The path to New Iran (Iranenow) opens with the total extirpation of the tyrannical Islamic Republic and all its social foundations. For a regime founded on deceit and falsehood, the knowledge of the Iranian public becomes the tool to weed it out. Bounded by this covenant to an inevitable struggle for Iranian liberty, we, a coalition of Iranian students and scholars, set ourselves in servitude to the production of knowledge, the growth of public awareness, and the guardianship of the pursuit of truth in all spheres.

Spaces of knowledge –schools, and universities– have always stood as the first bulwark of defense in Iranians’ struggle for democracy and liberation from authoritarianism. Every generation of Iranian scholars has experienced systemic exclusionary mechanisms that filter out the undesirable from accessing institutions of knowledge production—whether by gender, income, faith, occupation of family, language, or freedom of conscience.

This has become more evident following the murder of Mahsa Jina Amini and the "Woman, Life, Freedom" uprising. The regime expelled students and scholars, performed chemical attacks on girls' schools, imprisoned and tortured activists, denied education to women under the pretense of resistance against the draconian hijab laws, criminalized journalistic investigations and academic freedoms, and filled academic spaces with terrorist sympathizers and those with disdain for intellectual pursuits.

We see the unity of liberty-seeking youth, students, scholars, and teachers as a necessity. We have founded the Iranenow Consortium in response to this critical need. The Consortium shall be a space to transform our solidarity into pragmatic action, aiming to support scholars and students, represent the interests of the youth and new thinkers, and be the beacon that leads a new generation of the Iranian Enlightenment.

Iranenow embodies the spirit of the "Woman, Life, Freedom" revolution, signaling the awakening of the Iranian nation toward a new order. The Iranian youth, defined by their defiance of the regime's reign of terror, marked by a spirit of creativity, liberty, and an enlightened worldview, are the torchbearers of this mission.

Recognizing that sectarian sickness and historical grievances have thus far hindered the formation of a unified democratic opposition, we established the Iranenow Consortium to champion the interests of Iranians, independent of ideological narratives. We reject populist, reformist, elitist, exclusionary, and ideologically driven politics and slogans that have failed to mobilize democracy-demanding citizens. Our methods remain academic, transcending arbitrary ideological boundaries of the left and right.

We remain convinced that the plight of corruption, deceit, drought, discrimination, and division can only be resolved by extirpating the entirety of the Islamic clerical regime and its oppressive apparatus. The following covenant seeks to forge a foundational unity among us, and strengthen collective resistance. Today, on the 7th of December 2023, on the occasion of Iranian students joining together in strikes against the expulsion of protesting scholars from universities, we affirm our commitment to this declaration:

1. Commitment to the Woman Life Freedom Revolution: To endorse the Woman Life Freedom uprising and its core principles of emancipation of Women from gender apartheid, recognition of the right to life and individual autonomy, recognition of the discriminatory legal institutions and draconian legal frameworks, recognition of the violence inflicted on women and the right of all Iranian citizens to liberty, autonomy, and prosperity.

2. Commitment to Continued Education Assistance: To provide advisory support for Iranian scholars and students denied education, assisting with visa, scholarship, and migration processes.

3. Commitment to Amplifying Student Voices: To represent and voice the concerns of student and graduate associations throughout Iran.

4. Commitment to Students' Rights and Academic Prisoners Support: To actively seek sponsorships for imprisoned students, ensure their welfare and rights, and support Iranian students undergoing mental pressure by the regime with professional therapeutic help.

5. Commitment to Fortifying Civil Society: To support the strengthening of student and university associations as key players in civil society.

6. Commitment to Intensifying International Pressures: To maximize international pressure on the Islamic Republic, holding them accountable for their actions.

