Social Movements, the State and External Forces in Modern Iran

Abstract

In the following chapters I analyse the rise of modern nationwide movements in Iran and Egypt from the late nineteenth century onwards. Utilising a socio-historical perspective, I examine the social forces which participated in movements, their changing politics and the forms of protest that they utilised. I argue that women, workers’ associations, Islamic groups and organisations, national minorities, students and intellectuals developed and deployed repertoires of protest and forms of political discourse during this period which still exert an influence today. This chapter will present an analysis of the role of movements, the state and external forces in modern Iran, focusing on the period between the late nineteenth century and the end of the 1980s. Although chronological, it will not present a survey of Iranian history. Instead my analysis will focus on specific historical junctures and turning points in which national movements interacted with the state and external forces. These turning points include the tobacco protest of 1890, the constitutional revolution (1906–11), the oil nationalisation movement of 1951, the secular left, religious and nationalist movements of the 1960s and 1970s, the revolution of 1979 and the foundation of the reform movement in the late 1980s.