Marginalization and the Marginalized

The Director General of Situational Prevention at the Social Affairs Office of the Judiciary states that according to forecasts, the population of marginalized people in Iran will exceed 13 million by the end of this year. According to ISNA news agency, Alireza Savari described marginalization and its consequences as one of the challenges in the country and stated that marginalization leads to an increase in crime. Sociologist Hossein Ghazian, residing in the United States, answers the question of why there are so many marginalized people in Iran in an interview with Radio Farda. Ghazian states that the reason is that the social system has been unable to accommodate all residents of the country, thus pushing some out of the system and placing them on the margins. When discussing the social system, he refers to the broader meaning, including the political and administrative system, the economic system prevailing in society, and the existing cultural system. Typically, when we talk about marginalization, we focus on geographic marginalization, which is mainly urban marginalization. This refers to those residents of a country who live on the outskirts of cities, have no way to integrate into the city, and lead a completely different lifestyle from urban residents. They usually live in much worse conditions, with inadequate housing often in the form of huts, shanties, tents, and temporary shelters. Their social living conditions are also very low. These are individuals who have been pushed out of the urban life system and cannot reintegrate. However, marginalization is not limited to geographic and urban marginalization. There is also social marginalization, where if citizens of a country are not all first-class citizens and some are considered second-class or lower, they too are pushed out of the social system. This can be due to their religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, family background, or any other reason that prevents them from being integrated into the social system and ascending the social hierarchy like others. These individuals become socially marginalized, even if they do not occupy a specific geographic area. Both forms of marginalization are a single phenomenon with a common cause. The reason for the prevalence of marginalization in Iran is that the social system has failed to accommodate all members of society, both geographically and socially. Consequently, they are pushed out of the system to the margins. Thus, the phenomenon of marginalization has emerged. Ghazian notes that the population of marginalized individuals was 3.3 million in the 1990s, which increased to 5.8 million in the first half of the 2000s and reached 8.137 million in the latter half of that decade. Now, it is projected to reach 13 million by the end of the year. He attributes the sharp increase in marginalization over the past 20 years to the growth of migration. This migration has led to rapid urban growth, with populations moving from rural to urban areas. However, cities are not prepared to accommodate them within their established social systems, leading them to settle on the outskirts due to their inability to afford urban living conditions. Thus, urban marginalization arises. A fundamental cause of this issue has been migration over the past four to five decades, primarily from rural to urban areas. However, migration is not the only factor; persistent inflation, recession, and unemployment have also contributed to the decline in purchasing power among urban populations, pushing some from within the city to the margins. Therefore, the current number of marginalized individuals cannot be fully explained by the number of migrants alone. Many of these individuals have been driven to the margins due to poverty caused by ongoing inflation and reduced purchasing power, or due to recession and unemployment. Ghazian emphasizes that unless the underlying causes of unbalanced regional development and persistent inflation are addressed, geographic marginalization will continue. He suggests that the best solution to improve geographic marginalization is to enhance the economic system, but social marginalization will persist unless the entire social system is reformed.