DWA 244 Modern Iran: Society and Politics

This course is a survey of Iranian politics and society, from the establishment of the Qajar dynasty in the late 19th century to the present. The aims of the course are twofold: (1) to introduce students to major events shaping Iranian politics over the last century. Among the topics covered are: the rise and demise of the Qajar dynasty, the Persian Constitutional Revolution, the rise and fall of the Pahlavi dynasty, the role of Western imperialism, the geopolitics of oil, the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War, the crisis of theocracy, etc.; and (2) to expose students to a set of theoretical and analytical issues underlying Iran's political development, such as: the causes and consequences of revolutions, state-society relations, secularism and modernization, fundamentalism and reform, pluralism and democracy, autocracy and clientelism, corruption and the rentier state. Above all, this course is design to help students think, talk, and write in an informed and critical manner about politics in modern Iran.