In a video that has gone viral on Iranian social media this week, well-known economist Mohsen Renani says the clerical regime in Iran cannot survive.

Reani said in the video that the regime cannot survive because its foundations are rotten and have been devoured by termites. He added that “the elite have left the country’s administrative system,” echoing others who have pointed out how the hardliners have put incompetent people in critical government position.

Renani, an economist and an outspoken critic of the Iranian political system has warned several times about the collapse of the regime following the nationwide protests in the fall of 2022 and 2023, which posed the most serious threat to the regime since its inception in 1979.

Earlier, when the government reached out to him to help draft the country’s 7th Development Plan, he refused to cooperate and said that Iran’s economy was beyond rescue.

Renani argued in his latest video that you cannot solve the country’s problems using the same school of thought that created the problems in the first place. He added: “This political system has created several crises for the country with its underlying principles. So, it cannot resolve those crises using the same principles.”

He reiterated that the Islamic Republic has already crossed the point when it would have been possible to solve systemic problems. Now the regime needs big decisions. So, it cannot survive with this style of management and the way its leaders steer the country.”

“It cannot survive unless it makes big decisions, changes the rails on which it is moving, goes about a paradigm shift and starts a revolution from the top,” said Renani. “The regime needs to bring about changes that the people say, this was what we wanted.”

There won’t be a quiet social revolution in Iran. If there is ever another revolution, it is likely to be an urban revolution,” he said, explaining that “Urban revolutions happen like a sudden strike that knocks out the establishment.”

Using an analogy from soccer, Renani likened protests since 2018 including the 2022 uprising as “preparatory games.” The real revolution he argued would a different ball game.

The outspoken critic had warned Khamenei in a letter he published on social media in February that “the Islamic Republic is in the final stage of its downfall.” In the same letter, Renani also warned Khamenei that “a revolution in Iran is inevitable under these circumstances.”

In July, Hossein Valeh, a sociologist who can be considered a regime insider, had also warned the government that the gap between the people and the government that gave rise to the 2022 uprising still exist and have widened further.

Valeh stated in an interview with Roiuydad24: "When the government is perceived as a stranger, the society cannot tolerate its shortcomings." He explained that the reason for this is that the government has never tried enough to be all-inclusive. "The government has widened the gap between itself and the nation instead of trying to fill it."

Following the government’s renewed crackdown on women who defy the compulsory hijab, sociologist Ahmad Bokharaei warned that polarity created by the government and restrictions it imposes on its citizens can eventually lead to social upheavals and even armed clashes.