Iran and Democracy. These terms are not necessarily linked logically. After all, Iran is considered a deeply autocratic state, run by a narrow-minded spiritual elite, whose elections and democratic structures hardly deserve the name. Regardless of whether this judgment is 100% correct or not, the history of Iran can at least tell us something about democracy and its own history. Because even if – or precisely because – this country cannot pass as a flawless democratic society today, it shows us one thing above all. That at the end of the story there doesn't always have to be democracy. And everything could have turned out very differently in Iran.
Iran and the long road to modernity
Let's take a step back. In the 19th century, of course, there can be no talk of democracy in Iran. That's true of pretty much every country at the time. And yet it was then that the roots for the modernization of the ancient Persian state were laid. At the time, he had been in an increasingly difficult situation for years. After the traditional arch-rival, the Ottoman Empire, had slowly lost influence, the shahs of Persia suddenly had to contend with new foreign powers. In the north, tsarist Russia pushed ever closer towards the Iranian borders, in the south the danger lurked from the British colonial empire in India. And finally, in the 19th century, something also played out between these two great powers in the Central Asian region that was later referred to as “The Great Game”. The big game... You couldn't find a much more imperialistic term in London. In any case, it was all about one thing:dividing large parts of the Asian continent into spheres of influence. And Iran was right in the middle.
The problem for the Shahs was a simple one:one could hardly defend oneself against these attacks and encroachments. The great powers were too powerful and the Iranian state's ability to act was too limited. This was because the country had not made the transition to a centralized state that had been happening in Europe since the 18th century. In Iran, the Shah was not even able to collect taxes consistently. The necessary structures simply did not exist. So there can be no talk of a powerful army that could have been set up for defense. As the 19th century progressed, the situation only got worse and the country became more and more dependent on Russia and especially Great Britain. Among other things, this was expressed in the award of concessions. As a result, entire sectors of the economy were leased to foreign investors, such as the country's entire banking system. The Iranian government received (usually small) payments in return.
At some point, this development also led to a counter-movement internally. From 1906, a protest movement broke out against the Shah's regime, demanding modernization of Iran along Western lines. This "constitutional revolution" was supported by the upper class of Iran, by the nobility and clergy, which was probably also the reason why the Shah could hardly resist their demands. As a result, in 1906, for the first time in history, an Iranian parliament and constitution were established. However, the entire process was accompanied by conditions resembling a civil war, and in general the ideals of the Constitutional Revolution were never fully implemented. There was simply no time for that. Because only a few years later, during the First World War, parts of Iran were occupied by – who else – Russia and Great Britain. So the modernization of the state apparatus had to wait. Meanwhile, Iran's politics and economy became more and more dependent on Britain. Finally, since 1908 there was a concession for the production of oil, which would certainly never lead to any problems...
Persia becomes Iran
The large-scale modernization program that large parts of the Iranian upper class had wanted since the constitutional revolution was resumed in the early 1920s. One person played a very central role here:a soldier named Reza Khan. It was he who, with his brigade, led a coup against the post-war government in 1921. After a brief period as Minister of War, Reza Khan became Prime Minister in 1923 and set about radically restructuring the Iranian political system. In line with the simultaneous reforms in Turkey under Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Reza Khan was even striving to depose the Shah and introduce a republic at the time, but this was rejected by the clerical elite, among others. Two years later, as a kind of replacement, he simply had himself crowned the new Shah and continued his reform program on this path.
Over the next fifteen years of his (dim-democratic, it is worth mentioning) rule, the new Shah transformed Iran from the ground up. A state school system emerged that took education out of the hands of the Shiite clergy, and a secular court system developed in a similar way. As in Turkey, Iranians were also forced to dress in Western style from now on, the veil for women was banned and as a final symbol of the fundamental reorganization of the state, Reza Shah finally decreed the change of the name of Persia on Iran. Although… in internal parlance, the country has been called Iran for a long time. Persia was a foreign name that Reza Shah no longer wanted to accept after 1935. So he called on the international community to henceforth refer to the country as Iran – the land of the Aryans. Whether the decision also has something to do with his undisguised enthusiasm for Nazi Germany can of course only be speculated on...
