Overview

In this detailed political history of Iran from 1953, Ali Rahnema seeks to answer one question: How did the Shah become a modern despot? Against the background of power plays made by the Shah and successive US administrations, Rahnema focuses on the internal tug of war between the Shah, his political opposition, and a nation in search of greater liberty. He shows how the legislature, the judiciary, the executive and the media were gradually brought under the firm control of the monarch. While presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy both attempted to prevent the Shah from achieving absolute rule, eventually they were persuaded that his non-democratic regime was to their benefit. In the end, the Shah outlawed all opposition activities, and criminalised political ideas different from – let alone opposed to – his own. As Rahnema shows, the consequences of Iran’s turn to despotism would be far-reaching.

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9780861541423

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Reviews

'A brilliant history of late Pahlavi Iran and the fatal entanglements of the shah, the opposition and the United States.' * Stephanie Cronin, Elahe Omidyar Mir-Djalali Research Fellow, University of Oxford * 'Richly detailed yet exceedingly accessible... The significant insights Rahnema offers into Mohammad Reza Shah's rise and political trajectory make the book an important read for students not just of modern Iran but of despotic politics more broadly.' * Ali Mirsepassi, Albert Gallatin Research Excellence Professor, New York University *

'Rahnema...writes with a fluency and charm rare in academic books, sweeping the reader along with his enthusiasm and energy.' * Times Higher Education Supplement *

'A brilliant history of late-Pahlavi Iran and the fatal entanglements of the shah, the opposition and the United States. Rahnema has produced a forensic analysis of the construction of a dictatorship, turning a searchlight on the inexorable hubris and nemesis of the last shah.' * Stephanie Cronin, Elahe Omidyar Mir-Djalali Research Fellow, University of Oxford *

'As creative and sensitive in his interpretations as he is meticulous in his research, Rahnema offers a forensic analysis of the history of the last shah of Iran's drift into dictatorship, guiding us skilfully through Iran's political history, from the aftermath of the 1953 royalist coup d'etat to the shah's triumphant, Napoleonic coronation ceremony in 1968. Chronicles of the late monarch's steady consolidation of power in his own hands and the stifling of dissent are now legion, of course. But rarely has detail been marshalled so effectively in demonstrating these points... Rahnema has written an important and insightful treatment of Iranian political history in the 1950s and 1960s, a period that is often glossed over superficially in the rush to connect the 1953 coup to the shah's autocracy in the 1970s, but which actually marks a critical moment of transition for Iran.' * International Journal of Middle East Studies * 'A brilliant history of late Pahlavi Iran and the fatal entanglements of the shah, the opposition and the United States.' * Stephanie Cronin, Elahe Omidyar Mir-Djalali Research Fellow, University of Oxford * 'Richly detailed yet exceedingly accessible... The significant insights Rahnema offers into Mohammad Reza Shah's rise and political trajectory make the book an important read for students not just of modern Iran but of despotic politics more broadly.' * Ali Mirsepassi, Albert Gallatin Research Excellence Professor, New York University *

Author Information

Ali Rahnema is Professor of Economics at the American University of Paris. He is the author of An Islamic Utopian: A Political Biography of Ali Shari‘ati, Behind the 1953 Coup in Iran and Call to Arms: Iran’s Marxist Revolutionaries, which is also published by Oneworld.

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