The Tobacco Movement of 1890–1892 marked the beginning of more than a century of non-violent civil resistance in Iran. This movement and the succeeding Constitutional Revolution of 1906–1907 played important roles in forming the Iranian national identity and political culture, which in turn have indirectly influenced more recent non-violent civil insurrections. Almost all modern movements in Iran, including the Nationalization of Oil Movement of 1951–1953, the Revolution of 1979 and the Green Wave of 2009 have drawn on the Tobacco Movement and Constitutional Revolution and reflected most of their strategies and tactics.
This chapter discusses the Tobacco Movement and the Constitutional Revolution and how both established the foundations of and shaped national and collective identities. Each is an example of a non-violent struggle for people’s sovereignty, the rule of law and self-determination. In addition, these cases enable us to elaborate on historical acts of non-violent resistance in the context of the Iranian national liberation struggle as well as historical developments regarding discourses on non-violent resistance. This will help us assess the basic demands of the Iranian people and the impact of non-violent resistance on the formation of a nation, as well as on shaping collective or communal identities.
After providing a brief historical background to these two movements, this chapter focuses on the intellectual , theoretical and social pretext, forms, strategies and tactics of the non-violent action in late nineteenth and early twentieth-century Iran. The impact of these non-violent actions on the nation- and state-building processes and how civil resistance influenced the Iranian independence struggle are also discussed.
1.1 Nation- and State-Building Processes
Nation- and state-building processes have occurred in two different forms: violent and non-violent. Based on the methods undertaken in these processes, different nations and states have been created. Violent methods usually lead to a state that has no respect for human rights and the rule of law, at least for a period. A good example is the Iranian Revolution of 1979 ; its goal was to establish a revolutionary state and it consolidated its power through bloodshed, murder and torture. Conversely, non-violent methods lead to a democratic state that recognizes human rights and their foundations.
Demonstrations, civil disobedience and other forms of non-violent action have subverted the ways that most Iranians have adopted to order the institutions and discourses associated with the state-building process in the country. These non-violent actions have formed the cultural identity of modern Iranian society in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In contrast, Iranian clerics adopted violent methods to establish the religious state and have continued a long history of violence against their dissidents.
The theoretical and practical reforms pursued by Iranian intellectuals and nationalist politicians were aimed at modernizing the state and giving a new meaning to Iranian identity. However, Iranian reformists knew that they would not be able to establish a new state and a modern nation from the ashes of the Iranian empire without following the path of developed European nations. To do this, they felt the need for both a national identity shaped through the revival and reconstruction of a national heritage, and the diffusion into Iranian culture of Western civilization. The motivations for the participants’ movement derived from pre-material politics and newly created identities, particularly those from the small but growing middle class.
The most critical points of nation-building in Iran’s modern history have occurred when social and political movements have been pushing for reform and modernization. During these periods, Iranians have put their differences aside and focused on Iranian national identity, interests and history. The modern nation- and state-building processes began in the second half of the nineteenth century, when social movements were on the rise. The civil resistance of the population to autocracy, corruption and superpower domination was crucial to the formation of a national consciousness and a collective identity.
In the second half of the nineteenth century, Iran entered the modern international system of sovereign statehood (Arjomand 1988: 27) and the political elite was ready to receive the modern idea of a state as an institution distinct from the king and his court. Most of the building blocks of modern states—the rule of law, the separation of powers, a centralized government, a constitution and an independent judiciary—were introduced by the intellectuals and politicians who were active in the non-violent social movements.
Iran’s road to self-determination and its non-violent civil resistance to the domination of the Russians and the British Empire in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries continuously faced political obstacles. Monarchical absolutism was seen as collusion with the great powers. The Tobacco Movement and 1906 Constitutional Revolution were intended partly to address these obstacles in different contexts. Although Iran was never colonized, the political regimes fell under the influence of great powers during the rule of the late Qājārs, Pahlavis and Khameneis .