7. Commitment to Technological Empowerment for the Movement: To investigate developing a trustless and autonomous system of distributing Strike Funds; to educate Iranian students and protesters on technology and encrypted communications; to distribute internet access tools, including VPNs and Starlink dishes

8. Commitment to Safeguarding Human Dignity: To implement measures to prevent humiliation, objectification, degradation, and dehumanization. In totality opposing the Sharia Law as inhumane and unreformable, rejecting its punitive desecration of human dignity.

9. Commitment to the Sanctity of Life and Human Treatment: To uphold the right to life and protection against torture, capital punishment, and other inhumane treatments.

10. Commitment to total Egalitarian Principles: To uphold the equality of all individuals, devoid of discrimination based on gender, language, belief, religion, ethnicity, nationality, disability, status, or wealth, under the rule of law. Firmly adhering to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and opposing discrimination based on gender and sexual orientation. Dictate the abolition of discriminatory laws against women and the rainbow society, while enforcing affirmative action and protecting rights, thereby empowering all individuals under an equitable rule of law.

11. Commitment to Environmental Justice: To put environmental justice at the heart of environmental policy studies, including establishing legal frameworks for the protection of climate refugees. To recognize the role of local communities in land stewardship and uphold their rights, including regarding land tenure.

12. Commitment to Environmental Stewardship: To uphold and work towards measures that safeguard the environment, waters, and Iran's indigenous wildlife. Promote sustainable practices in industry and the ethical utilization of natural resources. To uphold advancing towards the attainment of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations, encompassing various facets of societal, environmental, and global progression. Devote to the preservation of natural ecosystems and judicious control of natural resources.

13. Commitment to Environmental Accountability: To hold businesses accountable for the human rights and environmental abuses taking place in their production and supply chains, applying a legally binding process of mandatory due diligence and the concept of “failure to prevent”. To investigate measures of mandatory carbon and water use disclosure from any large company operating in their country.

14. Commitment to Environmental Education in Schools:
To cultivate an environmentally conscious generation, and to integrate comprehensive environmental education into school curricula.

15. Commitment to Iranian Sovereignty: To uphold the Iranian citizens and their collective democratic will as the single sovereign of Iran, who shall be autonomous and equal under the rule of law; and to strictly oppose any undemocratic and hereditary privileges.

16. Commitment to the Inclusive Paradigm Of Iranian National Identity: To enshrine an inclusive and civil interpretation of Iranian nationhood, obligating the institutional recognition, protection against discrimination, and promotion of the inherent plurality embedded within Iran’s borders. To recognize the hitherto projects of ummah-state, nation-state, and ethno-state building as exclusionary mechanisms that predicate Iranian identity on ethnicity, language, or religion, and negation of the historical context of discrimination and violation of the rights of Iranian citizens to their intangible heritage.

17. Commitment to Recognizing Pluralism: To embrace and venerate political and cultural diversity with staunch opposition to policies of exclusion, denial, and hegemonization. To assess mechanisms to assure free competition among diverse political groups and demonstrate tolerance towards the democratic principles of transparent, free, and fair elections.

18. Commitment to Preserving And Promoting The Linguistic Heritage of Iran: To pledge institutional recognition, support, and promotion of all the languages of Iranian citizens, along with the Persian language as a collective heritage of Iranians and an axis of communication.

19. Commitment to Iranian Secularism: To endorse a system that refrains from imposing upon people’s beliefs and maintains a clear separation between ideological, religious, and state institutions.

20. Commitment to Secularization of Political Discourse: To recognize the performativity of legalistic languages and to undertake system removal of all legalistic syntax and terminology originating from Islamic and Sharia political doctrine.

21. Commitment to Empirical Policymaking and Technocratic Democracy: To pledge the incorporation of empirical methods in the formulation of policies and strategic decisions, devoid of ideological and romanticist motives. To endorse policy and decision-making processes that are predominantly influenced by experts in relevant fields, prioritizing knowledge, and scientific inquiry.

