A History of Modern Iran

“Iran entered the 20th Century with oxen and wooden ploughs. It exited with steel mills, automobiles, and a nuclear program. An Iranian Rip Van Winkle gone to sleep in 1900 would hardly have recognized his environment had he woken in 2000.” So writes Ervand Abrahamian in the introduction of his A History of Modern Iran. (Second edition) His focus is on the modernization of Iran in the last century, which he argues was made possible by the expansion of the state, underpinned by oil revenues. All this seemed highly unlikely during the first two decades of the 20th Century. Iran’s central government controlled the city of Tehran. Diseases, famine, and war swept the country from 1914-19. “By 1920 Iran was classic failed state,” Abrahamian writes, with little or no leadership. Then onto this stage strode a powerful man on horseback, a military officer who crowned himself as Shah Reza Pahlavi, and immediately set out to transform his backward nation with an iron fist, crushing anyone who dared oppose him and his sweeping changes. The bureaucracy increased 17 fold during his 20 years in power, the military and police expanded, leading to law and order, and thus the basis for the modernization Shah Reza Pahlavi wanted: increased schools, trains, buses, radios, new streets, railroads, and infrastructure. This was partially financed by increasing oil revenues. Oil had been discovered by the British in Iran in 1908. At first the revenues were paltry, but they increased, even as the British kept most of the profits for themselves. “It can be said of Reza Shah that he took over a country with a ramshackle administration and left it with a highly centralized state.” Thus the energetic and ruthless dictator had taken major steps toward modernizing Iran when he was forced from power by the British in 1941 for having cozied up to Nazi Germany. He was replaced by his son, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. It took over a decade and a Nationalist insurgency for the young Shah to consolidate his power, but when he did, he relaunched his father’s modernization program. Moreover, he had much greater resources at his disposal with the renegotiation of the oil treaty with the British in 1954, thanks to the Nationalist insurgency. If the modernization carried out by the elder Pahlavi from 1920-40 was due mainly to his iron will, the modernization carried out by his son was due almost exclusively to massive oil revenues, as the great man’s offspring lacked his father’s vision and determination. He also had a centralized state and bureaucracy to implement these changes thanks to his father. These changes were massive. Whereas his father had focused on state centralization and expansion, his son focused on heavy industry, hoping to bring Iran into the ranks of the great powers by the end of the century. He encouraged the building of large factories in the textile, machine tools, and car assembly industries, and smaller factories devoted to clothing, cement, paper, and the like to realize these hopes. Infrastructure including railways, asphalt roads, oil refineries, and hydroelectric dams were all financed by the state to bring these products to the outside world. Nor did the Shah ignore social programs, greatly expanding state-run schools, creating a literacy corps, and improving health care access. These programs helped in raising literacy rates and eliminating famines and epidemics. Yet the most significant reform the Shah initiated was the White Revolution, which was mostly an attempt at land reform. With nearly all arable concentrated in the hands a few notable families worked by landless peasants, the idea of redistributing the land to provide each family with a few acres seemed good and just. And yet it failed miserably. The actual goal of land reform was not justice; it was to undercut the notable’s power, neutralizing their opposition to the monarchy. Instead, the newly landed farmers would owe their allegiance to the Pahlavi state and become the main pillar of support. While the goal of undercutting the notable’s power was achieved, the second was not. The new farmers did not know how to work their land properly. Nor did the government provide them with equipment and loans to help them out. Furthermore, the lands were too small for self-sufficiency in many cases. The result was a class of newly-landed farmers who were barely scraping by, and another group of failed farmers who left the countryside for the cities. These new urban migrants invariably ended up in shantytowns cut off from their traditional way of life, chafing at the Shah’s attack on Islam, disappointed that the rising oil revenues did not improve their life in any way, while those whom the regime favored lived in glittering homes in northern Tehran. With the failure of land reform and the creation of new classes of discontented Iranians, other groups became more vocal. The most important of these was the clergy, who were viewed as an impediment to modernization by the Pahlavi dynasty. Yet the clergy had mostly stayed out of politics, or “earthy matters.” This all changed when one high-ranking clergyman, Ruhollah Khomeini, came up with a new doctrine. Khomeini claimed that until the Hidden Imam returned, the clergy should rule in his place. Thus, for the first time, Shiism became political. Abrahamian terms Khomeini’s ideology as “clerical populism.” By this Abrahamian means that Khomeini’s ideology included many practical elements, promising justice and equality to the oppressed, while making it clear that he had no intention of banning commercial activities as they did not conflict in any way with Islam. Thus, in addition to gaining support of the discontented lower classes, Khomeini also appealed the merchant class, who chafed under the one-party rule the Shah enforced. Ultimately, Abrahamian lays responsibility for the Islamic Revolution a the Shah’s door: The Shah alienated the clergy deliberately, appeared more interested in the West than his own people, spent money lavishly on modern arms while millions were mired in poverty, and then alienated the notables, the very class that should have been the regime’s last pillar of support. True, the Revolution required an unusual event in the re-interpretation of Shiism as a political force by a charismatic leader, but it was the Shah’s missteps than led to his fall. And yet the rise to power of a religious regime did not turn the clock back on the expansion of the state and modernization, the main themes in Ebrahamian’s narrative of modern Iran. This is so because the Islamic Republic as portrayed by Ebrahamian is quite pragmatic in many ways. Yes, women were forced to wear veils and censors struck any offensive public writings. But the regime used oil revenues to complete the Pahlavi’s goal of tying the countryside to the cities through paved roads, communications, literacy, health clinics and electricity. Moreover, Ebrahamian portrays the Islamic Republic as more competent than the Shah’s administration. Not only did the Islamic Republic bring the countryside into the 20th Century, it succeeded where he failed in land reform. The urban poor “the battering rams of the revolution,” were given careful attention by the new regime, bringing them a minimum wage, limited weekly work hours, paid holidays and job security. The urban poor therefore remain the regime’s solid base to this day. In sum, I highly recommend this book. Its easy to read and makes a lot different events and trends in Iran’s modern history quite understandable.

J'ai trouvé ce livre extrêmement intéressant et enrichissant pour qui veut comprendre l'Iran. En particulier, les relations entre l'Iran et les Etats-Unis, depuis et avant Mossadegh. Je recommande !

Well written, informative and interesting. Some books give too many details and dates, which make them difficult to remember. This overview paints a memorable picture of the events and characters that stick in the mind, creating a great framework to add further reading to.

Good stuff

I found this book to be very informative and as an Iranian I did not feel as if this was in any way inappropriate or inaccurate given it is written by a western author. I am actually quite impressed by the information and the sources gathered on the various topics covered.