Iranian activists aimed to address the legitimacy crisis of the state by shaping a framework of rule that recognized popular sovereignty and the rule of law. These are the bases of any modern state. The Constitutional Revolution was the reformers’ reaction to insurmountable obstacles placed in front of repeated attempts to realize reform by reorganizing and modernizing Qājār governance. This goal was pursued by reformers such as Amir Kabir and Sepahsālār , both prime ministers. The revolution of 1906–1907 was based on an accumulation of demands for reforms to modernize the state, which would in turn incorporate Iran into the international system of sovereign states. The political elite pursued this objective during the reign of Reza Shah Pahlavi.
1.2 The First Civil Resistance: The Tobacco Movement
Under the Qājār dynasty (1796–1925), Iran was increasingly subject to the economic and political domination of the great powers Russia and Great Britain due to the corruption of the Iranian court and the country’s weak armed forces. Because of a lack of industrialization and corruption-based treaties, there was a huge gap between imports and exports. This led to discontent among the peasantry and craftsmen. Some of the ‘ulamā (clerics ), merchants and bāzāris (tradesmen and shopkeepers) objected to the concessions granted to the great powers, while some of them supported the shah’s court. Nevertheless, the polity was not ripe for reform and high-ranking officials such as Abbās Mirzā (1789–1833), Qā’em Maqām-e Farāhāni (1779–1835), Amir Kabir (1807–1852) and Mirzā Husayn Khān Sepahsālār (1828−1880), all prime ministers, failed in their attempts at educational and administrative reform.
In 1890, unpopular concessions on tobacco and other product monopolies given to a British company led leading shi’i clerics to call for nationalist protests and a nationwide tobacco boycott, which succeeded in forcing Nāser ul-Din Shah to cancel the concession granted to the imperial power of Great Britain in early 1892.
The Tobacco Movement was strengthened by a fatwa issued by Mirzā Hassan Shirāzi , a cleric residing in Najaf, Iraq (at the time the city was under the rule of the Ottoman Empire). This fatwa had a huge impact on mobilizing the population against the use of tobacco and hence had a substantial anti-imperialist component. By declaring the use of tobacco to be tantamount to waging war against the Hidden Imam, Shirāzi identified the colonial powers as the enemies of Islam.1 This duality later became the context for the dehumanization of the West and the sacralization of the Muslim nations by Islamist ideologies and groups.
Shirāzi’s fatwa was a turning point in the struggle between the king’s court and shi’i clerics for power. For decades, the clerics had been using the extension of foreign imperial influence into Iran as a pretext for delegitimizing the Iranian government. Their first protest against this trend was against the Reuter Concession in 1873. Through this and other protests, religious institutions played a monumental role in the politics of the nation, a role which has functioned as a double-edged sword since. Religious institutions have supported various social movements while simultaneously directing them toward an Islamist agenda.
Although clerics protested in order to increase their own social power, the non-violent nature of these demonstrations helped to instigate mass participation. At the same time, some powerful clerics supported the king and opposed any reform. This resistance to foreign powers was peaceful action that targeted foreign trade. A considerable section of Iranian society stopped using tobacco to exert pressure on the government to annul the tobacco treaty. The boycott finally worked, ultimately proving to the Iranians that non-violent people power was a potent force for creating change.
The Tobacco Movement presents in microcosm many of the features which reappeared in the Constitutional Revolution of 1906–1907 (Keddie 1966: 1) and in other movements in modern Iran. This successful mass protest showed how attempts by foreign powers to infringe Iranian sovereignty would be met by resistance from the local population. It also inspired Iranians to resist despotic and authoritarian governments. The victory of the mass movement made it clear to the Iranian people that they could win if they were united against the powerful, encouraging opponents of the Iranian governments in the years to come to take action. This success proved that it would be possible to resist the shah and his court and that even the most powerful would submit to the will of the people.
1.3 A Non-Violent Social Movement: The Constitutional Revolution
The demand for reform in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries met little or no response from the different administrations appointed by the Qājār kings. The Tobacco Movement increased and gave a focus to a series of grievances which had accumulated from the nineteenth century (Keddie 1966: 2).
In 1905, an uprising initially led by merchants and clergy ensued which would continue for the next six years. This was in opposition to widespread corruption by the Qājār dynasty and its allied regional nobles and resulted from a series of other concessions to Russian and other foreign interests. This civil resistance was merely a continuation and intensification of the Tobacco Movement of the 1...