Palace Fundamentalism and Liberal Democracy: Oil,Arms and Irrationality

With the end of the Cold War, some students of international affairs have suggested that the next field of conflict will be defined in cultural terms, between West and East, and particularly between liberal democracy and Islam. In this essay, it is argued that constructing a dichotomy between ‘rational’ Western democracy and ‘irrational’ Islam is not only dangerous but hypocritical. Support for the most backward and fanatical forms of Islamic fundamentalism has long been an element in the global geopolitical strategies of Western democracies. The trade in oil and arms has had particularly perverse social and political effects, which must be confronted in order to provide greater opportunities for the development of a modern civil society in the Arab world.     

Revisiting and Revising the Tobacco Rebellion

The major foreign concessions granted in the reign of Nasser al-Din Shah Qajar have received considerable attention, none more so than the Tobacco Rebellion, which is generally viewed as a watershed event in the awakening of political consciousness in Iran. Although mentioned in most of the published material on the precedents of the Constitutional Revolution of 1906, a revised narrative of the tobacco rebellion is overdue. This paper fills the gaps and revises some of the widely held assumptions on the forces that unleashed a nationwide movement that almost brought down the Qajar dynasty. The emphasis is on the incendiary protests in Tabriz and the largely neglected role of Hajj Kazem Malek-al-Tojjar. This article, which is the fifth of a series by the author on the two Malek-al-tojjar-e mamalek-e mahrusa of the Qajar era, questions the authorship of the fatwa (hokm) and re-assesses the motivation for its hasty proclamation and dissemination. In other words, were the “sensation-seekers” the heroes of reform or is there a neglected version to extricate from the truths and half-truths propounded about this watershed event?     

An Iranian Perspective of J. B. Fraser's Trip to Khorasan in the 1820s

This paper is based on an earlier one about James Baillie Fraser's trip to Khorasan in the 1820s, the first European to travel there in the Qajar era. But instead of focusing on Fraser's experience, the information given by him is used to view the circumstances in Khorasan from an Iranian perspective, which, in turn, is derived from a study of the three main categories of people met by Fraser. Through them and their careers, the paper analyzes the problems, both inherited and new, that the early Qajars faced from the outset. Each of the three categories is dealt with separately under the headings of Prince-Governors, Princes in Exile or in Obeisance and, finally, High Priests. Together these complete the overall picture in Greater Khorasan and, by extension, throughout Iran at that particular time. What emerges from a study of their careers are the seeds of some of the major trends that were to mark nineteenth-century Iran. Khorasan, with its size and position, was particularly well placed to afford a view of a society still dependent on tribal vagaries and the dominant role of the religious hierarchy. Above all, the geo-strategic location of the province affords a privileged view across to the outlying parts of Greater Khorasan which, although still viewed from inside as a part of Greater Iran, were, due to inherent instabilities, liable to manipulation by British and Russian imperialism. The most effective tool of the latter was a propensity to promote new national entities on the ruins of an empire struggling to sustain itself without means and with a dated mindset of which most people were sorely unaware. By projecting the circumstances of time and place onto the future, one can perceive a certain degree of inevitability in the upcoming history of Qajar Iran.