Iran is one of the 20 vulnerable countries to climate change and has high rate of deforestation and rural poverty. Recently, after years of top-down and state-centered strategies, changes start to happen due to decentralization and bolding the influence of civil society organizations (CSOs) and non- governmental organizations (NGOs) specially in natural resources management. However, there is limited studies which investigate the role of such CSOs on forest governance and rural development. To mitigate climate change impacts on forests it is necessary to change policies according to sustainable development goals. In other semi democratic countries there have been various successful stories in this regard, so studying the experience of these countries can be useful. The main aim of this research is to study the role of CSOs on forest governance and rural development. To study the role of CSOs, the five years development plans were used from 2001-2021. This research involves qualitative methodology and documenting the analysis of development plans which are the most important policy documents of country and studying the role of civil society organizations and non-governmental organization role on forest governance/ rural development in Iran. MAXQDA software was used for analysis. Result showed that main functions of CSOs were implementation of policies and capacity building. Job creation and awareness were other roles CSOs on forest governance. Several MAXMAPs were produced to visualization of the results. The obtained results can be used for the improvement of the next development plans in Iran as well as an example for investigate the role of CSOs in other developing countries.