Development of Cultural Construction and Constitutional Revolution in Iran

Bijan Rabiee,Shiva Jalalpoor

doi:10.7596/taksad.v6i4.1136

Abstract

The subject of this article is the development of the cultural construction and the emergence of the Constitutional Revolution in Iran. This study, by examining the cultural structure of the Qajar era of the Naser-al-Din Shah period wants to investigate the cause of the Constitutional Revolution.The findings of this research, which have been collected by historical-analytical method, indicate that the pattern of development in the Qajar era is consistent with the pattern of unbalanced development. In this sense, by starting educational, political and military reforms in the Qajar era specially Nasser-al-Din Shah, gradually the cultural structure apart from the traditional political structure. This development provided the basis for the emergence of new intellectuals and elites with new political ideas in the field of governance methods. However, the attenuation of political structure and the backwardness of political development from cultural development faced with some obstacles. Political system instead of creating a development along with gradual cultural development and consolidating its position through the persuasion of the community, in fact to maintain integrity in the social system was resorted to force and preferred force and compulsion to persuasion. The kind of reaction and opposition of the political power structure against the modern intellectual movement, which contained new political demands in the area of governance and freedom, led to the weakness and, finally, the collapse of the Qajar political system and the constitutional revolution.

Highlights

The article is divided into three parts of the cultural construction of Qajar era and its internal and external agents of its development, political power structure in Qajar era and its characteristics, and the development of cultural construction, the lack of development of the political structure and the occurrence of the Constitutional Revolution
Several factors led to the inability of the Qajar political system to perform well, including its coordination with the environment, the political absolutism, the centrality of the king, and the main elements of the political power structure in the political administration of the society; in addition, the lack of institutional power in the third central government, the presence of foreign forces, and the existence of an Islamic and nomadic military structure, which we will discuss in the text
The most important issue that caused Iran's disability and backwardness in the Qajar era is the absolute despotism and the old way of governance, due to the effort of some reformist intellectuals and reformist forces, a new parliamentary and libertarian thought was entered to Iran, which led to the development of the cultural structure of Iran

Summary

Introduction

The article is divided into three parts of the cultural construction of Qajar era and its internal and external agents of its development, political power structure in Qajar era and its characteristics, and the development of cultural construction, the lack of development of the political structure and the occurrence of the Constitutional Revolution. Several factors led to the inability of the Qajar political system to perform well, including its coordination with the environment (progressive cultural structure), the political absolutism, the centrality of the king, and the main elements of the political power structure in the political administration of the society; in addition, the lack of institutional power in the third central government, the presence of foreign forces, and the existence of an Islamic and nomadic military structure, which we will discuss in the text. 2.2 Constitutional Revolution The Constitutional Revolution is a collection of efforts and events that led to the signing of the Constitutional Order by Muzaffarodin Shah Qajar in 1906 and continued until the Mohammad Ali Shah Qajar period to convert the autocratic government to constitutional government, leading to the formation of the National Assembly and the adoption of the first constitution of Iran

Characteristics of Cultural Construction in Qajar Era

3-2-1 External Factors of Constructing Political Power

Features of Constructing Political Power in Qajar Era

Influence of Aliens

6- Conclusion