22. Commitment to Modular Governance: To endorse the transition to decentralized governance in financial, bureaucratic, and policy-making affairs to elected provincial, city, and regional administrations. To endorse a centralized command structure for health, higher education, national security, and fiscal policies. To endorse an autonomous technocratic decision-making structure on urgent environmental policies in every province.

23. Commitment to Accountability and Ombudsmanship: To endorse stringent governance through the establishment of an independent inspectorate to ensure governmental accountability, integrity, and citizen-focused oversight. Additionally, maintaining the role of civil societies in a steadfast vigilance against maladministration and corruption within all facets of government and private-public partnerships.

24. Commitment to Maximized Individual Autonomy: To endorse the right of autonomy to the fullest extent permissible, the uninhibited right to self-determination and development without inflicting harm upon others, the environment, or encroaching upon their similar rights.

25. Commitment to Free Expression: To endorse the right to freedom of thought, and expression, ensuring that all entities may freely express, disseminate, and receive information, ideas, and opinions without fear of retribution or censorship, within the parameters that do not propagate violence and deceit.

26. Commitment to Privacy and Personal Space: To endorse the right to have the absolute right to privacy, securing their personal data, communications, and spaces from surveillance, intrusion, and dissemination.

27. Commitment to Economic Liberty: To endorse an environment that supports entrepreneurial spirit, and innovation while maintaining checks and balances to prevent exploitation, degradation of environment, and monopolization, and ensuring equitable access to opportunities. To endorse privatizing all existing economic monopolies controlled by the IRGC and the regime affiliates.

28. Commitment to the protection of Unions: To endorse acceding to the International Labour Organization's conventions concerning worker rights, encompassing the liberty to assemble and establish organizations, the right to strike, and collective bargaining agreements. Safeguard health, and security, and implement non-discrimination policies while assuring equitable wage guarantees.

29. Commitment to Bodily Autonomy: To endorse unconditional rights over one's own body, mind, and life, ensuring the freedom to make decisions pertaining to physical and mental health, well-being, and personal integrity without coerced intervention. To safeguard the right to make decisions concerning one’s existence, life extension, and manner of being, whether biological, digital, or other.

30. Commitment to Technological and Scientific Freedom: To endorse unfettered research, development, and application of scientific and technological innovations while maintaining ethical oversight and ensuring equitable access and benefits to all entities.

31. Commitment to Free Assembly and Social Liberty: To endorse the right to engage in social and recreational activities of their choice, respecting cultural, communal, and individual preferences and traditions.

32. Commitment to Spatial Liberties: To endorse the right to freely navigate, utilize, and coexist within physical, digital, and other conceivable spaces, respecting the intrinsic values and norms of varied environments.

33. Commitment to Academic Independence and Integrity: To pledge to depoliticize universities, ensuring their stature as institutions of academic excellence remains untainted. Universities shall be endowed with unequivocal research autonomy, ensuring they operate devoid of any external political encroachments.

34. Commitment to the Revocation of Undeserved Academic Credentials: To undertake a methodical review of degrees conferred upon officials absent of requisite academic milestones. A comprehensive reassessment of the academic qualifications of current government personnel will be embarked upon, and, where appropriate evidence is discerned, such degrees will be rescinded in the interests of upholding academic verity.

35. Commitment to barrier-free education: To pledge to endorse an education landscape that is devoid of socio-economic, linguistic, religious, or gender-related obstacles. This encompasses ensuring unobstructed access, fostering an environment that champions diverse educational methodologies, and diminishing financial barriers to education, ensuring each citizen's potential is fully actualized.

36. Commitment to STEM Education Development:
To foster a culture of innovation and prepare the next generation for the challenges of the future, we commit to significant investment in constructing curriculums of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) from early levels of education to higher education.

37. Commitment to Open Access to Knowledge:
To democratize access to knowledge, advocating for open access policies to scientific publications, research findings, and educational resources. Ensuring knowledge is freely available to the public, fostering collaboration, and accelerating scientific progress.

