A Study on the Identity of the New Middle Class in Iran in Last three Decades Since the Islamic Revolution

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Professor of Political Science at University of Tehran

2 Assistant Professor of International Relations, Islamic Azad University-Khorram Abad Branch

Abstract

All of the authorities believe that the incomplete process of forming a new social middle class is one of the reasons that prevent the growth of democracy in developing countries. On the other hand, many experts in political science and some Iranian sociologists believe that Iranian middle class have not passed the historical and economic development as European middle class that came out of bourgeois class so we don’t have a social middle class in Iran. On the other hand, one can ask that how we can name the social class that have immigrated from rural areas and small cities into large cities and have worked in bureaucratic systems and have changed their consuming habits, lifestyles and social and political concerns since Reza Pahlavi. Can we name them a kind of social middle class that are different from new social classes because the modernization process in Iran was obligatory, so their practice as a critic and a dynamic social class in social and political development is not similar to that of new middle class? Another question is that whether the existence of this social group can form dignity and some demands for them? Can these demands affect social and political events? This article tries to study the identity of this new middle class in Iran in last three decades and their role in Iran`s political development.
 

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