| This dissertation is an analysis of the unintended consequences of state transformative projects. I address this topic by analyzing the transformation of the Tehran Bazaar's internal governance and capacity to mobilize against the state under the Pahlavi monarchy and the Islamic Republic. Specifically, I ask why did the Bazaar prosper and persist under the Pahlavi monarchy that was hostile towards it; and conversely, why was it that after the establishment of the Islamic Republic, a regime that came to power with the support of the bazaaris class and with the mandate to preserve "Islamic" institutions, the structure of the Tehran Bazaar was radically changed and its capacity to mobilize was diminished?; By bringing together institutional analysis and a network approach to markets, I argue that the transformative programs of these two regimes (i.e. high modernism and Islamic populism) altered the institutional setting and physical locations of the networks that constitute the Bazaar in ways that led to these divergent outcomes. Based primarily on participant observation and interviews, the narrative demonstrates that the Bazaar's "form of governance" during the late Pahlavi era approximated a set of cooperative hierarchies (i.e. long-term, multifaceted, and crosscutting ties), while during the post-revolutionary era it was dominated by coercive hierarchies (i.e. short term and less socially embedded relations with fewer crosscutting ties). Second, I argue that the variation in governance, rather than grievances or the mosque-bazaar alliance, explain the decline in the Bazaar's capacity to mobilize against the state. Finally, I elaborate these arguments and adjudicate between competing hypotheses by complementing by bazaar level analysis with investigations of the hand-woven carpet, tea, and china and glassware sectors in the Tehran marketplace. The sub-bazaar comparisons evaluate the impact of variations in the socioeconomic structures to posit that the commodity type (standard versus non-standard goods) conditions the transformation from cooperative to coercive hierarchies. Thus, by integrating micro and macro-level analysis and by tracing how and why institutional configurations mold patterns of on-going relations that distribute resources and create group identity, I show that the dialogue between state and society structures generates governance and permit collective action in groups. |
