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The City of Chaos: The Housing Exclusion Network during the Pahlavi Era and the 1979 Revolution
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Rohollah Ghasemi *  |
| allameh Tabatabaei , r_ghasami@yahoo.com |
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Abstract: (68 Views) |
Objective: The study examines the formation, stabilization, and consolidation of housing exclusion in Tehran during the Pahlavi era, with particular attention to the decades leading up to the 1970s.
Method: Drawing on Actor-Network Theory (ANT) as both a conceptual framework and a methodological approach, the research conceptualizes housing exclusion not as a policy failure or demographic outcome, but as a socio-technical “black box” produced through the alignment and translation of heterogeneous actors.
Results: The analysis identifies two dominant actor-networks shaping Tehran’s urban transformation during the Pahlavi period: the “City of Stillness” (1920–1960) and the “City of Chaos”(1960–1978) . The “City of Stillness” network was structured around two central actors: migration and renovation. These actors operated in relative isolation from comprehensive regulatory or planning frameworks, facilitating Tehran’s transition from a traditional city to a modern urban form. Migration functioned by gradually increasing urban population without triggering immediate institutional responses in housing provision. Together, these two actors produced a latent housing imbalance. The “City of Chaos” network marked the intensification and visibility of housing exclusion. In this network, multiple actors converged and interacted, including land reforms, accelerated rural migration, state-led development programs, declining mortality rates, comprehensive master planning, and oil-dependent economic growth commonly described as Dutch disease.
Conclusions: The findings demonstrate that by the late Pahlavi period, housing exclusion had become a stabilized black box. Despite the enactment of more than ten housing-related laws and repeated state interventions, the government was unable to disrupt the underlying network producing exclusion. This structural rigidity contributed to rising housing and land prices, increasing unemployment, and widening urban inequality. The study argues that housing exclusion played a significant role in shaping the socio-economic tensions that accumulated prior to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, highlighting housing as a central but often overlooked dimension of revolutionary discontent. |
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| Keywords: Housing exclusion, 1979 Revolution, Actor–network, City of Chaos, Urban transformation |
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Type of Study: Research |
Subject:
General
Received: 2025/12/21 | Accepted: 2026/03/15
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