Is Ghalibaf Becoming a “Second Larijani”?
The pilot and professor of geopolitics-who has combined the mayoralty of Tehran with the speakership of parliament-now emerges as a potential negotiator and a figure poised to shape the contours of a political transition.
The name of Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has recently emerged as that of a figure who has accumulated a rare breadth of experience across some of the most sensitive nodes of the Iranian state: the Revolutionary Guard, the police, the Municipality of Tehran, and ultimately the parliament. This trajectory raises a critical question: to what extent might these accumulated experiences be mobilized toward a more consequential role, and whether Ghalibaf is being positioned to perform a function akin-at least in part-to that assumed by Ali Larijani in his later years.
The plausibility of this question stems from the sequential pattern of offices and portfolios in Ghalibaf’s career. He assumed the mayoralty of Tehran in 2005, a position of considerable importance that had also been held by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad prior to his election to the presidency. He later became Speaker of Parliament in 2020, succeeding Larijani, who had occupied that office continuously from 2008 to 2020.
Within the Iranian political experience, the “Mayoralty of Tehran” functions as a laboratory for governing the capital, given its symbolic, economic, and political weight. Observers note that when Ghalibaf succeeded Ahmadinejad as mayor, he oversaw extensive infrastructure projects over a twelve-year period, although his tenure was also marked by serious allegations of corruption and mismanagement of public funds.
When this municipal experience is combined with the speakership of parliament, what emerges is a dual track of governance within the state’s internal balance of power. In Iran, the parliament-Majles-e Shura-ye Eslami-derives its real significance from its role as one of the institutional channels through which issues of national security, foreign policy, and inter-institutional relations are processed.
Ali Larijani, for his part, distinguished himself as one of the principal “managers” of systemic balance within the regime, underscoring the fact that the parliamentary speakership constitutes a sovereign position of considerable qualitative and political weight. Accordingly, Ghalibaf’s succession to Larijani may be interpreted as a transition in a heavy institutional function within the structure of governance-one that demands a deep understanding of state institutions and an ability to manage the interface between the political, security, and religious spheres.
Ghalibaf was born in 1961 in Torqabeh, near Mashhad. He joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in 1980 during the Iran–Iraq War and rapidly advanced through senior military and security positions. He became an early commander within the Guard, assumed leadership of its Air Force in 1997, and later headed the national police forces from 2000 to 2005, before transitioning to the mayoralty of Tehran and subsequently to the speakership of parliament.
This trajectory reflects a familiar pattern in complex political systems: a figure emerging from the core of the state’s hard apparatus into its political forefront, without relinquishing the language-or logic-of that original domain.
Ghalibaf’s profile is not limited to his military and security background; it is further reinforced by a notable academic dimension, as he holds a PhD in geopolitics. This specialization extends beyond geography as mere cartography or territorial demarcation, encompassing instead the study of the relationship between power, politics, space, and the state-how influence is managed, how spheres of interest are defined, and how balances are interpreted both domestically and internationally.
From this perspective, Ghalibaf’s background appears as part of a broader cognitive framework that helps explain his inclination toward thinking in terms of positioning, balance, control, and the management of space, rather than relying on abstract ideological rhetoric.
For this reason, Ghalibaf cannot be adequately understood simply through his classification within the conservative camp. More precisely, he operates within a functional triangle of power in the Iranian system: the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the executive bureaucracy, and the overarching religious-political establishment.
Recently, Reuters described him as having become a “node” or “point of connection” between political, security, and religious elites at a moment when the apex of the system has experienced disruption and the circle of figures capable of bridging these three domains has narrowed. In assessing the implications of Ali Larijani’s absence, the agency noted that Ghalibaf has emerged as one of the most prominent remaining figures, yet at the same time lacks the “religious capital” or seminary-based authority that Larijani possessed within the clerical hierarchy.
This suggests that while Ghalibaf is institutionally powerful and adept at navigating between state structures, he does not transcend them in a manner that would enable him to reconcile their contradictions with ease. Herein lies the fundamental distinction between him and Larijani. The latter was not merely an influential conservative politician; rather, he embodied a more complex form of capital-combining security and political experience with deeper ties to the religious establishment, and demonstrating a greater capacity to engage different factions from a position closer to that of a unifying intermediary.
More importantly, Larijani’s significance was not limited to the weight of his personal trajectory; he was also embedded within an exceptional familial–religious–political network within the Islamic Republic. He possessed a rare form of religious distinction rooted in his prominent clerical family, which afforded him a stronger ability to act as an intermediary among competing centers of power. His brother, Sadeq Amoli Larijani, served as head of the judiciary and later as chairman of the Expediency Discernment Council. Another brother, Mohammad Javad Larijani, occupied influential positions in parliament and in senior advisory circles, while a third brother held advanced academic posts, including the presidency of the University of Tehran. This familial network, alongside marital ties connecting him to senior clerical authorities, constituted a significant component of his qualitative political capital.
From this angle, despite Ghalibaf’s evident institutional weight, he lacks the exceptional familial and socio-religious extension that formed part of Larijani’s strength and shaped the distinctiveness of his presence in Iranian political life.
Accordingly, the label “a second Larijani” is inaccurate if it implies structural or historical equivalence. It acquires meaning, however, if it is understood as denoting the inheritance of a partial function. In other words, a figure emerging from within the system-trusted by its core institutions-may be positioned to perform a role that combines internal cohesion with the capacity to carry sensitive messages, without being a replica of Larijani himself. This distinction is analytically important, as it shifts the focus from superficial personal resemblance to functional similarity.
