The last shah of Iran, Reza Khan, came to power in 1925. He was an Iranian military leader who had seized power and in an effort to modernize Iran, he set out not only to improve the country’s social services and infrastructure but to also restrict the influence of Islam in everyday life. During World War II however, Reza Khan’s son, Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlevi was put in his father’s place by the British and Soviets. Both father and son, nevertheless, had the same agenda in mind. This gave birth to the revolution’s first and foremost cause; bring Islam back to Iranian society by eliminating objects involved in the westernization of Iran.
Reza Khan was a keen advocate of westernization and he introduced many new concepts that the people weren’t ready for. He banned the veil that women wore and if anyone resisted, it was forcibly removed and torn off. He had protestors outside of mosques massacred; he banned the traditional dresses of both men and women and strongly favored more western attire. He changed the national calendar system from the Islamic Hijri system to the Roman dating system. His policies were directly in opposition of the Islamic Shari’a law. Reza Khan’s son, Reza Shah Pahlevi further continued the secularization of the nation by separating the religious institution from the government. These rules and laws negatively played with the emotions of the people overtime which led to a lot of opposition that eventually played a great part in the revolution. To make sure things are under control and everything is done with accordance to the Shah, secret police by the name of SAVAK was formed which made sure that Shah’s laws were put in practice. Newspapers were being shut left and right, the common people didn’t have any voice, religious and political leaders were being imprisoned for speaking their mind and anything and everything that posed a threat to the Shah was eliminated.
With time, oppositional leaders who had grass root support were becoming more and more popular, like Dr. Shariati and Ayatollah Khomeini, in society as they were able to unite people under a common umbrella. This movement basically held the philosophy that Iran’s path towards the westernization is a wrong path because it directly contradicts with the Islamic Shari’a. Thus the overthrow of the Shah and creating a society that provides justice and equal rights to all its citizens was becoming an increasingly popular notion and what seemed like the only way out.
The second reason for the revolution was due to the Shah’s “White Revolutionâ€. A series of reforms were presented in this era that ranged from industrialization to land reforms. Although the land reforms were beneficial in a way to the economy, the religious leaders and land elites were not in favor of it. Merchants were unhappy with the heavy-handed way in which the shah micromanaged the economy. These reforms also angered the religious leaders because it removed a lot of their traditional power in terms of education, family law, and to add to it, these laws greatly compensated their influence in rural areas. Likewise Landlords were equally threatened because their land was being taken away by the government. So although the White Revolution contributed towards the economic and technological advancement of the country, the failure of some of the programs, the lack of democracy and hostility from leaders and landlords ultimately led to increased opposition. Bazaaris (shop owners/merchants) were the ones being penalized because of the westernization and their shops were being demolished to make way for schools, streets, hospitals and other institutions. They become one of the leading groups that provided their full support to the religious opposition to the Shah. Nikki R. Keddie, a published author tells of how the whole economy was suffering: “not only those who had shops in the bazaar but also those who carried on retail and export trade and manufacture of traditional rather than a modern type†(Keddi, 226).
The third reason that caused the revolution was the way the Shah was spending the state finances. Although oil had been discovered in Iran since the early 1900s, the country’s petroleum industry didn’t fully blossom until the postwar era. By the 1960s, the Shah was using much of the nation’s oil revenue to finance another modernization drive. Money was lavished on programs to promote more of the flawed programs of the White Revolution. Additionally, the money coming in from the oil fields was used to buy weaponry and other heavy military investments were taking place. The spending of the country’s finances on such activities was strongly opposed by the people.
By the late 1960s, the opposition had gained much momentum in the forms of demonstrations and strikes and it was the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who united the people into a movement to overthrow the Shah. Khomeini was the perfect person to do this because he was a religious leader who had been exiled in 1964 for his outspoken antagonism against the Shah. From abroad, Khomeini decried the secularization, but he did not call for the establishment of a theocracy, which would have scared off non-religious opposition to the Shah. Instead, Khomeini started to influence the people in a very non-authoritative way. Khomeini’s “writings and speeches as well as tape cassettes were smuggled into Iran and circulated through the mosque network†(Esposito, 112). His view of future Iran and his ideology was as charismatic as his personality and people started to believe in him as a leader who would unite them all and help them overthrow the Shah. As the 1970s rolled in, the opposition to the Shah’s rule had seeped into almost every segment of society.
In January 1978, the shah’s “regime demonstrated the degree to which it miscalculated the strength of the religious opposition in taking one of its fatal missteps†(Keddie, 225). An article attacking Khomeini’s character in a government newspaper sparked a new round of emotion driven demonstrations. Security forces killed protesters by the hundreds, but this time the crackdown backfired. This newspaper attack unified the revolutionary forces involved in the overthrow of the Shah. The religious opposition had far more steam now than the secularist opposition and the masses were beginning to organize under the banner of Khomeini.
Another important segment of the society that was involved and supported the revolution was women and students who were affecting and influencing change. Students and women abroad, though insignificant in number, helped foreigners understand that brutality of the Shah and its adversaries that was gripping Iran. “As in many revolutionary movements, many politically conscious women assumed that their participation in struggle and the victory of their cause would give women what they had desired.†(Keddie, 229).
Even though the revolution took its full form during a period of 2-3 years, the seeds were sown a long time ago. This revolution cannot be seen as an overnight ordeal but should be seen as phenomenon unlike no other where the ruling leader completely miscalculated the opposition and was unable to reach a compromise with its own people in terms of basic needs and wants of the society.
As Keddie says “Numerous eyewitnesses have commented on the almost universal enthusiasm, discipline, mutual cooperation, and organization which not only added to the esprit and extent of the last months of the revolution and distributed supplies and heating oil during the revolutionary strikes, but helped make it impossible to break off one group from the others.†(Keddie, 239) This was more of one country uniting against a corrupt leader than anything else. Every group had a common agenda and a common enemy. One can argue as to how successful the post-revolutionary period was but the unification of the masses cannot be down played as it played an important role leading to the overthrow of the Shah.
As weeks and months passed, the intensity of demonstrations increased. By November the whole country was gripped in mayhem. The Shah decided to step down and on Dec. 29, 1978 he appointed the opposition politician Shahpur Bakhtiar, as prime minister. This move did nothing to calm the people and demonstrations went on .On Jan. 16, 1979, the Shah went into exile and on Feb. 1, 1979, Khomeini arrived back in Iran to a hero’s welcome. In less than two weeks, Bakhtiar resigned as prime minister and fled the country. On April 1, Khomeini gained power over the Islamic Republic of Iran.
In conclusion, the Islamic revolution in Iran had many strong factors playing key roles that ranged in the form of opposition from various groups be it religious, political, economical or humanitarian. After analyzing the causes of the revolution and how each one of them was brought about, it is nothing short of inspiring on how united the different fragments of society became to overthrow their oppressor. Thus it can be said that even though the time frame in which the revolutionary events occurred was short, the lava had been boiling for little too long and it was about time it erupted.
Bibliography
Keddie, Nikki R. Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution. Yale UP, 2003.
Esposito, John L. The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality? Oxford University Press, 1999. 3rd Edition.
“Iranian Revolution.” Wikipedia. 20 May 2007.
I wrote this essay/paper for my History 605 class, this was first of the two essays we were suppose to submit as our final. It’s a a very vast and complex topic but we had to fit everything in 7 pages or less. Use it as a referrence, don’t copy my work and present it as yours, that’s called PLAGARISM and you will get caught!
