For decades, Western commentary has treated protest in Iran as a countdown to regime collapse. Each wave of unrest is framed as the final chapter of the Islamic Republic, each demonstration as proof that the system is about to fall. This narrative has resurfaced once again following the nationwide protests that erupted in late 2025. Yet this framing is analytically lazy and politically dangerous. What Iran is facing today is not a sudden revolutionary rupture, but a systemic crisis produced by three converging forces: economic breakdown, social realignment, and an increasingly coercive yet exhausted state. As Michael Doran argues in The Free Press, the regime is not collapsing overnight but is steadily losing its capacity to govern under conditions of […]