Agency and Iranian Myth in Mohammad Reza Pahlavi s The Shah s Story (EUC702)

Transcription

1 As a political memoir, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi s The Shah s Story is a typical in its purpose. It acts as a justification or statement of case for the actions of the political character who is also the narrator, usually retrospectively ordering them (not just chronologically) so as to construct a narrative of continuity defining their career. While there may be some admittance of error, the continuity of principles and aims underlying the narrator s proposed effects must be seen to be evident in order to validate their actions both to themselves and to others. The Shah wrote his autobiography immediately after going into exile in the face of criticism from both secular anti-monarchists and religious revivalists, particularly to his umbrella of policies he termed the White Revolution, so this defensive purpose is abundantly clear; he was at pains to demonstrate his progressive (Pahlavi 1980, 11) and his Islamic (idem, 37) credentials in response to those two elements that forced him from his position. To understand how the Shah justifies his policy decisions, it is imperative that one attempt to gain an insight into how he saw the world around him. The way in which he constructs the history of Iran and his place in it is, I feel, very obvious at least in a broad sense from his own writings, but it seems to have not received a significant weighting in current commentary upon his career. I have for this essay called this construction an Iranian or Persian myth, though I do not use it in a pejorative sense, nor do even seek to imply that it is necessarily a falsehood. Rather, I use it to mean a series of broad aesthetic ideas concerning an essentialist view of the Iranian/Persian people throughout history, the dramatic characterisation of salient individuals and the emotive terms in which they are couched. This myth is inextricably linked to his understanding of his own policy decisions, what might be called the ideology that informed them and the agency he gives to parties involved in their implementation. Seeing as he is, undeniably, one of those pivotal figures within this grand historical narrative, this has profound implications for his perception of his self, the identity Josh Turnbull A Page 1

2 of which is a conglomerate of several components, as it and the Iranian myth exist in a mutually endogenous relationship, each supporting the other. In exploring this multifaceted approach to the Shah s autobiography, as with any analysis of opinion, it is always too easy to appear to be somewhat patronisingly criticising views with the aim to invalidate them. I seek not, however, to challenge or even discuss the validity of his assertions, merely to understand its contribution to his unique historiography of his own reign. Two concepts that feature heavily as part of the Iranian myth are that of culture and civilisation, terms that the Shah repeatedly invokes (for example Pahlavi 1980, 27; 39; Pahlavi 1961, 18), and while they can appear as distinct terms within a sentence (for example the essence of Iranian civilisation and culture would prevail (Pahlavi 1980, 11), there is no apparent distinction made between them, and they appear to be used interchangeably, for example wherein the chapter Defence of the Iranian Civilisation, he lists as supporting examples great Iranian literary figures (Pahlavi 1980, 101). This conceptual amorphousness demonstrates the nature of his nationalism, which is based on vague notions of essential qualities of the Iranian people such as hardiness and superiority in matters of intellect and sport (Pahlavi 1961, 16-7), but importantly manifests as a single character of Iran, its civilisation, culture and people. It becomes pronounced in light of his use of such concepts to compare Iran with large foreign regions, for example in stating a belief that the Civilisation of Iran is superior to China in some respects (idem, 18) without describing what those respects might be. He also cites Albuquerque s invasion of Hormoz as a sign of new times, modern times: the movement which drew us towards the East had come to an end; imperceptibly the attraction toward the West had begun (Pahlavi 1980, 20), which does not describe a specific, consciously acted historical event, but one formed of impressions and subject to relativity. Josh Turnbull A Page 2

3 Understanding how the Shah relates and compares Iran to perceived others also makes clear what evaluative conditions he attaches to the Iranian myth. In what one might call a fundamental attribution error as it is a case of divergent judgements for two individuals committing the same act he persistently characterises military incursions into Iran as unjust and malevolent, but portrays Iran s ventures outwards as glorious or hard-won (Pahlavi 1980, 15; 24; 43; 46; 59; 117; 134; Pahlavi 1961, 25). There seems to be some appeal to an idea of the global centrality of Iran underlying this, as the Shah cites its medial position in Asia as what allowed it to conquer, trade with, influence and civilise our neighbouring countries (Pahlavi 1980, 15). Similarly, he constructs the narrative so that it is the progenitor of the success of other nations, particularly in relation to what he considers to be the developmentally antagonistic West (Pahlavi 1980, 17; 18). Given Schayegh s contention that dynastic nationalism positioned the Pahlavi shahs both on top and at the centre of society (Schayegh 2010, 37), it is interesting to consider that what I have just described is a conceptual positioning of Iran itself at the zenith of a developmental hierarchy and at the centre of an historical geography; perhaps this is indicative of how he perceives his self within the context of the Iranian myth that is so resoundingly positive. How the Shah relates himself to the state and the myth behind it tells a lot about the cognitive processes that allows him to defend the White Revolution and his conduct in office. The identity of the Shah that he communicates in his autobiography can be understood as a set of four components in two sets of two, distinguished along similar lines as the dual functionality of a life writer as the historical figure and the person from the inside described by Smith and Watson (2001, 6). The first two are a consequence of his position as monarch, that is, his identity as leader of the people and his identity as Shah in a line of great Shahs. The second two, while still frequently relating to himself as a ruler, refer more to his political personality (as opposed to duty), comprising of his identity as a Muslim and his Josh Turnbull A Page 3

