By reaching a framework agreement with the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany (P5+1), President Hassan Rouhani's administration has come closer to resolving Iran's nuclear saga than any of his predecessors, regardless of the final outcome. However, the nuclear negotiations have caused another big part of Rouhani’s agenda to be neglected — a long list of domestic, social and political demands made by the Iranian people and the Reformist camp. To keep his critics at bay and his support base intact, Rouhani needs to shift his focus toward rebalancing the government. Given the intricate domestic political considerations and the country’s vast bureaucratic machinery, the task at hand is a challenging one.   

Backed by different interests and ideologies, which result in varying domestic political calculations, each incoming faction adopts a domestic policy agenda best suited for its constituents. Such factors are often underweighted or absent in mainstream analyses of a president's performance. The elected government needs to keep the domestic political factions and the constituents content to operate with relative ease. If an administration neglects this delicate balancing act, it is bound to face a tremendous amount of opposition from competing groups.

It is, perhaps, more important for the current administration to abide by this political maxim. As a moderate-seasoned technocrat and a balancing figure, Rouhani does not belong to a specific camp vis-a-vis a popular Reformist or conservative faction rooted within the society. As a result, he cannot afford to lose all support on either side. However, the longer the domestic promises made on his electoral platform are ignored, the louder the dissenting Reformist voices will become. Given the administration's achievements in the foreign policy arena, the Reformist camp — sidelined since the contested 2009 presidential election — has patiently waited; but the longer the government delays, the more anxious the critics will become.

Some Reformists have already begun demonstrating signs of dissatisfaction. In its annual New Year edition, Reformist newspaper Shargh published an extensive discussion with influential former Reformist members of the country’s Interior Ministry: Ahmad Pournejati, Mohammad Atrianfar and Morteza Moballegh. All interviewees were outspoken about the government’s neglect of domestic reforms and explicitly warned Rouhani about the possibility of a popular backlash similar to what the ruling apparatus faced in the run-up to Reformist President Mohammad Khatami’s 1997 election.