Masters of the Garden: An Environmental History of Nation-Building in Pahlavi Iran

Abstract

Studies on Iranian nationalism, development, and modernization have yet to fully reflect on the role of the environment. By applying an environmental lens, this dissertation rethinks the history of Pahlavi Iran (1925-79), exploring the ways in which the natural environment shaped, and was shaped by, national and other ideologies. It analyzes major episodes of environmental transformation along a chronological timeline—the construction of the Trans-Iranian Railway in the interwar period; dam and irrigation projects in the early Cold War; policies aimed at curbing deforestation and desertification; the emergence of an environmentalist agenda in the late Pahlavi era; and management of nature-induced disasters. I argue that these episodes were integral to the Pahlavis’ nation-building and national narrative. Moreover, they embodied modern Iran’s distinct historical condition: Iranian state-builders thought of their country in imperial terms, but unlike its de-colonized neighbors, Iran lacked imperial infrastructure in transport, communication, or natural resource extraction. This resulted in hasty and aggressive projects in the environment, meant not only to restore the grandeur of the pre-Islamic Iranian empires, but also to reassert Iran as a central actor within the world order. Most crucially, projects to transform the environment were not geared toward ecologically sound harnessing of natural resources so much as toward expanding state control and exclusion of those marginal to the Pahlavi nationalist project. Vigorous action in fields such as dam building, anti-desertification, and environmentalism at times did grant the Pahlavi dynasty international prestige and a more influential role in the Middle East. At the same time, however, such measures contributed in meaningful—if overlooked—ways to the Pahlavi state’s chronic vulnerability to pressures from the outside as well as from within. The Pahlavis’ environmental legacy has transcended the 1979 revolution, and to understand Iran’s current environmental crisis, we must therefore pay close attention to the ways in which this story unfolded.PhDHistoryUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/177817/1/sadan_1.pd