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Rapid population growth has in Iran presented itself as a national
Dilemma since the early! 960's. The classical perspective of a unilinear relationship between economic growth and social development cannot
provide solution to Iran's population dilemma as socioeconomic factors arc unable to provide incentives for smaller family size in the short run.
Accordingly, an adjustment of reproduction behavior must be introduced into Iranian society by a means other than gradual
Development.
I would argue that the state through its empowerment process could


control population growth by modifying the economic, social, and cultural reasons for a large family. Individual empowerment is a process
that is capable of producing the human factors that are required, but lacking, in the modernization of most developing countries. The
empowerment process generates socially active, economically productive, and politically participant individuals, and because it creates
alternatives to large family-size, it is conducive to voluntary low fertility behavior.
The state policies, which contribute to individual empowerment, eliminate the desire for a larger family by providing personally
satisfying alternatives to child bearing and repaving. Promotions in the status of women and improvement in public education are expected to
contribute to individual empowerment under most circumstances and thus, have contraceptive properties.
I also contend that in generating individual empowerment grass roots
politics, provides the state with a convincing device to achieve and sustain fertility adjustment. Grassroots politics can bridge the interests
between the state and the masses, unleashing the tremendous power behind the state's authority for the enforcement of its social
development programs as well as its population policies.