Is it possible to predict revolutions and understand their causes?

The Islamic Revolution of Iran, a social revolution in 1979, has so far been studied from various perspectives by different Iranian and non-Iranian scholars. The present paper, written by Nikki Keddie, is to answer the question whether the Iranian revolution was predictable or not. In other words, if the staff of the American Embassy in Tehran had not put aside the domestic information agents and had contacts with more people, wouldn’t their behavior and, as a result, the Islamic revolution, have been predictable? What were the differences between Iran and other Islamic countries?