University of Windsor Scholarship at UWindsor Electronic Theses and Dissertations Theses, Dissertations, and Major Papers 2018 CLASS AND POLITICS IN POST-REVOLUTION IRAN: DESCRIPTIVE AND SUBSTANTIVE JUSTICE Ali Dadgar University of Windsor Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/etd Recommended Citation Dadgar, Ali, "CLASS AND POLITICS IN POST-REVOLUTION IRAN: DESCRIPTIVE AND SUBSTANTIVE JUSTICE" (2018). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 7352. https://scholar.uwindsor.ca/etd/7352 This online database contains the full-text of PhD dissertations and Masters’ theses of University of Windsor students from 1954 forward. These documents are made available for personal study and research purposes only, in accordance with the Canadian Copyright Act and the Creative Commons license—CC BY-NC-ND (Attribution, Non-Commercial, No Derivative Works). Under this license, works must always be attributed to the copyright holder (original author), cannot be used for any commercial purposes, and may not be altered. Any other use would require the permission of the copyright holder. Students may inquire about withdrawing their dissertation and/or thesis from this database. For additional inquiries, please contact the repository administrator via email ([email protected]) or by telephone at 519-253-3000ext. 3208. CLASS AND POLITICS IN POST-REVOLUTION IRAN: DESCRIPTIVE AND SUBSTANTIVE JUSTICE by Ali Dadgar A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies through the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Windsor Windsor, Ontario, Canada © 2018 Ali Dadgar Class and Politics in Post-Revolution Iran: Descriptive and Substantive Justice by Ali Dadgar APPROVED BY: _____________________________ M. Mahdavi, External Examiner University of Alberta _____________________________ T. Najem Department of Political Science _____________________________ B. Adam Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology _____________________________ R. Cheran Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology _____________________________ T. Azadarmaki University of Tehran _____________________________ R. Nakhaie, Advisor Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology [December 15, 2017] DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY I hereby certify that I am the sole author of this thesis and that no part of this thesis has been published or submitted for publication. I certify that, to the best of my knowledge, my thesis does not infringe upon anyone’s copyright nor violate any proprietary rights and that any ideas, techniques, quotations, or any other material from the work of other people included in my thesis, published or otherwise, are fully acknowledged in accordance with the standard referencing practices. Furthermore, to the extent that I have included copyrighted material that surpasses the bounds of fair dealing within the meaning of the Canada Copyright Act, I certify that I have obtained a written permission from the copyright owner(s) to include such material(s) in my thesis and have included copies of such copyright clearances to my appendix. I declare that this is a true copy of my thesis, including any final revisions, as approved by my thesis committee and the Graduate Studies office, and that this thesis has not been submitted for a higher degree to any other University or Institution. III ABSTRACT Iranian society has undergone significant transformations since the 1962 Land Reform and the modernization plans implemented by its different governments. These transformations include industrialization, bureaucratization, population explosion, rural-urban migration, increase in the size of the working class, massive entry of women into the labor force, and the subsequent 1979 Islamic Revolution. Since the Revolution, the class structure and the composition of Iran’s political elites have changed significantly. Previous research has been particularly less attentive to the relationship between the structure of classes in Iran and the demographic composition of elected members of parliament (MPs). This study aims to enhance previous research by studying the nature and extent of representativeness of members of the Iranian parliament since the Revolution. Special attention will be paid to the descriptive representation of MPs by calculating the index of dissimilarity. Utilizing data on the occupational distribution of the general population and parliamentarians, this study will identify social class representativeness of MPs in each of the ten parliamentarian elections from 1980 to 2016. It employs a mixed methodology placing emphasis on the demographic (gender, age, ethnicity, etc.) and socioeconomic (education and occupation) dimensions of political representation. Using various theoretical models, it will test the extent to which each of the liberal-pluralist, instrumentalist and structuralist Marxists, or cultural reproduction theoretical approaches fit the evidence. The current study finds that educational credential, as a measure of credentialized cultural capital, is an important predictor of being elected as a member of parliament in Iran, supporting the cultural reproduction theory. Evidence also supports Marxist theory in that working class is underrepresented in the Majles, and that education itself is class-based. Finally, this study observes strong representation of professional and managerial class among the parliamentarians which lends support to liberal-pluralist theory. IV DEDICATION I dedicate this dissertation to my wife; without her, this success would not have been possible. I dedicate this dissertation to my beloved father and mother. I also dedicate this work to the memories of my grandfathers and my grandmother; God bless them. V ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My sincere gratitude to Dr. Reza Nakhaie, my supervisor, for guiding and supporting me over the years. He has helped me greatly in a variety of situations and provided the tools and guidance that I needed to pick the right path and successfully complete this dissertation. I would also like to thank the internal readers of my dissertation, Dr. Barry Adam, Dr. Rudhramoorthy Cheran, and Dr. Tom Najem for their valuable feedbacks and comments. I wish to extend my appreciation to my external examiner, Dr. Mojtaba Mahdavi, and the Special Member of the dissertation, Dr. Taghi Azadarmaki for their special help in improving my work. I am very grateful to all of my dissertation committee members. My thanks also go out to the University of Windsor’s Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology for offering me the financial support that allowed me to fulfill my Doctoral studies. My thanks to all the professors of the Department, especially Dr. Nicholas Harney, the head of the department, Dr. Glynis George, chair of the graduate program, and Dr. Paul Datta for their constant support. This research would not have been possible without the generous help and collaboration of many friends and well-wishers. I would like to thank the helpful staffs of the Statistical Centre of Iran, especially Mr. Farhad Nouparast, as well as the staff of the Library, Museum and Document Center of the Islamic Consultative Assembly of Iran for helping me to access the datasets that I required to conduct this research. I would also like to express my gratitude to my fellow graduate students, Erwin Selimos, Amy Peirone, Travis Reitsma, and Jane Mcarthur for their enthusiasm and encouragement. VI TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY ................................................................................................................... III ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................................................... IV DEDICATION .................................................................................................................................................. V ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................................................ VI LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................................................. IX LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................................................... XI LIST OF APPENDICES ................................................................................................................................... XII INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................................. 1 Statement and Significance of the Problem ............................................................................................. 2 Structure of Dissertation ........................................................................................................................... 9 CHAPTER ONE: THEORY OF CLASS AND POLITICS ....................................................................................... 11 The Study of Class-state Relations .......................................................................................................... 12 CHAPTER TWO: THE STUDY OF PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ........................ 25 CHAPTER THREE: THE STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION OF IRAN ............................................................