This interpretation becomes clearer when examining Ghalibaf’s position within the conservative camp itself. Specialized media sources portray him as an “institutional man,” known for a top-down, pragmatic administrative style and close ties to the Revolutionary Guard. Other accounts emphasize his hardline positions and firm loyalty to the regime, while noting that he simultaneously maintains the image of a “pragmatic interlocutor.” This duality, in fact, constitutes the key to his political character: Ghalibaf does not belong to the archetype of a purely ideological conservative whose political weight rests solely on doctrinal rigidity.
As for his relationship with reformists and moderates, his record indicates involvement in the suppression of student protests in 1999 and his participation, alongside other IRGC commanders, in signing a letter threatening reformist President Mohammad Khatami. He later assumed command of the national police and oversaw the suppression of protests in 2003. These elements alone suffice to impose a low ceiling on the level of trust many reformists place in him.
At the same time, however, it would be analytically imprecise to conflate his non-reformist stance with total inflexibility. His institutional experience may render him more capable than the most rigid conservative factions of accommodating certain moderate actors or expanding the margin for tactical de-escalation when required by the system’s interests.
Nevertheless, Ghalibaf does not appear to be a figure advancing a project aimed at reconstituting the relationship between the state and society, or between the regime and its internal opposition.
In this specific context, recent leaks linking Ghalibaf’s name to de-escalation channels with the United States have acquired particular significance. Yet this issue requires careful scrutiny. While international media outlets attributed to an Israeli official the claim that Ghalibaf had been negotiating with the United States on Iran’s behalf amid escalating conflict-interpreting this as evidence of his rising role-statements attributed to Ghalibaf himself included an explicit denial of any such negotiations. Between these two levels, any rigorous analysis must distinguish clearly between verified information and circulating conjecture.
Even so, the importance of the matter does not lie solely in whether the leak is accurate or not. Rather, the mere circulation of his name in this context, despite his denial, reveals an emerging functional image: that of a figure who can be envisaged, when necessary, as a bridge between the logic of the hard state and the system’s need for a controlled channel of de-escalation. This is not an arbitrary inference. If the parliamentary speakership in Iran provides oversight over major strategic files, and if Ghalibaf has accumulated prior experience as mayor of the capital, while simultaneously belonging to the Revolutionary Guard and understanding the logic of the hard institutional core, then the invocation of his name in discussions of mediation, de-escalation, or transitional management is not disconnected from his trajectory. On the contrary, it may align with the type of role the system would prefer to assign to a figure of his profile, particularly if it finds itself compelled to reconcile two seemingly contradictory imperatives: reassuring governing elites that negotiation does not entail a retreat from systemic firmness, and reassuring external actors that there exists in Tehran a figure capable of speaking on behalf of the state as a whole, rather than on behalf of a fragmented faction.
In essence, this constitutes one of the deeper meanings of the comparison with Larijani-not because Ghalibaf replicates his persona, but because he may be called upon to perform part of the function that Larijani once fulfilled, albeit with different tools and a different style.
That said, none of this implies that Ghalibaf is suited to every role. There is a significant difference between leading a phase of institutional balancing and leading a phase of comprehensive political reconciliation. The former requires a figure capable of understanding the apparatus of the state, managing the relationship between the Revolutionary Guard, the bureaucracy, the parliament, and the central decision-making core, and providing the system with an opportunity to recalibrate in the aftermath of war or under its pressures. This, in all likelihood, constitutes his primary zone of strength. The latter, however-namely, a phase of broad political opening toward internal opposition, the forging of a historic reconciliation between the regime and its adversaries, or the construction of a new and deeper form of political legitimacy-appears far more distant from his formation and structural limits.
By virtue of his background, position, and career trajectory, Ghalibaf is closer to a figure of systemic reorganization than to one of foundational transformation. He may be equipped to guide a transition from exhaustion to cohesion, but it is far less clear that he is capable of steering a transition from cohesion to expansive political pluralism. This constitutes a more precise delineation of the type of role that may suit him within the current Iranian context.
From this angle, his current ascent can be understood as an expression of the system’s need for an institutional figure rather than a rhetorical or purely ideological one. When options narrow, elites are depleted, and the apex of the system becomes unsettled, political orders tend to gravitate toward those who understand their inner workings rather than those who dominate their public arenas. Ghalibaf, at this juncture, appears to belong precisely to this category: a figure possessing operational experience within state apparatuses, enjoying the confidence of the hard institutional core, and occupying one of the central nodes of the Iranian state.
This, in turn, renders him a natural-though not inevitable-candidate for roles requiring their holder to act as a connector among centers of power, a front for strategic recalibration, or a figurehead for a phase of internal consolidation potentially accompanied by limited channels of external de-escalation.
Accordingly, Ghalibaf is not a “second Larijani” in the full sense of the term. He does not possess Larijani’s layered religious capital, nor his depth of political flexibility, nor his distinctive capacity to act as a unifying figure across multiple domains in the same manner.
He may, however, represent the closest functional substitute in a phase where Tehran’s options have narrowed and its need has grown for a figure who combines firmness, discipline, and a limited-but real-capacity for negotiation.