Sociological Analysis of the Formation of the Iranian Working Class in the Qajar Era and Its Role in the Modernization of Society and the Constitutional Revolution

Different social classes, each with their own motives, participated in the Iranian Constitutional Revolution.  Workers were one of the emergent classes in Iranian society.  They differed from the old tradesmen and guilds in terms of their participation in production processes and their ownership of the means of production; moreover, they did not resemble their European counterpart because they lived in a tribal context and in a society based on agricultural and livestock economy. Due to the pressure of the ruling class and poverty, many of these workers were forced to leave their home and migrate to more prosperous areas or neighboring countries. They were impressed by the political, social, and economic situation in these areas. Since most of them were seasonal workers, after returning to Iran, they shared what they had observed with their compatriots. The purpose of this article is to explore the contribution of workers in shaping the Iranian constitutional movement. Using a historical methodology, the author tries to address how the working class was formed in Iranian society and what role workers played in the emergence of social modernization. It is proposed that the working class was formed in Iran much later than in European societies, and it constituted only a small section of the productive forces. The awareness of Iranian workers of their political and social rights was influenced more by leftist ideas in the Caucasus than by endogenous causes and industrial development. Therefore, despite its involvement in modernization and the constitutional movement, this spectrum of society could not play its historical role as it did in the great European revolutions in Britain, France, and Russia.    This study shows that before the development of the constitutional movement, some workers participated in the revolutions in the Caucasus and became acquainted with its revolutionary ideas. These workers, in union with other compatriots, joined the Iranian liberation movement and fought against tyranny by distributing leaflets, participating in rallies, and appearing on the battlefields, and thus paved the way for future revolutionary movements.