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Mode of Production in Medieval Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Hassan Shaugannik
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Extract

This essay has two purposes. One is to compare the agrarian mode of production in Iran during the 7th through 12th centuries with the mode of production in European feudalism, searching for clues as to why Europe--but not Iran--developed a capitalist mode of production. The second, accompanying purpose is to evaluate the theory of the Asiatic Mode of Production, a theory developed mainly within the Marxist tradition, in the context of medieval Iran.

A few Persian writers of the 1960s and 1970s dealt with the question of why non-European societies failed to experience a transition to capitalism, but their writings were not convincing. If the transformation from a feudal mode to a capitalist mode is due to feudal evolution, then a rigorous comparative approach is necessary in order to see why such an evolution took place in one society and not in another.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , Winter 1985 , pp. 75 - 94
Copyright
Copyright © Association For Iranian Studies, Inc 1985

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Footnotes

I am grateful to the editors of Iranian Studies for their comments on the earlier version of this paper. I am, however, entirely responsible for its contents.

References

Notes

1. Among the Persian and English articles, the following should be mentioned:

Ervand Abrahamian, “Oriental Despotism: The Case of Qajar Iran,” IJMES, No. 5 (1974), pp. 3-31; “European Feudalism and Middle Eastern Despotism,” Science and Society, Vol. 39, No. 2 (Summer 1975), pp. 129–156.Google Scholar

Ahmad Ashraf, “Nezam-e Asia'i ya Nezam-e Feodali” (Asiatic or Feudal System), Jahan-e No, Nos. 5-12 (1346/1967); “Historical Obstacles to the Development of a Bourgeoisie in Iran,” Iranian Studies, Vol. II, Nos. 2-3 (Spring-Summer 1969).Google Scholar

M. A. Khonji, “Tarikh-e Mad va Mansha-e Nazariye-ye Diakonov” (A Critique on Diakonov's History of Media), Rahnama-ye Ketab (Shahrivar, 1346/September 1967), Appendix, pp. 1-36.

K. Khosrovi, “Bourgeoisie dar Iran” (The Bourgeoisie in Iran) (Tehran University, 1344/1965; Mimeo); “Abyari va Jame'h-ye Rusta'i dar Iran” (Irrigation and Rural Society in Iran), Nameh-ye Olum-e Ejtema'i, 1/3 (February 1970); Jame'n-e Shenasi-ye Rusta'i-ye Iran Sociology of Iranian Countryside) (Tehran: Institute of Social Research Publications, 1350/1971)Google Scholar; Nezamhaye Bahrebardari az-Zamin (The Systems of Exploitation of Land) (Tehran: Shabgir Publications, 1355/1976.Google Scholar

Nomani, Farhad, “The Origin and Development of Feudalism in Iran: 300-1600 A.D.,” Tahqiqat-e Eqtesadi , Vol. 9, Nos. 27-28Google Scholar (Tehran: Tehran University, Department of Economics, 1972), pp. 5-61; “Notes on the Origins and Development of Extra-Economic Obligations of Peasants in Iran: 300-1600 A.D.,” Iranian Studies, Vol. IX, Nos. 2-3 (Spring-Summer 1976), pp. 121–141Google Scholar; “Notes on the Economic Obligations of Peasants in Iran: 300-1600 A.D.,” Iranian Studies, Vol. X, Nos. 1-2 (Winter-Spring 1977), pp. 62–83.Google Scholar

Piramun-e Shiveh-ye Tolid-e Asia'i (on the Asiatic Mode of Production), a collection of essays including Khonji's (Florence: Mazdak Publications, n.d.).

Socialism-e Elmi va Mobareze-ye Tabaqati (Scientific Socialism and Class Struggle), No. I (Fall 1354/1975), Berlin. Marx's-Engels’ writings on pre-capitalist modes; Marx's letter to Vera Zasulich, and his three drafts, Engels on social relations in Russia, and “Formen” from Grundrisse.

In addition, five more works which have been concerned with the same question are as follows:

Dariush Navidi, “Socio-Economic and Political Change in Safavid Iran, 16th and 17th Centuries,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Vanderbilt, 1977. This work, despite several methodological and theoretical failures, can be useful as a source of information.

Jahangier Saleh, “Social Formation in Iran, 750-1914,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Massachusetts, July 1978. This work, however, is very inadequate.

