White+Revolution

=White Revolution (1961-1963)= The White Revolution consisted of a series of reforms that the shah of Iran (Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi) launched in an effort to prevent the strengthening of opposition groups, as well as remain in favor with the United States. The shah wanted to gain the support of the peasant-class in Iran due to the rising fear of the increasingly more outspoken (and threatening) middle class.

The United States “supported economic and social reforms in countries such as Iran as a means of undercutting the appeal” of anti-government (anti-shah) movements that posed the threat of being allied with the Soviets (Hooglund).

Initially, the White Revolution was comprised of six programs: - Redistribution of private land to peasants - Effort to fight illiteracy in Iran, forced soldiers who held high school degrees to go to villages as teachers
 * Land Reform
 * Nationalization of Forests
 * Shares of some government-owned industries were sold to the public
 * Profit sharing (workers to share in profits of factories)
 * Women’s Suffrage
 * Literacy Corps was created

Results of the White Revolution:


 * “About half a million peasants” received enough land to actually profit from farming
 * Schools were established in “several hundred villages”
 * Rural population was positively impacted by different government development programs that occurred during the White Revolution
 * “Widespread Disillusionment”
 * White Revolution is characterized by a pattern of a small amount of a large group (minority/majority) actually benefiting from the reforms/attempts at modernization
 * Example: Land reform, while it did benefit a number of peasant families, also resulted in approximately “one-half of all rural families [receiving] no land at all,” and “about 73 percent” of those receiving land to only be enough for subsistence farming (Hoogland).

Hooglund, Eric. "White Revolution (1961–1963)." //Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East and North Africa//. Ed. Philip Mattar. 2nd ed. Vol. 4. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2004. 2351-2352. //Gale Virtual Reference Library//. Web. 18 Jan. 2010. .