For many years in Iran, the interactions between the powers of religious authorities, military institutions, and the merchant class in the Bazaar have played a significant role in the formation of Iran’s structure of authority and politics.1 It was this interaction that played a key role in leading to the revolution in 1979 when the Bazaari (which was struggling with the official governing authorities) allied with the religious authorities to overthrow the Shah’s regime.

When the government was taken over by Khomeini and the religious authorities, the military, on the one hand, and the senior professionals and bureaucrats of the opposition, on the other hand, were distanced from the institutions of governance. The Iranian revolution then proceeded to devour its original founders and form a new structure of power based on revolutionary and religious legitimacy.

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Read the full commentary at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.