Homa Katouzian, “On the Mode of Production: Feudalism or Despotism?,” in his book The Political Economy of Modern Iran (New York: New York University Press, 1981)Google Scholar; “The Aridisolated Society, a Mode of Long-Term Social and Economic Development in Iran,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 15, No. 2 (May 1983).Google Scholar

Keyvani, Mehdi, Artisans and Guild Life in the Later Safavid Persia (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1982).Google Scholar

2. Melotti, Umberto, Marxism and the Third World (London: Macmillan Press Ltd., 1981), p. 54.Google Scholar

3. Amin, Samir, Unequal Development (New York: MRP, 1976), p. 115.Google Scholar

4. Amin, Samir, Accumulation on a World Scale, Vol. I (New York: MRP, 1974), p. 140.Google Scholar

5. Helfgott, Leonard M., “Tribalism as Socio-Economic Formation in Iranian History,” Iranian Studies, Vol. X, Nos. 1-2 (Winter-Spring 1977), pp. 36–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6. Marx, K., Grundrisse, trans, by Nicolaus, Martin (New York: Vintage Books, 1976), p. 98.Google Scholar

7. Krader, Lawrence, The Asiatic Mode of Production (Assen, The Netherlands: Van Gorum, 1975), p. 190.Google Scholar

8. Korsch, Karl, Karl Marx (New York: Russell and Russell, 1963), p. 52.Google Scholar

9. Nomani, Farhad, “Notes on the Origins and Development of Extra Economic Obligations of Peasants in Iran, 300-1600,” Iranian Studies, Vol. IX, Nos. 2-3 (Spring-Summer 1976), p. 131.Google Scholar

10. Lambton, Ann, Landlord and Peasant in Persia (New York: Oxford University Press, 1969), p. 25.Google Scholar

11. Ibid., p. 53.

12. Bonne, Alfred, State and Economics in the Middle East (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1955), p. 121.Google Scholar

13. Ibid., p. 47.

14. See Lambton, Ann, “The Evolution of Iqta in Medieval Iran,” Iran: Journal of Persian Studies, Vol. V (1967), pp. 41–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15. Ibid., p. 43.

16. Lambton, Landlord and Peasant in Persia, op. cit., p. 77.

17. Ibid., p. 112.

18. Ibid., p. 115.

19. Dobb, Maurice, Studies in the Development of Capitalism (New York: International Publishers, 1978), p. 33.Google Scholar

20. Marx, K. and Engels, F., Pre-Capitalist Socio-Economic Formations (Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1979), p. 517.Google Scholar

21. Lambton, “Evolution of Iqta…,” op. cit., p. 43.

22. See Currie, Kate, “Problematic Modes and the Mughal Social Formation,” The Insurgent Sociologist, Vol. IX, No. 4 (Spring 1980), p. 10.Google Scholar

23. Hindess, B. and Hirst, P., Pre-Capitalist Modes of Production (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977), p. 184.Google Scholar

24. Ibid., p. 2.

25. K. Marx, Capital, Vol. III (New York: International Publishers, 1967), p. 771.

26. Marx, K., Pre-Capitalist Economic Formations (New York: International Publishers, 1969), p. 78.Google Scholar

27. Ibid., p. 69.

28. Ibid., pp. 79-80.

29. Ibid., p. 83.

30. K. Marx, Grundrisse, op. cit., p. 87.

31. A. B. Hibbert, “The Origins of the Medieval Town Patriciate,” Past & Present (February 1953), p. 18.

32. K. Marx, Capital, Vol. III, op. cit., p. 332.

33. K. Marx, Pre-Capitalist Economic…, op. cit., pp. 122-25.

34. K. Marx, Capital, Vol. I, p. 235.

35. Hilton, Rodney et al., Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism (London: Verse, 1978), p. 59.Google Scholar

36. Ibid., p. 112.

37. Ibid., p. 166.

38. Tokei, Ference, Essays on the Asiatic Mode of Production (Budapest: Akamediai Kiado, 1979), p. 16.Google Scholar

39. Ibid., p. 18; and K. Marx, Capital, Vol. III, pp. 790-91.

40. William Rosebbery, “Anthropology, History, and Modes of Production,” Department of Anthropology, New School for Social Research, 1982, p. 1. (Mimeographed.)