38. Commitment to Collaboration with Academic Institutions:
To bridge the gap between theory and practice, and to foster strong partnerships with academic institutions. This includes encouraging collaborative research projects, knowledge exchange programs, and industry-academia collaborations to drive innovation.

39. Commitment to Science Literacy Initiatives:
To enhance public understanding of scientific concepts and encourage evidence-based decision-making, we commit to launching nationwide science literacy campaigns.

40. Commitment to Lifelong Learning:
To ensure a resilient and adaptable workforce in a rapidly changing world, we commit to developing programs that promote lifelong learning, supporting continuous education, and skill development for individuals at all stages of their careers, and embracing emerging fields and technologies.

41. Commitment to Supporting Unconditional Release of Prisoners of Conscience: To demand a resolute and unequivocal commitment to the immediate and unconditional release of all individuals incarcerated on the grounds of political activism, artistic expression, and other forms of peaceful expression and dissent, ensuring their freedom and implementing measures for the protection of their civil liberties and fundamental rights in the ongoing and future governance of the nation.

42. Commitment to Termination of Capital Punishment: To endorse the abolition of capital punishment within the legal framework of the nation, and to conduct a thorough re-evaluation of all cases in which individuals were subjected to the death penalty within the existing judicial system.

43. Commitment to Total Autonomy of Practice For Universities, Research Institutes, Environmental Associations, Journalist Associations, Commercial Associations, and Bar Association and all Civil Societies Under the Rule of a Just Law: To recognize the indispensable role each plays in preserving the fabric of democratic society, their operations, mandates, and pursuits must remain inviolably autonomous from any state influence.

44. Commitment to Procedural Justice: To demand procedural justice by instituting thorough and impartial legal proceedings against entities and individuals associated with acts of violence against Iranian citizens.

45. Commitment to Investigative Economic Justice: To demand and pledge the conduct of comprehensive investigations into allegations of corruption and theft during the regime, intending to secure economic justice for all identified victims thereof. To demand unconditional closure of EIKO and all affiliated Bonyads.

46. Commitment to Dissolution of the IRGC, its Affiliates, and Other Politically and Ideologically Armed Groups: To recognize the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization, and to demand the unconditional and total dissolution of the IRGC, parallel intelligence offices, affiliated ideological and politically motivated armed factions, and other politically motivated armed groups outside the Islamic Republic’s apparatus. Integration of the intelligence forces of the IRGC and the armed forces into the National Army may solely be permissible contingent upon the absence of involvement in illicit activities and predicated on requisite qualifications. All holdings, assets, and possessions of IRGC and its affiliates shall be appropriated for the National Army.

47. Commitment to Dissolution of the non-IR Affiliated Armed Groups and Reintegration with the Iranian Society: To endorse the right of all other political opposition, pledged to uphold the sovereignty of Iranian citizens, the guaranteed right to free partaking in democratic processes following their dissolution and reintegration into the National Army and/or local law enforcement units predicated on requisite qualifications.

48. Commitment to Abolishing Sharia Law, and Dismantling Clerical Governance and Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist: To demand and formulate the systematic dismantling of all clerical governance structures, including clerical Hawza, seminaries, and the issuance of Marja’s fatwas, affirming the independence of state apparatuses from religious doctrines.

49. Commitment to extrication of Ideological Terrorists and Their Sponsors: To pledge to undertake a pragmatic process of surveilling, reporting, and eliminating ideologically violent groups and supporters of Sharia governance (i.e. Khomeinists, Mahdavists, and Salafists) and cults of apocalypse from Iranian politics, economic, and education systems through procedural justice, criminalization of their activities and sponsorship, and extensive rehabilitation and reintegration process of their followers to civil Iranian society.

50. Commitment to Transparency and Truth: To pledge complete dedication to uphold, safeguard, and promote a culture of pursuing truth, and transparency within all spheres of governance.