thumb|250px| [[Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah of Iran hands out documents of ownership of land to new owners during the White Revolution's land reform, 1963]]
The White Revolution () or the Shah and People Revolution () was a series of reforms to modernize the Imperial State of Iran launched on 26 January 1963 by the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and ended with his overthrow in 1979. Among the elements of the revolution were land reform where landlords were compensated for their land by shares of privatized state-owned factories, expanded road, rail, and air network, dam and irrigation projects, work to eradicate diseases such as malaria, promotion of industrial growth and profit-sharing schemes for workers, enfranchisement of women, nationalization of forests and pastures, literacy and health corps for isolated rural areas.
The bulk of the program was aimed at Iran's peasantry while redistributing the aristocrat landlord class wealth down to working class Iranians. Through land reform, the Shah hoped to ally himself with the peasantry in the countryside, and to sever their ties with the aristocracy in the city.
In subsequent decades, per capita income for Iranians greatly increased, and petroleum export revenue fueled an enormous increase in state funding for industrial development projects, economic growth, rapid urbanization, spread of literacy, and dissolution of Iran's feudalist customs.
However, the revolution also aroused the antagonism of the Ulama (Islamic clergy) led by Ruhollah Khomeini, the future leader of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, who opposed the erosion of their traditional bases of power, and met with difficulties from a high failure rate for new farms and an exodus of agricultural workers to Iran's major cities.
Reforms
thumb|Women voting for the first time in 1963
The Shah had intended it to be a non-violent regeneration of Iranian society through economic and social reforms, with the ultimate long-term aim of transforming Iran into a global economic and industrial power. The Shah introduced economic concepts such as profit-sharing for workers and initiated massive government-financed heavy industry projects, as well as the nationalization of forests and pastureland. Most important, however, were the land reform programs which saw the traditional landed elites of Iran lose much of their influence and power. Nearly 90% of Iranian sharecroppers became landowners as a result.
Socially, the platform granted women more rights and poured money into education, especially in the rural areas. A Literacy Corps was established, which allowed young men to fulfill their compulsory military service by working as village literacy teachers.
thumb|Uniformed women of the Literacy Corps outside the Iranian Senate building.
The White Revolution consisted of 19 elements that were introduced over a period of 16 years, with the first six introduced on January 9, 1963, and put to a national referendum on January 26, 1963:
- Land Reforms Program and Abolishing "Feudalism": The government bought the land during the Iranian Land Reform from the feudal landlords at what was considered to be a fair price and sold it to the peasants at 30% below the market value, with the loan being payable over 25 years at very low interest rates. This made it possible for 1.5 million peasant families who had once been little more than serfs to own the lands that they had been cultivating all their lives. Given that the average size of a peasant family was five, the land reforms program brought freedom to approximately nine million people, or 40% of Iran's population.
- Nationalization of Forests and Pasturelands: Many measures were introduced, not only to protect the national resources and stop the destruction of forests and pasturelands, but also to further develop and cultivate them. More than 9 million trees were planted in 26 regions, creating 70,000 acres (280 km<sup>2</sup>) of "green belts" around cities and on the borders of the major highways. While the Caspian forests were nationalized, the forest inhabitants—primarily cattle herders—were expelled by the government and relocated to nearby villages.
- Privatization of the Government Owned Enterprises, would be offered for sale to the workers of the establishment at first and then to the general public.
- Price Stabilization and campaign against unreasonable profiteering (1975). Owners of factories and large chain stores were heavily fined, with some being imprisoned and other's licenses being revoked. Sanctions were imposed on multi-national foreign companies and tons of merchandise stored for speculative purposes were confiscated and sold to consumers at fixed prices.
- Free and Compulsory Education and a daily free meal for all children from kindergarten to 14 years of age. Primary schools were built in hundreds of villages that previously did not have one. Educational institutions also grew after the launching of the White Revolution. Enrollment in kindergarten increased from 13,300 to 221,990, elementary schools from 1,640,000 to 4,080,000, secondary schools from 370,000 to 741,000 and colleges from 24,885 to 145,210. The new schools instituted educational policies designed to undercut clerical control over education and religious education. The Literacy Corps also helped raise the literacy rate from 26 to 42 percent. The White Revolution also included certain reforms of women's rights. Women gained the right to vote, to run for elected office and to serve as lawyers and later judges. The marriageable age for women was also raised to fifteen.
Iran experienced explosive economic expansion with an annual economic growth rate averaging at 9.8%. There was a substantial rise in the Iranian middle class with over one million families becoming small business owners and an estimated 700,000 salaried professionals. The large economic growth was later used to fund arms built up by the Shah who spent billions on purchasing foreign weapons establishing Iran as a geopolitical power. The history of the Persian empire was taught as means to make people feel part of Iran. In the textbook for the third year of high school, for instance, it states that the interference of the Zoroastrian clergy in politics caused the defeat of the Sasanian empire by the Muslim armies. Therefore, religious interference in political affairs was taught to be extremely dangerous.
