Ansari Ali M. - Modern Iran since 1797: Reform and Revolution

Modern Iran since 1797

Modern Iran since 1797 offers a comprehensive analysis of political, social and economic developments in Iran since the end of the eighteenth century. Spanning two centuries, the book provides historical context for Irans international relationships and its internal struggle to reconcile itself and its traditions with the modern world.

The book presents an overview of this crucial period in Irans history, its emergence from the political turmoil of the eighteenth century through to its initial encounter with the industrial powers of Europe and its attempts to navigate the turbulent waters of European imperialism. It assesses the impact of European ideas on the triumph and tragedy of the Constitutional Revolution, which established the political template for the country going forward and against which all other political developments have been measured. This new edition has been updated to incorporate new scholarship and research to make a rounded assessment of recent developments and bring the text fully up to date. A substantive new prequel has also been added, covering the long nineteenth century from 1797 through to 1921, including a fuller and more detailed treatment both of the Constitutional Revolution and the events and ideology that underpinned it.

Written in a clear, engaging style and highlighting Iran as a state and society grappling with the realities of the modern age, Modern Iran since 1797 remains the perfect guide for all those studying the history of modern Iran.

Ali M. Ansari is Professor of Iranian History at the University of St Andrews. His most recent publications include The Politics of Nationalism in Modern Iran (2012) and Iran: A Very Short Introduction (2014).

Modern Iran since 1797

Reform and Revolution

3rd edition

Ali M. Ansari

Third edition published 2019
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN

and by Routledge
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2019 Ali M. Ansari

The right of Ali M. Ansari to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

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First edition published by Pearson Education Limited 2003
Second edition published by Pearson Education Limited 2007
Second edition published by Routledge 2014

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Ansari, Ali M., author. | Ansari, Ali M. Modern Iran.

Title: Modern Iran since 1797 : reform and revolution / Ali M. Ansari.

Description: 3rd edition. | Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2019. | Revised edition of: Modern Iran : the Pahlavis and after. Harlow, England : Pearson Education, 2007. | Includes bibliographical references and index. |

Identifiers: LCCN 2018046942 (print) | LCCN 2018049217 (ebook) |

Subjects: LCSH: IranHistory.

Classification: LCC DS272 (ebook) | LCC DS272 .A58 2019 (print) | DDC 955dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018046942

ISBN: 978-1-138-28184-4 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-28185-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-39987-9 (ebk)

Typeset in Galliard
by Swales & Willis Ltd, Exeter, Devon, UK

For Marjon

Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please; they do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly found, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living. And just when they seem engaged in revolutionising themselves and things, in creating something entirely new, precisely in such epochs of revolutionary crisis they anxiously conjure up the spirits of the past to their service and borrow from them names, battle slogans and costumes in order to present the new scene of world history in this time honoured disguise.

Karl Marx, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte

It seems remarkable to me now that the first edition of this text was completed in 2002 sitting with my mother and stepfather in their somewhat ramshackle villa in Kelarabad in Mazandaran on Irans Caspian littoral. The world appeared an altogether more optimistic place then. The tragedy of 9/11 had of course by then occurred and President Khatami was facing severe pressure at home not least from yet another downturn in USIran relations. Yet despite membership of the Axis of Evil, there were still grounds for hope in the future. The international situation might yet still yield opportunities for a rapprochement with Iran, while the Reform movement in Iran, although stalled had not yet been fully derailed. The following decade was to put paid to such optimism and on both fronts, domestic and foreign, developments took a decided turn for the worse. Iran did benefit from the turbulence of the Global War on Terror, but not in the manner its political reformists might have hoped. Time of course offers the benefit of greater perspective and context. An assessment of a revolution after 20 years especially when ten of those years were wracked by war is quite different to one after 40 years, when it had reached its proverbial middle age, and the optimism of youth gives way to a somewhat cynical weariness. The reader will not be surprised to see such sentiments reflected at times in the pages of this book, not least the conclusion.

This new perspective has been enhanced by the period under review. This new 3rd edition, is most obviously distinguished from the previous two by having a substantive prequel added to cover the long nineteenth century from 1797 through to 1921. Not only has this allowed a fuller and more detailed treatment of perhaps the most significant development in modern Iran the Constitutional Revolution but also an assessment of the intellectual awakening that underpinned it and the political and social developments that in turn catalysed what I have described here and elsewhere as an Iranian enlightenment. This context of course changes the balance of the book. Whereas earlier editions juxtaposed the Pahlavis with the Islamic Republic and suggested the former to be anomalous if in their own way revolutionary to the natural trajectory of development, this broader context allows us to situate the Pahlavis more securely within the framework of the late Qajar era. Just as students of Turkish history have become increasingly aware of the debt Ataturk owed to the Young Turks, the Young Ottomans and the Tanzimat, so too I hope it will become apparent that Reza Shah was himself a product of the Constitutional Revolution, and that many of the ideas he institutionalised had echoes in the Qajar period. We may (I hope) finally lay to rest the frequently attested assertion that Reza Shah changed the name of the country to Iran, or indeed, reinvented the title Shahanshah . Even the tendency to archaism, and an association with the glories of pre-Islamic Iran were not a preoccupation peculiar to the Pahlavis. Both the Qajars and latterly the Islamic Republic showed a predilection in this regard, and certainly Ahmadinejads affection for Cyrus the Great and the Achaemenids is almost on a par with Mohammad Reza Shah. The reader will see, that for all the change that has taken place, there are some interesting continuities, and the more a political order seeks to distance itself from its predecessor, the more it in fact resembles it.