abadan ( fa, آبادان ''Ābādān'', ) is a city and capital of Abadan County, Khuzestan Province, which is located in the southwest of Iran. It lies on Abadan Island ( long, 3–19 km or 2–12 miles wide). The island is bounded ...

) was a former student leader who had arrived in the West Germany to study and was involved in anti-Shah protests with German students associated with the

New Left The New Left was a broad political movement mainly in the 1960s and 1970s consisting of activists in the Western world who campaigned for a broad range of social issues such as civil and political rights, environmentalism, feminism, gay rights, g ...

. In August 1969, as a secretary of the

(CISNU) he went to Jordan and participated in the congress of the General Union of Palestinian Students, before visiting

Ruhollah Khomeini Ruhollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Khomeini, Imam Khomeini ( , ; ; 17 May 1900 – 3 June 1989) was an Iranian political and religious leader who served as the first supreme leader of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989. He was the founder of ...

in Najaf to ensure him that CISNU was both anti-imperialist and anti-Zionist. He also agreed to consider publishing more onn Islamic aspects of opposition to Shah in that meeting. He was, along with Bahman Nirumand and Mehdi Khanbaba-Tehran, part of the triumvirate of the 'Cadres of the Revolutionary Organization', an organization split from the 'Revolutionary Organization of the Tudeh Party' which was itself an offshoot of the Tudeh Party of Iran. The provincial candidates who were supported at least by one of the coalition partners were:

References

{{1979 Iranian constitutional assembly elections 1979 establishments in Iran Aftermath of the Iranian Revolution Defunct left-wing political party alliances Defunct political party alliances in Iran Organizations established in 1979 Organizations with year of disestablishment missing

Parties in coalition

Candidates

See also

References