From Agriculture to Urban Real Estate: A 21st Century Perspective on the 1962 Aliabad Land Reform

Concerned about the communist movements in Latin American and wishing to avoid such trends elsewhere, the US Kennedy administration encouraged the government of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi to bring about the “White Revolution,” including land reform. Although in some areas, including several neighboring villages, in Aliabad near Shiraz land reform did not bring about a more independent, better off, and productive community of agriculturalists. Through anthropological participant observation, open-ended interviewing, and oral history conducted in 1978-1979 and during six additional research stays in Aliabad from 2003 to 2015 totaling another year, the author investigates the short-term and long-term aftermath of the 1962 land reform: 1. The immediate result was violence and conflict, as villagers learned that only half of the land was to be distributed among cultivators: the landlord, knowing about the upcoming land reform, sold half of village land to his main village supporter. 2. Because of the violence, on-going conflict, and lack of sufficient land received to make a livelihood, almost all of the younger men turned to work outside of the village. 3. Lack of attention to sources of irrigation and increasing household use of water exacerbated the decline of agriculture. 4. Along with the tremendous population growth of the 1960s and 1970s, the highly contentious 1962 land reform process helped to bring about a village divided between supporters of and enemies of the man who bought much of the village land before land reform. Lack of fairness in how the land was subsequently assigned and further encroachments on land supposedly to go to cultivators further angered villages. The purchase of half of village land before land reform caused further strife after the 1979 Iranian Revolution when villagers took over and planted the land under contention. Supporters of the buyer of land even had to move to Shiraz to avoid disputing villagers. 5. With the growth of the real estate market in this settlement close to Shiraz, by the latter part of the 20th and early part of the 21st century, people were turning much former agricultural land into cash and real estate speculation. Many Aliabad residents became wealthy and enjoyed a much higher standard of living. 6. As land because highly valuable, family members fought over land, and suffered from alienation from each other. 6. Now Aliabad produces very little, and has become a community of consumers. Men earn money from construction and real estate, buying and selling, and services. The settlement has been formally incorporated into Shiraz.