Economically, the White Revolution was very successful. The White Revolution successfully redistributed land to approximately 2.5 million families, established literacy and health corps targeting Iran's rural areas, and resulted in a slew of social and legal reform. In the decades following the revolution, per capita income for Iranians skyrocketed. The rapid rise in Iran's revenues paved the way for increased state spending used to fund major industrial development projects in Iran.
Problems and criticism
thumb|Prime Minister [[Amir Abbas Hoveida and his cabinet in 11th anniversary of the reforms, 1974]]
Land reform
Land reform, which was the focus of the White Revolution, did what it was intended to do – weaken the nobles and landlords. In their place, though, emerged a new group of commercial farmers, and many previously large landowning families, such as the Pahlavi family, managed to renovate themselves into these commercial farmers. A rapid expansion of small landowners did occur, but only about half of the rural population received any land, and many of the people who did receive land did not receive enough to sustain themselves. The result of the White Revolution was that the rural population could be separated into three groups: prosperous farmers, small landowners, and village laborers. The first group was the only group to really benefit from the land reforms, and this group consisted of former village headmen, bailiffs, and some former landlords. The second group consisted of sharecroppers who received no more than 10 hectares of land. Most of these people ended up trading their land in for shares in state cooperatives. The last group received no land at all, and survived as farm hands, laborers, or shepherds. Many of them migrated to urban centers for work.
In late 1978, there had been widespread dissatisfaction among Iranian farmers with regards to land reforms which were supposed to empower them. The Shah's reforms focused on grandiose industrial projects over agriculture, which often lacked trained manpower. Farmers also complained of corruption. Earlier in 1978 for example, a former minister of agriculture and a former undersecretary of agriculture were arrested on suspicion of embezzlement. Emigrations to cities accelerated, and agricultural demand outpaced production. Even though reforms turned many peasants into landowners, it imposed upon them taxes and other costssuch as the purchase of seeds, water, and equipmentthat they were not burdened with when they worked for landowners, while also eliminating services such as health and education that were provided for them by landlords under the traditional system. An influx of agricultural imports from US also reduced the farmers' market share.
thumb|Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi speaking about the principles of the White Revolution
Critics
In the beginning, the White Revolution received most of its criticism from two main groups: the clergy, and the landlords. The landlords were angry about the land reforms because their land was bought by the government and then sold in smaller plots to the citizenry at a lower price.
The powerful Shī'ah clergy were also angered at the reforms that removed much of their traditional powers in the realms of education and family law, as well as lessening their previously strong influence in the rural areas. The White Revolution's emphasis on secular education eroded the Ulama's former monopoly in that field, after the development of secular courts had reduced clerical power over law and jurisprudence.
Ruhollah Khomeini was possibly the most open and vocal opponent to the White Revolution and to the Shah himself. Although the clergy in Iran were not happy about many aspects of the White Revolution, such as granting suffrage to women, the secular local election bill, and land reforms, the clergy as a whole were not actively protesting. Khomeini, on the other hand, actively spoke out against the new reforms and the Shah, having apparently undergone a serious change of thought from the traditional role and practices of Shi’ite clergy. In a speech at Feyziyeh School in June 1963, Khomeini spoke out against the Shah's brutality towards student protests, and for the first time, it was a speech attacking the Shah as a person. This speech did lead to Khomeini's exile, but being outside of Iran did not stop Khomeini's protests, nor did it weaken his influence inside Iran.
Khomeini also attacked provisions of the reforms that would allow members of Iran's non-Muslim minority to be elected or appointed to local offices:
A few months later, on Ashura, Khomeini gave an angry speech attacking the Shah as a "wretched miserable man." Two days later, on June 5 (15 of Khordad), Khomeini was arrested. This sparked three days of rioting and left several hundred dead (however, this number was inflated in the speeches and writings of Khomeini, in which he claims the army "slaughtered no less than 15,000").
Aftermath
Immediate consequences
thumb|left|Coin on the anniversary of revolution
The most important and relevant consequence of the White Revolution and the reforms it brought was the increased popularity of Ruhollah Khomeini. With the growing perception of government corruption, and the implementation of reforms through the White Revolution, Khomeini grew to be an outspoken political enemy of the Shah. The White Revolution was the catalyst for Khomeini's change in thought. Once Khomeini, as a respected member of the clergy, started to openly oppose the Shah and call for his overthrow, a favourable view of him emerged amongst the opposition to the reforms, seeing him as a figure they could rally for.
Long-term consequences
thumb|[[National Archives and Records Administration|NARA Newsreel about unrest in Iran following the White Revolution, 1963.]]
Though the White Revolution contributed towards the economic and technological advancement of Iran, the failures of some of the land reform programs and the partial lack of democratic reforms, as well as severe antagonism towards the White Revolution from the clergy and landed elites, would ultimately contribute to the Shah's eventual downfall and the Iranian Revolution in 1979, radically transforming Iran into the first ever Islamic theocracy in the world.
See also
- Hasan Arsanjani
- 1963 Iranian referendum
- Great Civilization