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Being Modern in Iran »

Authors: Fariba Adelkhah, Jonathan Derrick (Translator), Fondation Nationale Des Sciences Politiq
ISBN-13: 9780231119405, ISBN-10: 0231119402
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Date Published: March 2000
Edition: (Non-applicable)

Author Biography: Fariba Adelkhah

Fariba Adelkhah is a senior researcher at the Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI/Sciences-po) in Paris.

Book Synopsis

Since its 1979 revolution seized the world's attention, the Islamic Republic of Iran has remained a subject of misunderstanding, passion, and polemic. This book — a study of Iran's political culture in the broadest and deepest sense — examines the tremendous changes taking place in Iran today.

Most studies of contemporary Iran overemphasize the revolution's radical break with the past and focus exclusively on the Republic's Islamic character as the decisive factor in its social reality. But modernity has not simply been banished and excluded from Iran; nor have the effects of globalization passed it by. Drawing on her extensive ethnographic fieldwork in Iran and an encyclopedic knowledge of contemporary Iranian politics and culture, anthropologist Fariba Adelkhah investigates modernity in the Islamic Republic of Iran by looking at the growth of individualism, the bureaucracy, commercial forces, and rationalization in post-revolution Iran.

Journal of Palestine Studies

This fascinating study of postrevolutionary Iran, based on extensive anthropological field research undertaken by Adelkhah in the 1990s, ought to be required reading for anyone wanting to understand the political and social changes in Iran during the past two decades. . . . This highly readable book is especially valuable for teachers looking for a volume that goes beyond simplistic stereotypes about Iran and Islam and also stimulates discussion and comparative analyses among students.

	Acknowledgements
	Preface to the English edition
	Introduction: A Political Earthquake	1
1	When Taxes Bloom in Tehran	9
	Giving Islamic Legitimacy to Taxation	11
	The 'Rentier State' and Taxation in Iran	13
	A Look Inside the Mayor's Gardens	18
	Parks as Scenes of Conflict	23
2	The Man of Integrity: A Matter of Style	30
	Javanmardi as a Package	33
	Teyyeb: A Very Ambiguous Hero	35
	The Fruit and Vegetable Market: Inventing Tradition	38
	Javanmardi and Contemporary Life	42
	Javanmardi as a Modern Political 'Imaginaire'	46
3	The Economics of Beneficence: Generosity and Business Orientation	53
	Two Islamic Credit Networks	56
	Open-Handedness as a Social Movement	67
4	Social Beings, Political Beings: The Story of an Election	79
	The Election Campaign	80
	From the First Round to the Second	83
	Local Issues in an Election	87
	The Strategy of Companies (Sherkat)	89
	Politics in its Own Right, No Longer Sacred	91
	Elections and Political Reformulation	100
5	A New Public Space for Islam?	105
	Institutionalising the Religious Sphere	113
	Rationalising and Individualising Processes in Islam	120
	Towards Money Orientation in the Religious Field	127
6	Looking after Number One: A Competitive Society	139
	A Sports-mad Republic	140
	Competition and Self-Reflexivity	146
	Self-Reflexivity and Relations with Others	156
	From Social Relations to Social Regulations?	162
	Conclusion	175
	Glossary	179
	Index	189