Examining a sixteen-year period of oil labour history in Iran, beginning with the inauguration of Iran’s Third Development Plan in 1962, this analysis highlights a timeline where rapid economic growth persisted until 1976, subsequently leading to an economic crisis in 1977 and culminating in the revolution of 1978–79. Contrary to typical revolutionary patterns, this study argues that the Iranian Revolution was precipitated not merely by the short-lived economic recession but by more than a decade of rapid economic expansion beforehand. Despite varying interpretations of the economic and political roots of the 1978–79 revolution, there is a consensus among scholars about the decisive role played by the oil industry workers’ entrance into the revolutionary scene, which was pivotal for the revolution’s significant momentum. Revisiting the chronology of the revolution, this exploration delves into how workers in the Iranian oil industry prominently emerged during these upheavals and investigates how an industry, whose labour movements were historically shaped by a secular work and life culture, gradually came to embrace the Islamic leadership of Ayatollah Khomeini. Ultimately, this analysis seeks to examine the evolution of the positions of Iran’s oil working class in the year leading up to the collapse of the monarchy in Iran, striving to achieve a broader understanding of the determinative power of labour movements in political upheavals.

Velāyat-e faqih (guardianship of the jurist) is the political system governing Iran since 1979, and it was espoused by Ayatollah Khomeini and Ayatollah Montazeri in the early years of the revolution. This chapter discusses and analyzes the implications that this doctrine has with marjaʿiyat, the ideas surrounding the highest source of emulation and spirituality within Twelver Shiʿism. This chapter analyzes Qābel’s rejection of the political doctrine, and his relationships and perspsectives of the three most influentiual Ayatollahs during his life. Once again, Qābel was to cross the redline of what was acceptable in Iran by advocating a system that endorsed religious secularity.

On January 7, 1978, Daryush Homayun, the Shah’s Information Minister, published an article in a semiofficial newspaper in which he described Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as “an adventurer, without faith, and tied to the centers of colonialism … a man with a dubious past, tied to the more superficial and reactionary colonialists.” Writing under a pseudonym that in no way disguised the regime’s authorship, Homayun accused Khomeini of accepting money from the British in return for his public attacks on the Shah’s reform program. Rioting broke out the following day in the holy city of Qom after the regime’s security forces attempted to suppress protests by theological students. Some seventy people were killed in the next two days. Thus began the Iranian Revolution.1

Groups advocating change had long existed in the form of political parties, intellectuals, guerrilla organizations, and of course the clergy. Yet only in 1977 did a number of developments converge to usher in a mass movement against the state. These included a sudden rise in levels of urban unemployment sparked by slumps in the global oil market and the domestic construction sector, the government’s need to open up political space in response to the Carter administration’s demands for reforms, and missteps by the government itself in its efforts to introduce reforms and to appear receptive to middle-class needs. Allowing for some grievances to be aired without addressing their root causes only encouraged more open expressions of popular anger, resulting in largely unorganized protests and strikes, which over time gained in frequency, intensity, and size. Poor at crisis management, panicked reactions by the state only deepened what had rapidly become a serious crisis. As the social movement grew into a revolution, the state proved woefully unprepared to deal with the expansive popular anger. Devoid of a meaningful base of social support, by the final months of 1978 the monarchy’s slide toward collapse was all but irreversible.

Chapter 1 provides a theoretical introduction to the Green Uprisings of 2009, situating the Green Movement in a genealogy of Iranian history that is informed by the country’s past, and especially by the Iranian Revolution of 1978‒1979. Since the Iranian Revolution draws on specific moments of Islamic history, including the Battle of Karbala, this history is summarized for introductory purposes. Through this history and historiography, the reader can assess the lesser-known victories that have long-term implications for the future of Iran’s experiment with Islamic government—the “post-Islamist turn.” The chapter also makes the case for the research methodology of the book, and includes an outline of the five subsequent chapters. It ends with an important disclaimer in terms of who can speak for such a multi-faceted history so recent that it is still connected emotionally to countless people.