The reign of Reza Shah finally ended in the now well-known way. In the course of the Second World War, Russian (or this time Soviet) and British troops once again moved into Iran, took control of large parts of the country and forced the reluctant Reza to resign. His son Mohammad Reza Shah took his place. And if you were paying attention:We are now only 35 years away from the Islamic Revolution, which would drive this very Mohammad Reza Shah out of the country in 1979 and set up a theocratic republic. But this development was by no means foreseeable in the 1940s! On the way from the removal of Reza Shah to the Islamic Revolution there were still a few decisive events. Iran's development could have gone in the other direction during this time. towards democracy. And that this was not the case, the Western world is at least partly to blame.
Mohammad Mossadegh and the beginning of the end
Especially in the period immediately after the end of the World War and the Soviet and British occupation, the way forward still seemed clear. Iran's transformation progressed almost unchecked under Mohammad Reza Shah as well. A new media scene developed and an openness that the country had never seen before. But the big topic of the time was something else and here you can see that we are clearly approaching the present. It was almost all about oil now. In 1951, the Iranian parliament decided to nationalize oil production in the country and to reach an agreement with the British. But that wasn't as radical as it might sound. The treaties with Great Britain were indeed a disaster for Iran. The government in Tehran only received 16 percent of the profits from the subsidy, and the British regularly cheated there too. Iran had no way of looking into the calculation of this profit. You can imagine how that must have happened ... On top of that, Saudi Arabia had just negotiated new conditions with the USA in oil production at the time and received a full 50 percent! You can ask, is that what you thought in Teheran...
However, the British government did not exactly respond to this development in a sporting manner. Instead of entering into negotiations, they simply boycotted Iranian oil, which naturally led to gigantic defaults and an economic crisis in Iran, the so-called Abadan crisis. Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh was not exactly intimidated by this either. Today, Mossadegh is viewed very positively in large parts of the world (including in Iran) as someone who had rebelled against an imperial foreign power. At the same time, however, he ruled in a more authoritarian manner than is fondly remembered today. Mossadegh, for example, had parliament grant him a power of attorney that allowed him to enact laws without its consent. He also moved to curtail the powers of the Shah and the Senate (the upper house of Parliament). That was not necessarily good for his broad coalition in parliament. More and more members from religion and industry left until almost only the communists remained on Mossadegh's side. One can imagine how that was received in the West in the 1950s. When he then wanted to dissolve parliament by referendum, the chaos was finally complete. The British secret service (which had been trying to do this for a long time) with the help of the CIA instigated a coup against Mossadegh, the Shah appointed a new prime minister. These events went down in history as "Operation Ajax".
A lesson for democracy?
In the period that followed, Mohammad Reza Shah continued to try to continue his father's reform program, but at the same time he ruled in an increasingly authoritarian manner. The fact that he could now officially count on the support of the USA and that he could do almost anything within that framework means that this attitude is quickly explained. As a result, dissatisfaction among the people continued to build up over time. The Shah lost support not only in religious circles, but also in liberal and left-wing circles. The Islamic Revolution finally followed in 1979, which finally drove him out of office and out of the country.
But where in this decade-long process did the young plant of democracy in Iran die? Was it the failure of the Constitutional Revolution before World War I? In the authoritarian rule of Reza Khan afterwards? In the unfortunate period of government and ultimately the removal of Mossadegh? It was probably a little everywhere. Of course, everything could have turned out differently. But democracy is not always the end of the story. That's probably the lesson from the Iran case.
I'll give you a little more context on the recent history of the Persian Empire and Iran in this week's Déjà Vu History podcast. Listen to it! This article is also my contribution to the blog parade #DHM Demokratie, which the German Historical Museum is currently organizing. You can find all the articles on the DHM website.