Reza Shah and the tribes

Reza Khan assumed the premiership in 1923 and became Reza Shah Pahlavi in early 1926, bringing the Qajar dynasty to an end. His aversion to the tribes in Iran is notorious, and he is widely thought to have broken the back of the tribal system. In his programme for unifying Iran and creating a modern, independent, secular, Persian-speaking country, he saw in the nomad tribes symbols of much that he was trying to replace: alien cultures and languages, allegiance to hereditary chiefs, a ‘primitive’ way of life, and a mobility that made them inaccessible to administration and the rule of law. He was also concerned by the extent to which the tribes had been subject to manipulation by foreign powers. Judging the organization and leadership of the tribes a continuing political danger, and their nomadism as anachronistic in a modern state, he eventually determined on the revolutionary step of destroying the tribal system altogether.

Reza Shah's tribal policy had two main aspects, and was implemented in two distinct phases: a campaign of pacification and disarmament, carried out mostly before he became Shah, and a programme of nomad settlement enforced during his last decade. The pacification campaign, often quoted as a successful example of his strong-arm approach, is well documented, but there is little detailed record of the enforced settlement, which by contrast has received considerable – largely justified – notoriety as a brutal and catastrophic failure.