4 identity as an Iranian. The first of these four components is probably the least controversial academically most scholars agree that his rule cannot be characterised as working in the interests of the people and so it is the aspect of himself that the Shah is so eager to defend. He rejects the label of dictator throughout his career (Pahlavi 1961, 162) and constantly appeals to democratic legitimacy, particularly for his dismissal of Mosaddeq in 1953, where he cites popular enthusiasm to state that now I had the right to claim I had really been elected by the people (Pahlavi 1980, 57). This is an evocation of the facet of the Iranian myth that describes Iran as a single character, using the phrase the people and applying to it a unity of motivation and action, and importantly perceiving it as a support for himself as a ruler, rather than support for the decision he made. Such a conceptualisation stands in stark contrast to the whole phenomenon of unionisation in this period[, which] mirrored the interests and aspirations of large segments of Iranian society to control their own fate and voice their own needs (Mirsepassi 2000, 67), which posits a view of a far more heterogeneous society, wherein people support institutions as they see fitting to their own interests. In the Shah s conceptualisation, however, the people are not just in support of him, he actually attributes an active agency to them for example, through the activities of the volunteers within the education, hygiene and development corps (Pahlavi 1980, 85-9) rather than himself, which reinforces through an appeal to approval the legitimacy he feels he has. The legitimating populous is not viewed by the Shah, however, as something on which he sits atop, and there is clearly an understanding of the requirement for mutual benefit to be shared between himself and the people. Other scholars may disagree with this, for example Halliday who states that the problem with [analysing in terms of modernisation and development, much as the Shah did], is that they do not identify in whose interests these processes are occurring (Halliday 1979, 39), but the Shah did believe he was acting in Josh Turnbull A Page 4

5 the interests of and achieving positive ends for the great masses of the population. His personal ambitions as stated to preserve national unity, to make the Iranian people as happy as possible and to prepare a more peaceful future (Pahlavi 1980, 68) are devoid of self- or even elite-interest. Probably because of this there is little evidence of addressing such policy concerns as the strong elitist orientation of the [higher education] system that discouraged education expansion to the masses (Hamdhaidhari 2008, 19), which is why there is a seamless shift in concern from education for all at primary level, to quality of graduates at higher education (Pahlavi 1980, 101-5), indicating a continuity of the vague nature of the perception of the people to the understanding of what acting in their interests entails. There is an apparent conflict between the importance the Shah stresses on national wealth belonging to the nation rather than the state (Pahlavi 1980, 35) and the fact that the government s ability to persuade (and not only by terror) owed something to the money at the government s disposal (Keddie 1977, 231), which suggests that substantial investment was made in suppression of opposition at the expense of the nation. To understand how the Shah reconciles this, one should consider what he feels it is to be a national leader and the protocol by which he applied to his conduct. These perceptions were influenced by what he deemed to be lessons from previous rulers (Pahlavi 1980, 17), which is a crucial part of the second of his four identity components. Interestingly, in this component, agency is not attributed to the great masses, from whom he can gain legitimacy by democratic appeal, but solely to himself so that he can gain legitimacy by achievement. Thus, through associating himself so strongly with the White Revolution, he depicted himself as the motor of the 1963 White Revolution, which was an attempt to provide a legitimating myth for the Pahlavi monarchy (Schayegh 2010, 39-40). It is not hard to see why he was so invested in the White Revolution, and why therefore he had to invest in suppression, despite the way it Josh Turnbull A Page 5

