Protest Events in the Tehran Bazaar during the Oil Nationalization Movement of Iran

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  • NUKII Mari
    Organization for Islamic Area Studies, Waseda University

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  • イラン石油国有化運動期のテヘラン・バーザールにおける抗議活動

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In the spring of 1951, the Iranian government nationalized the oil industry, which had been controlled by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC) since the beginning of the 20th century. As a result of the oil nationalization movement, the National Front (NF) and its leader Mohammad Mosaddeq gained in popularity among the public, especially the merchants and guilds in the bazaar (bazaaris). There are two views on the bazaaris’ motivation for joining the oil nationalization movement: the religious explanation and the economic explanation. However, the religious explanation ignores the diversity within the Tehran bazaar community. In addition, neither model was supported by systematic analysis based on the collective actions of the bazaaris at the time. The aim of this paper is to better understand the bazaaris’ motivation for joining the Iranian oil nationalization movement through the analysis of protest events in the Tehran bazaar. Both explanations for bazaaris joining nationalist movements were examined through the analysis of two sets of data: (1) the shutdown of the Tehran bazaar (24 events) and (2) the bazaaris’ protests (321 events), collected from Persian newspapers, Eṭṭelā‘āt and Bākhtar-e Emrūz, during the Mosaddeq government (April 1951–August 1953). The paper concludes that protest events organized by the Tehran bazaaris support the economic explanation more than the religious explanation. Although the Society of Merchants, Guilds, and Artisans (SMGA), the decision maker of the Tehran bazaar closure, and Kāshānī initially had a cooperative relationship, the SMGA cultivated closer relationships with the secular parties of the NF and continued to support Mosaddeq after the July 21 uprising. Detailed analysis of bazaaris’ claims revealed the rivalry between the SMGA, which accounted for the middle and lower levels of the bazaar and dealt with domestic industries, and the Union of Guilds and the Chamber of Commerce, which consisted of the wealthy merchants, traders, and industrialists. This rivalry was caused by the Pahlavi monarchy’s economic policies and the influence of the world capitalist system after World War II. The focal point of strife within the oil nationalization movement was not religious; rather, it revolved around people’s “national rights” to access national resources and politics, in which bazaaris played an essential role.

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