AHC: Modernize Persia

You could try having the Zand pursue a policy of Ethnic Economic Caste. Have the Zand related Ethnic group be rulers and cavalry while actively encouraging Iranians to be industrious, and another group to be Bureaucrats and so forth.
 

KaiserCorax

Banned
This is a far-fetched idea, but I am planning this to make a ATL world that is led by these 6 countries:
Kongo, Korea, Persia, Brazil, Germany, USA. This plan would be more interesting with a Persian Arabia...:cool::D:p

Having an African nation as a superpower is ASB, unless you mean with a European government/African puppet-government.
 
Having an African nation as a superpower is ASB, unless you mean with a European government/African puppet-government.

Depends on how far back your POD is: if you're willing to take PODs back to early modern times, it's still unlikely, but not impossible. Say, a more Christianized and Portuguese-influenced Kongo surviving into modern times and perhaps expanding throughout central Africa is not beyond belief, although gobbling enough of Africa to become an out-and-out superpower is unlikely. Similarly, an Ethiopia whose 16th century opening by the Portuguese is not interrupted by civil strife and the Ottomans might well become a major power. Or some mega-Sahel state that picks up on tropical medicine (early discovery of Quinine?) and expands into the tropical zone. Or some early big-ass *Draka that has gone majority-rule by current times.

Just some random thoughts,
Bruce
 
As Egypt proves, government commitment to modernization is less valuable than the natural factors contributing to it. Thus, committed aristocracies in Europe did better than nationalist progressive governments in the Middle East. Agrarianism in Persia was a structural problem stemming from thousands of years of feudal tradition, an agricultural and non-urbanized workforce, and the complete absence of any trace of legitimate capital. Industrialization in Persia would have to start with an earlier set of foundations. Maybe a heavy string of defeats at Ottoman hands earlier would mass Safavid capital away from conflict and force institutional reforms, Peter the Great style and some semblance of an agricultural reform. Over time, the seizing of communal lands would lay the foundation for an industrial persia.
 
As Egypt proves, government commitment to modernization is less valuable than the natural factors contributing to it. Thus, committed aristocracies in Europe did better than nationalist progressive governments in the Middle East. Agrarianism in Persia was a structural problem stemming from thousands of years of feudal tradition, an agricultural and non-urbanized workforce . . .

It might be well worth pointing out that the Mongols (including Timur) did a great number on the urban aspect of Persia.

The state of affairs in the OTL 19th century was a result of something far less pre-determined than "structural problems" with roots "thousands of years" old.
 
It might be well worth pointing out that the Mongols (including Timur) did a great number on the urban aspect of Persia.

The state of affairs in the OTL 19th century was a result of something far less pre-determined than "structural problems" with roots "thousands of years" old.

Yeah, Persia after the Mongol period always had an unhealthy power balance, so to speak, between the settled and the nomadic populations, with much of the land lost to irrigation and gone over to pastoralism. The loss of the agricultural lands of Mesopotamia to the Ottomans was a big blow - the glory of Safavid Persia was always a fragile glory, based on a narrow human and material resource base. I don't know how much damage the Russians did by taking their territories in the Caucuses, but I suspect it was a substantial blow to the economy. And although the Shi'a religion provided a powerful unifying force, it also cut them off to a substantial extent from such traditionally "Persian sphere" areas as most of Central Asia and the Afghanistan/Pakistan area.

Bruce
 
Yeah, Persia after the Mongol period always had an unhealthy power balance, so to speak, between the settled and the nomadic populations, with much of the land lost to irrigation and gone over to pastoralism. The loss of the agricultural lands of Mesopotamia to the Ottomans was a big blow - the glory of Safavid Persia was always a fragile glory, based on a narrow human and material resource base. I don't know how much damage the Russians did by taking their territories in the Caucuses, but I suspect it was a substantial blow to the economy. And although the Shi'a religion provided a powerful unifying force, it also cut them off to a substantial extent from such traditionally "Persian sphere" areas as most of Central Asia and the Afghanistan/Pakistan area.

Bruce

I don't know either - at best it was a sign and consequence of being increasingly cut off from anything outside (what is now) Iran, which meant they were never in the same position as earlier Iranian empires.
 
I don't know either - at best it was a sign and consequence of being increasingly cut off from anything outside (what is now) Iran, which meant they were never in the same position as earlier Iranian empires.
I think we still may have some hopes. Listen to this quote:
add Baluchistan, Iraq, some of Azerbaijan and Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan. Some of that is easier than it sounds - have Iran play a more active part in the fall of the Ottoman Empire, have Iran manage to procure or later absorb an indepedent Baluchistan, or win it from Pakistan/India/Raj.
An inevitable side effect is that Shia may lose its dominance in the state and thus make it unstable.
make Iran stable, industrialized and and modernized enough then it can fare pretty well during the fall of the Ottomans. It could take a lot of territory, and after several decades of rule the nation would be strong enough to control its territories.
 
make Iran stable, industrialized and and modernized enough then it can fare pretty well during the fall of the Ottomans. It could take a lot of territory, and after several decades of rule the nation would be strong enough to control its territories.

The problem is getting it to that point.
 
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