6 seems to be in conflict with the very principles upon which it was based. He would have seen it as a pragmatic response to the threat to the White Revolution, and so, like the great Persian kings before him, he would have to act to save his accomplishments, and act because as ruler, he is the only one who effectively can. The two forms of agency to the people and to himself he attributes throughout his work appear to be conflicting in their simultaneity, and indeed I do believe they are and yet still coexist. One statement, however, sheds some light on how they relate to each other in which he claims that the Order of the Pahlavans [Persian knights] was always one of the most important factors in the continuity of the national spirit (Pahlavi 1980, 103). This indicates that while he attributes the success of the White Revolution to the people, the motivation to do it originated not within them, but from somewhere within the state above them. This may help explain why the Shah was eager to give his new economic initiatives an air of nationalism (Nasr 2000, 101), as he felt that it was only he who could spur on the development of Iran, or to put it another way, it was only by his agency that the people could be imbued with theirs. This shows how the third of the Shah s four identity components, may have been subverted to, or at least at the utilisation of, his duties influenced by the first two. This is not to say that he feels less Iranian than he feels a historical figure, but rather it is demonstrative of the way that the Iranian myth and nationalism underlies his political decisions, affirming those decisions with the incontrovertible idea of Iran. The fourth of the Shah s identity components is perhaps the most academically controversial, with claims that Islam is a rather insignificant part of the régime s official ideology (Halliday 1979, 31) in contrast to the state, concerned with Islamic militancy, made encroachments on the clergy s traditional prerogatives (Hamdhaidari 2008, 20), also conflicting with the secular opposition was always perceived as the real danger by the Shah s regime while the Islamic opposition was always overlooked (Mirsepassi 2000, 73). Josh Turnbull A Page 6

7 The reason for this inconsistency is that these are all different interpretations of the role of Islam within the Shah s life, some emphasising its place in his government, others concerning Islam as a threat to government, others the relationship with Islam in society and surprisingly, none with his personal spirituality. The Shah is keen to establish himself as a Muslim by asserting the power of prayer and faith (Pahlavi 1980, 37), and also its value in society through the claim that An atheist civilisation is not truly civilised (idem, 39). His opposition to begins when he identifies ideologists who have usurped power in Islam (idem, 110), but the distinction between what he approves of about Islam and what he doesn t becomes less clear when its role in government is taken into account. He claims that Islam is behind all of his decisions in government and it is folly for it not to be, but he never refers to Islam when explaining his policies. It is probably the case that Islam holds a significant position within the Iranian myth, and therefore as part of his identity, but it is linked more aesthetically with his view of Iran and its society, rather than pragmatically with his view of government in general. The Islamic identity component is part of, rather than separate from the third Iranian component. Throughout this essay I have used the abstraction of identity components to describe how the Shah places himself within the greater notion of an Iranian myth that he has cognitively formed. His autobiography, though, is ultimately a political justification piece, and therefore it is essential to see how his identity and myth influence the way he retroactively constructs a narrative to validate his actions. Identity and myth feed into what Terrance Cook refers to as standards the base assumptions from which arguments and rationalisations form (Cook 1980, 514) and it is interesting to note that all eight of Cook s typologies can be described by those components. The appeal to prudence, where secular interest is linked to a candidate s preferred course of conduct (ibid.), the appeal to public opinion and the appeal to prestige (the quality of a source) all stem from the first identity Josh Turnbull A Page 7

8 component. The appeal to tradition and the appeal to law (or human rules/norms) are evident from the second component, the appeal to human nature (in this case the nature of a certain group Iranians) from the third, the appeal to the supernatural from the fourth and ideals from all four. This demonstrates the importance of the Shah s identity in his political reasoning and the way he understands the events he put into place and those that happened to him. It is an identity formed out of the Iranian myth that he constructed, and most importantly for his understanding, the perception of agency by which he and others acted throughout his career. Bibliography Cook, Terrence Political Justifications: The Use of Standards in Political Appeals. Journal of Politics, vol. 42(2), pp Halliday, Fred Iran: Dictatorship and Development. Harmondsworth: Penguin. Hamdhaidari, Shokrollah Education during the Pahlavi Dynasty in Iran ( ). Teaching in Higher Education, vol. 13(1) pp Keddie, Nikki R Oil, Economic Policy and Social Change in Iran. In: Keddie, Nikki R Iran: Religion, Politics and Society: Collected Essays. London: Cass. Mirsepassi, Ali Intellectual Discourse and the Politics of Modernisation: Negotiating Modernity in Iran. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nasr, Vali Politics Within the Late Pahlavi State: The Ministry of Economy and Industrial Policy, International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 32(1) pp Pahlavi, Mohammad Reza Mission for my Country. Hutchinson. Pahlavi, Mohammad Reza The Shah s Story. London: Michael Joseph Ltd. Schayegh, Cyrus Seeing like a State : An Essay on the Historiography of Modern Iran. International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 42(1) pp Josh Turnbull A Page 8

9 Smith, Sidonie and Watson, Julia Reading Autobiography: A Guide to Interpreting Life Narratives. Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press. Josh Turnbull A Page 9