Three years after Mahsa Amini’s death, protests persist as Iran tightens controls

Mahsa Jina Amini’s death in the custody of Iran’s morality police on Sept. 16, 2022, continues to reverberate across the country three years later, with persistent protests and mounting international scrutiny of Tehran’s domestic tactics and regional posture.

Amini, a 22-year-old Iranian Kurd who was detained after an encounter with the morality police over the mandatory hijab, became a rallying figure for nationwide demonstrations that experts and opposition sources describe as the largest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Rights groups and opposition monitors say security forces killed more than 500 protesters and detained more than 22,000 people in the months that followed the unrest.

The unrest crystallized around the slogan "Woman, Life, Freedom," and has not entirely subsided. Monitoring by the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies recorded more than 2,500 separate demonstrations over the past year, including 186 in August and 43 in the two weeks preceding a recent analysis, illustrating a sustained pattern of public dissent, the group said.

Iranian authorities have intensified enforcement of social and political control, combining traditional methods of repression with technology, analysts say. Surveillance measures cited by rights advocates and exiled opposition groups include expanded use of facial-recognition cameras, monitoring mobile applications and state-run surveillance platforms, and the mobilization of neighborhood vigilantes to report deviations from clothing and conduct rules. Some activists and analysts also say the state has begun to incorporate artificial-intelligence tools to detect alleged breaches of dress codes and public behavior.

Those domestic measures have unfolded against a backdrop of deepening economic and humanitarian strain. Decades of corruption, international sanctions and what opposition sources describe as mismanagement have coincided with rolling power outages, water shortages and declining agricultural productivity in parts of the country. The cumulative effect has increased public frustration and fed recurring protests that span social and geographic divides, drawing students, workers, shopkeepers and ethnic minorities.

Human rights monitors report a marked increase in executions in recent years. Nearly 1,000 people were executed last year, many on charges described by rights groups as political or morality-related offenses, according to the monitors. International rights organizations have warned that authorities have weaponized the death penalty to deter dissent.

Analysts writing in an opinion column for an international newspaper argued that the Islamic Republic’s strategic posture has also been affected since 2022. The column cited what it called a June campaign of strikes against Iranian nuclear sites, described by the authors as the "Midnight Hammer," and said European efforts to pursue a "snap back" of U.N. sanctions have narrowed Tehran’s diplomatic room for maneuver. The authors, Behnam Ben Taleblu and Richard Goldberg of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, wrote that such moves may close the door on efforts to revive the 2015 nuclear agreement and would further isolate Iran economically unless alternative arrangements are pursued.

Those external pressures, the columnists argued, could strain Tehran’s ability to finance its security apparatus and domestic patronage networks, potentially weakening the regime. They portrayed two possible trajectories: one in which continued pressure and popular unrest precipitate political change, and another in which the state responds with renewed cycles of crackdowns, prison sentences and public executions. The authors urged consistent international pressure, sanctions enforcement and support for civil society as ways to amplify the demands of Iranians seeking reform.

Iranian officials have insisted that stability is being restored and defended the use of security measures as necessary to preserve law and order. They have also rejected foreign interference and argued that economic hardship stems largely from foreign sanctions and regional geopolitics.

Observers say the dynamic on the ground is likely to remain a mixture of protest and repression. The persistence of demonstrations, even small-scale and sporadic ones, complicates the narrative that fear alone has quashed dissent. At the same time, Tehran retains a substantial security apparatus and has demonstrated a willingness to use force, internet shutdowns and legal measures to suppress opposition.

For many inside and outside Iran, Amini’s name endures as a symbol of resistance and of the questions that still confront the Islamic Republic: whether sustained public pressure and international measures will translate into change, or whether cycles of protest will be met by further punitive state action. Analysts say the balance between those outcomes will depend on domestic resilience, the durability of international pressure and the choices of both Iranian authorities and foreign governments.

Three years after her death, Mahsa Amini remains a focal point in narratives about Iran’s future — a reminder of the grievances that ignited the 2022 uprising and of the unresolved tensions between a population pushing for greater freedoms and a state determined to maintain control.