The ُStructure of the International System and its Impact on the State-building Process in Iran in the Second Pahlavi Era (1979- 1946)

Abstract

The main question of the present article is that what effect did the structure of the international system in the Cold War era have on the state-building process in Iran during the second Pahlavi period? The hypothesis of the research is that the characteristics of the structure of the international system in the Cold War era, caused the second Pahlavi in order to maintain the existence of the country and the survival of his regime, seeking security in the form of alliance and coalition on the agenda. Iran's foreign policy, in other words, because of the strong military aspect of security during the Cold War on the one hand and the regime's lack of legitimacy and dependence on the United States after the 1953 coup, on the other hand, "national security" is mostly narrow. "Government security" or "regime security" was defined, and as a result, the state-building project in the second Pahlavi era deviated from its original path and took a military-security direction. To explain this issue, a combination of structural neo-realist theory and state-building theory has been used. Findings show that Iran's sensitive geopolitical position and structural requirements for playing an active regional player in the US global defense strategy in the Cold War bipolar order, fear of Soviet communism and radical Arab nationalism, the most important and obvious factors influencing the structure of the international system are the security-militarization of the state-building policies of the second Pahlavi regime

Keywords

• international system structure
• bipolar system
• cold war
• second pahlavi
• state building