The Despotic State & the Emerge of the Despotic Semi-Modern State in Iran: A Theoretical Pattern

The Pahlavi despotic semi-modern state was the first state formed in Iran in accordance to the theoretical model of John Frankopouji. In this state the bureaucratic institutions were formed and developed, power was concentrated and a modern army was established. Having full control over compelling and non-compelling sources, this state had an overall objective of power concentration and monopoly. The root in the formation of such state must be found in the socio-political changes in the Constitutional and post-Constitutional era. Contrary to European despotic states such as England and France where a new class could make a democratic society in a competitive environment parallel to the socio-economic and political modernization of state, since the state’s reliance on various classes prevented the despotic procedure of state and facilitated the passage stage to a democratic society; in the absence or weakness of such classes, the Pahlavi despotic state in Iran could finally have a more different form and nature than of European despotic states by an ever more concentrating of the power in the Court and by making a new army, a new bureaucracy and emphasizing the nationalist ideology. Despite some socio-economic, cultural and political modernizations, the context for transition to a democratic state and society was never provided in such state.