Monarchy failed as a regime type in Iran, but still persists in Saudi Arabia. What explains that difference?

Running Head: The Iranian and Saudi Monarchies Name Lecturer Institution Date The Differences between the Iranian and the Saudi Monarchies Most Middle East countries have experienced the monarchial governance for long periods. These monarchies grew from tribal kingship and royal priesthoods making the monarchy offices to become totally hereditary which later resulted to long successive dynasties. However, some of these monarchies have since disappeared due to their inability to cope with changes and the people`s demands. Even though the Saudi Arabian monarchy has survived till now, others like the Iranian since ended. The collapse of the Iranian monarchy is attributed to the failure of King Pahlavi, the Shah, to acquire legitimacy. The Shah was not capable of acquiring the legitimacy in terms of its existing foundation or to develop an alternative legitimacy formula in terms of which his dictatorship could be justified (Tulloch, 2009, pg 4). This brought down not only his regime but also the monarchial system. This showed that lack of legitimacy by political leaders may result in disappearance of institutions closely associated with them. The commencement of the Iranian monarchy fall can be traced from the time Shah came into power in 1953. From 1953 to 1963 much poverty remained among the Iranian people and the gap between the rich and the poor grew immensely. Shah was one of the rich landowners in the time. He increased Iran`s ties with United States when he came to power. The agreement he had with a western oil corporation annoyed many. Furthermore some of the people were not pleased by the presence of many Americans in the area. This lead to some discontented groups of the Iranians deciding to form some underground groups called the Fedaiyan-e Islam (Arjmand, 1986, pg 23). This group attempted to assassinate Shah`s prime minister which prompted him to react by executing a few members of the group. On top this; Shah was worried about the opinion of ultra-conservative Muslims though he enjoyed the support of the Iranian middle class. On the other some clerics were uncomfortable with Shah`s monarchy. This is because they could recall that shah`s father had in the year 1936 barred clerics from acting as judges in state courts. When shah came to power in the 1954, he had plans to modernize Iran economically and socially. He therefore sought to balance his increase in power with reforms that would win more favor from the common Iranians. However, some landowners and clerics were loudly opposed to the reforms. Fearing the possible rise of opposition to the reforms shah decided a crackdown on dissent. He then decided to attack some theological students who were agitating against a scheduled opening of a liquor store on March 22, n1963. This caused a disturbance that spread to other students in the city of Tabriz (Niblock ,2006 ). This actions lead to killing of hundreds by the government forces. The governance of the Shah was then labeled tyrannical by many leaders in the country and opponent like Khomeini. Shah went ahead to arrest those who had opposed and demonstrated for the killings. This actions lead to more and demonstrations which were retaliated by shootings and bombings from Shah Forces. More and more people were arrested by the government with their leaders like Khomeini being sent to exile. It is estimated that more than 10,000 people were killed in process of suppressing the demonstrations. These actions made many Iranians to lose faith in the shah leadership and also in the monarchial system of governance. Khomeini who was sent to exile continued his attacks on the Shah, sending into Iran pamphlets and tapes recordings. In these tapes he tried to describe that Islam was opposed to monarchy. He even further described the title of "King of Kings" which was used by Shah as the most hated of tittles in the sight of God (Tulloch, 2009, pg 7). He called the monarchy system a shameful, disgraceful and reactionary system. Shah continued to rule and also went on to work out his developments and the reforms. For the period of 1963-1967 the economy of Iran rose dramatically. The oil production boomed which produced an abundance of cash for Iran. Industries like refineries, aluminum smelters, machine tools factories and tractors, trucks, and automobiles were built. Other sectors like public education and health improve drastically. However the stigma of the bloody repression in 1963 remained and the Shah continued his repression against cleric`s hostile modernization. Shah established book censorship with police agents raiding mosques libraries. The fall of the shah and end of the Iranian monarchy then began taking course in the year 1976. In this year shah upset some clerics by replacing the old Islamic calendar with a secular new calendar. One of those who were highly vocal and a critic in the change of the calendar was found murdered and it was assumed to be work of shah (Niblock, 2006). This was taken to indicate lack of respect to human rights by Shah. In 1979 a revolution also known as the Islamic revolution came into effect and saw the relinquishing of power by the shah. The demonstrations had started in 1977 developing into a campaign of civil resistance that was partly secular and partly religious and intensified in 1978( Alaolmolki, 1996, pg 7 ). In the months of august to December 1978, strikes and demonstrations paralyzed the country. Then Shah got out of Iran for exile in mid January 1979 resulting to a power vacuum. The royal regime collapsed when the guerrillas and rebel troops overwhelmed troops loyal to the shah in armed street fighting. Khomeini returned to Iran and was accepted by the people. Iran then voted in a referendum to become an Islamic republic approving the theocratic constitution and Khomeini become the supreme leader of the country in December 1979. The events above describe what occurred leading to the eventual falling of the monarchy system in Iran. This revolution was quite unusual but was mainly seen as part of a conservative backlash against the westernizing and secularizing efforts of the western backed Shah. It was also a liberal backlash to social injustice and other shortcomings of the ancient regime. The people perceived Shah as a puppet of the non-Muslim western power whose culture was affecting that of Iran (Arjmand, 1986, pg17). They also viewed the regime as oppressive, brutal due to the many martial laws it used to quell the demonstrations. This shows the importance of a political leader in the survival and continuity of any political system is even greater in the Middle East. This is because political leaders in this area tend to posses more authority than what is known in the west and other countries. Most of the events that made Iran to get ripe for revolutions in 1979 have as well occurred in Saudi Arabia over the past decades. However the Al -Saud monarchy has shown consistent political skill in managing various potential sources of lack of stability thus sparing Saudi from experiencing a revolution like that in Iran. According to Tulloch (2009, pg2) Many of the conditions that left Iran vulnerable to revolution in 1979 have been noted in Saudi Arabia as well. Some of these include an authoritarian regime with little political freedom; a close relationship with the United States; an economy dependant on oil wealth; and a powerful and politically religious establishment (Tulloch, 2009,pg 4 ). On the contrary, despite these similarities the Saudi government has managed to over and over again, overcome destabilizing factors and either successfully, repress or pacify dissenting elements in the society. The Al-Saud regime had two factors upon which its legitimacy was based. These have been observed to be religion and oil wealth. The regime has retained its historic religious legitimacy through a continued close relationship with the Saudi religious establishment. The regime professed to uphold Islamic values and have further been endorsed by the ulema which have made it more legitimate. This has been a key element in the durability of the Al-Saud regime. Furthermore, there has been interdependence relationship between the Saudi government and the religious establishment in modern Saudi which is essentially an extension of the religious -political agreement between the Ibn-Saud and Ibn-Abdul-Wahab that provided the foundation on which the monarchy was established in 1744. Such a relationship is said to have been formed in I...