A History of Modern Iran

"Iran entered the twentieth century with oxen and wooden plough. It exited with steel mills, one of the world's highest automobile accident rates, and, to the consternation of many, a nuclear program. This book narrates the dramatic transformation that has taken place in twentieth-century Iran. Since the main engine of this transformation has been the central government, the book focuses on the state, on how it was created and expanded, and how its expansion has had profound repercussions not only on the polity and economy, but also on the environment, culture, and, most important of all, wider society. Some repercussions were intended; others, especially protest movements and political revolutions, were not. This book may appear somewhat quaint and even insidious to those convinced that the state is inherently a part of the problem rather than solution of contemporary dilemmas. But since this book is about major transformations, and these transformations in Iran have been initiated invariably by the central government, it will focus on the latter hopefully without falling into the Hegelian-Rankean pitfalls of glorifying the state"--