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Iran’s Brain Drain Problem
Educated Iranians are leaving the country in droves. Can you blame them?
Other impacted sectors are Iran’s oil and gas. Iran relies on these sectors for 80% of its export receipts. Decaying infrastructure, corruption, and low wages are forcing some of Iran’s top oil engineers to look for new jobs. Increasing numbers of such engineers are finding it easier to get work abroad for higher wages and better conditions due to an increase in investment by oil-rich countries of the Persian Gulf.
Perhaps one area which is worrying the Iranian government the most is Iran’s nuclear program. For years, the best and the brightest within Iran have been recruited by the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI). Its top scientists are reported to receive Western-style salaries and benefits. More importantly, this organization has been the only sector in Iran which benefited from a brain gain by recruiting Iranian engineers and scientists from places such as the United States. With runaway inflation figures and increasing risk against the lives of such scientists, more may now be tempted to defect. Meanwhile, top graduates that the AEOI wants to recruit may now decide to look elsewhere, thus causing further damage to Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Proportionally, graduates from Tehran’s Sharif University, dubbed “Iran’s MIT,” seem to make up the largest proportion of graduates who leave the country. The parliament (Majlis) has decided to take the unprecedented step of summoning Saeed Sohrab, the head of the university, to see why so many graduates from Iran’s top university prefer to live and work abroad. This alone will not be enough to stop this damaging phenomenon. What is needed is urgent and concrete action by Iran’s leaders.
However, some officials, such as Ahmadinejad, have no interest in tackling this problem. Unlike some government officials, President Ahmadinejad does not even believe that the brain drain phenomenon exists. During a trip to the UAE in April 2007, he openly stated that there is “no brain drain in Iran.” He even said that he fully supports Iranians “traveling abroad.” Ahmadinejad, who prides himself on being a staunch follower of Imam Khomeini, belongs to a group of right-wing extremists who believe in Khomeini’s teachings, declared publicly in 1980 by the founder of the revolution:
The enemies of the Islamic revolution say that the country’s best brains are escaping. I don’t care that they are escaping. These university-educated people who are always concerned about Western science and civilization should be allowed to leave. We don’t want Western science and know-how. If you think that this is not your place, you are free to go.
The fact that Ahmadinejad and his supporters do not want to address Iran’s brain drain problem is likely to cause more divisions within the Iranian government. This is because more moderate politicians see this phenomenon as severely damaging, and they are right. If unchecked, this phenomenon could contribute to factors which could cause the eventual downfall of the regime. A country of 70 million cannot afford to see its important economic infrastructure fall apart due to a shortage of skills. Especially not Iran, because stability is of utmost importance to its rulers. With oil prices falling and Iran needing to develop its non-oil sector, it is very likely that the extremists will be cornered. It’s either them or the economic progress of the country. One of them will have to win. For the sake of his government, Ayatollah Khamenei should make sure it is the latter.
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Meir Javedanfar is the co-author with Yossi Melman of The Nuclear Sphinx of Tehran: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the State of Iran. He runs Middle East Economic and Political Analysis (MEEPAS).
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13 Comments
1. abu yussif:when these regimes start talking about “conspiracies” regarding things like, as in this situation, prosperous independent-thinking people leaving a backward thugocracy for a better life, you have to wonder if they actually believe it themselves.
if that is a conspiracy, then why not the idea that the mullahs are really financed by american agents and the mossad to cause iran’s best and brightest to come to the west where their talents can be exploited on behalf of the great satan himself? in their world that’s just as reasonable to assume.
Dec 15, 2008 - 1:38 am 2. RightwingHippyChick:The mullahs ought to be counting their lucky stars that so many capable people are leaving rather than decide to take their country back and make the mullahs leave instead…
Dec 15, 2008 - 2:58 am 3. Saltherring:Devil-worshippers like Ahmadimenad and the mullahs are more than happy to let the intellectual class leave Iran, as such people pose the only internal threat to the present government. The sheeple that are left have enough brains to produce the only products the mullahs are interested in exporting….suicide bombers, terrorists and radical Islam.
Dec 15, 2008 - 3:40 am 4. Toad:There is an old saying, “Do you want him inside the tent pissing out, or outside the tent pissing in.”
Dec 15, 2008 - 4:07 am 5. Craig:The Mullahs require money to stay in power. Also it is getting harder for the populace remaining to get food on the table. Another old saying is that, “Three missed meals and a government falls.”
“Increasing numbers of Iranian pilots are leaving their $450-a-month jobs in Iran for $7,000 monthly salaries paid by newly established Persian Gulf airlines.”
Ahhhhh capitalism. Praise allah.
Dec 15, 2008 - 4:17 am 6. Roger L Simon:The problem decent Iranians have is their choice is between mafiosi (Rafsanjani, et al) and psychopathic theocrats (Ahmadinejad). There is no good choice but to leave.
Dec 15, 2008 - 12:25 pm 7. Tamara Wilhite:This could simply be a matter that those who know of a better life do not want to live under Sharia. Or this could be a matter of Shariah discriminating against the intelligent. Or it could be a matter of those with the ability to leave do, while many other Persians would leave if they could.
Dec 15, 2008 - 4:45 pm 8. a Duoist:Very few people would actually choose to live under Shariah. That’s why it has to be enforced by the sword.
The best and brightest Iranian students might well be moving to the Anglosphere for an education, but they are discovering that Anglo immigration laws make it very difficult to stay once they have completed their degrees. In the US, young Iranian PhD’s are being forced to go home after their student visas have expired.
Dec 16, 2008 - 11:42 am 9. DD:The mullah’s loss is our gain. Some of our best graduate students are ‘Persian’ (as they describe themselves). They are smart, have a reasonably good work ethic and a lot of pride in their ancient history of civilization. Persians are NOT the enemies of the west. The regime is another matter.
Dec 16, 2008 - 12:48 pm 10. Gary:Boy, I wish I could spell schadenfreude.
Dec 16, 2008 - 4:13 pm 11. J'hn1:Well, if the stay loyal to that branch of Islam (or are likely to come back to it) they should be referred to as “colonists”. Ask the citizens (but not politicians) of the “old EU” countries.
Dec 17, 2008 - 9:08 am 12. kabud:LET MY PEOPLE GO!!!
Dec 17, 2008 - 8:21 pm 13. Dark Helmet:That’s funny…. some of the best and brightest are already here and have been great Americans since dimmy karter let Iran go to the mooslimes. If reeeally smart people leave, then shouldn’t most of hollyweird been gone 8 years ago?
Dec 19, 2008 - 10:07 am