More than 10,000 people liked an Iranian user’s post on X in early September describing how international sanctions had unexpectedly affected his attempt to seek help during a personal crisis. The user wrote that he had been so distressed that he considered taking his own life before telling ChatGPT, the US-based chatbot, about his situation. It directed him to a psychological support network where he could speak to a counsellor. After several minutes, the counsellor asked which country he was calling from. When the user answered Iran, the call was disconnected.
“I laughed so much that I forgot how bad I felt,” he wrote. “I never thought their sanctions would affect our lives, too.”
The episode, reported by the German newspaper Die Zeit, illustrates how restrictions intended to pressure Iran’s Islamic Republic can also obstruct ordinary citizens’ access to international services and support. The user had circumvented the country’s internet restrictions to reach an external service, only to encounter another barrier linked, apparently, to US sanctions. His experience reflects a wider problem for a population already struggling with economic hardship, political repression and fears of renewed war.
The latest US measures have extended restrictions beyond the sectors most visibly affected by earlier rounds of sanctions. Iran’s aviation industry, previously constrained by shortages of spare parts and an ageing fleet, now faces restrictions that make international operations increasingly difficult. Countries are prohibited from refuelling Iranian aircraft or providing ground-handling and cargo services. Since the measures took effect in mid-September, international flights from Iran have fallen sharply. People seeking to leave the country may first have to travel overland to Turkey.
Academic and professional exchanges have also come under pressure. Iranian students have circulated emails from Western universities rejecting their applications because of their nationality or place of residence, while researchers report difficulties collaborating with Iranian colleagues. Economic restrictions are therefore accompanied by growing obstacles to travel, education and contact with institutions abroad, narrowing the channels through which Iranian society can maintain international connections.
The economic consequences are severe. Inflation has exceeded 70 per cent, while the rial has lost substantial value. Earlier sanctions were officially presented as a means of pressuring Iran’s leadership into negotiations. The administration of US President Donald Trump has adopted a broader approach, seeking to intensify public dissatisfaction and encourage protests through economic hardship. Parts of the Iranian opposition support this strategy, regarding mounting pressure as a potential catalyst for political change.
Firoozeh Farvardin, a political sociologist at the University of Vienna, argues that the strategy risks weakening the very social forces capable of challenging the government. In comments to Die Zeit, she said previous sanctions had harmed Iranian society more than the state’s repressive apparatus. What has changed, she argues, is the growing willingness of sanctions advocates and some opposition groups to accept the social consequences.
Farvardin identifies two long-term effects: the militarisation of the state and its withdrawal from social responsibilities. As resources flow towards military and security institutions, government spending on education, healthcare and social protection is reduced. Sanctions provide the authorities with a justification for these choices, she says, while the burden falls disproportionately on people with fewer resources.
Restrictions have also helped create a shadow economy built around smuggling, intermediaries and sanctions evasion. Those with state connections, access to foreign currency or political protection are better placed to profit. “The revenues from the shadow economy themselves become a new form of economic and political privilege,” Farvardin told Die Zeit. Rather than simply depriving the government of resources, sanctions can create opportunities for politically connected networks to accumulate wealth and influence.
Workers, poorer households and the middle classes bear much of the resulting hardship. According to Farvardin, the struggle to meet everyday needs consumes the energy and time required for political organisation, collective action and maintaining relationships abroad. Years of efforts to organise change from below become more difficult when people are preoccupied with survival. She describes the resulting erosion of social capacity as a form of “social death”.
These pressures coincide with an intensified domestic crackdown. Since protests at the beginning of the year, Iranian security forces have arrested tens of thousands of people and imposed prolonged restrictions that largely shut down internet access. Human rights organisations have reported torture, forced confessions and death sentences against demonstrators. At least 60 political prisoners have been executed since March, including two only days before Die Zeit’s report was published. The authorities had arrested those two prisoners in connection with the January protests.
Economic isolation and political repression consequently reinforce each other. Sanctions make daily life harder and restrict travel and communication, while arrests, executions and death sentences increase the personal risks of opposing the state. “These two forces do not work against each other, but in the same direction,” Farvardin said. She argues that Iran’s government has chosen to transfer the costs of sanctions to workers, poor people and marginalised communities while protecting its military and security structures.
Her proposed alternative is to target those directly and indirectly responsible for repression, torture and executions through more selective political and economic sanctions and boycotts. Measures should avoid restricting the movement, communication and livelihoods of ordinary citizens, she argues, because these freedoms are essential to civil society’s ability to organise against authoritarian rule.
The debate also touches on the political model Iran’s leadership has pursued since the 1979 revolution. Islamists initially promised to transform the country into an “Islamic Japan”. As that ambition receded, technocrats spoke instead of an “Islamic South Korea”. In May 1989, a month before becoming supreme leader, then-President Ayatollah Ali Khamenei visited North Korea and met its leader, Kim Il Sung. According to accounts later given by Khamenei’s associates in memoirs and interviews, he was impressed by the country’s highly isolated, militarised dictatorship and pervasive personality cult. Following Khamenei’s death in February during the first hours of US and Israeli attacks on Iran, Die Zeit’s account argues that the political legacy he left behind increasingly resembles the North Korean model.
