Lorestan and the Political Economy of Security in the Late Qajar era

This article demonstrates that state formation in the political geography of Lorestan during the late Qajar period was not the result of a simple, comprehensive, or pre-designed government plan. Rather, it emerged from decades of efforts to penetrate tribal territories, co-opt tribal elements, conduct surveying, and create exploratory maps. This process, involving global, national, and local stakeholders, unfolded in a complex and layered manner, consistently met with tribal resistance against the Imposition of authority and the appropriation of their lands.
Due to the plundering of tribes by the central government and local governors, exorbitant taxation, and systematic repression, the social condition of Lorestan throughout the Qajar era is reported as disastrous and tense.

Historical records and travelogues attest that Lorestan has long held strategic significance, particularly for the British Empire. By controlling this territory and linking the communication axes of Lorestan to Khuzestan and southern ports, Britain sought to expand its commercial influence within Iran’s geography. Simultaneously, this connectivity aimed to consolidate and optimize international trade routes by linking the Mesopotamia-India axis. Geopolitically, within the context of the ’Great Game,’ such maneuvers were designed to diminish Russia’s share of the Iranian economy.
While exploratory projects and surveys of the Southern and Central Zagros (encompassing Khuzestan, Bakhtiari, and Lorestan) commenced in the early Qajar period, they reached their zenith during the mid-Nasiri era, increasingly shifting toward operationalization under the framework of ’economic exploitation.’ Prior to the Pahlavi era and the formation of a modern standing army, these policies consistently encountered widespread tribal resistance—primarily aimed at safeguarding communal and social territories. Consequently, imperial objectives were, at best, realized only at a limited, sporadic, and decentralized level, contingent upon tribal dynamics, shifting alliances, and the instigation of internal discord through a policy of ’carrots and sticks.'
The present study examines the conflict between the involved forces through a tri-level lens: the global, the national, and the local.’Given that these levels emerged within the context of nineteenth-century commercial expansion and the reconfiguration of the national market—and its subsequent tensions with tribal society—this research adopts the struggle over territorial control and ‘oad-construction projects as its primary analytical axis to narrate this extensive historical trajectory."
Long before the economic exploitation and operational penetration of the British in the Zagros region, numerous travelogues—authored by envoys dispatched directly by Western governments—emphasized the vast economic and commercial potential of this territory. However, they maintained that the realization of such potential was strictly contingent upon the interconnection of various districts and the expansion of road-construction projects. Nevertheless, the impediments were not merely confined to the limitations of road-building technology; rather, the primary concern for the stakeholders of this nascent commerce was the resistance of nomadic tribes and indigenous populations against the encroachment of external forces. For these tribes, the penetration of foreign powers and the central government through the expansion of new trade routes was synonymous with the loss of their cultural, civilizational, and biological territories, as well as the migratory axes that formed the cornerstone of the tribal pastoral economy. Consequently, since the onset of the modern era and the dominance of market relations, tribal resistance—driven by the realization that they would be excluded from the benefits of this new order—constituted a struggle for their very existence.
A contextual reading of tribal history reveals that the phenomena of 'insecurity,' theft, or brigandage from the mid-Qajar period onward were fundamentally distinct from pre-modern tribal raiding traditions inherent in pastoral and nomadic economies. While those earlier raids were localized, regulated, and situated within the spatial limits of seasonal migration (Sardsir-Garmsir), the escalation of brigandage into a powerful, mass phenomenon from the late Qajar period (particularly its final three decades) until the early Pahlavi era was perceived by the tribes as a reflection of the Gendarmerie’s perceived impotence. It further mirrored the grievances of the tribal and rural poor against the corruption and tyranny of the Qajar-appointed governors. Moreover, within the framework of pre-modern Iran, particularly among tribal societies, brigandage must be analyzed in relation to the rudimentary forces of local law and order. For instance, the Amniyeh (security forces) or Rahdari (road guards) were often recruited by local rulers or tribal Khans from among the nomads themselves—individuals who might simultaneously be the very outlaws they were tasked to apprehend, or whose governors might be complicit in their banditry.
In her insightful and scholarly travelogue of southern Lorestan among the Papi tribe (written in 1935 within the tradition of French anthropology), Maria Philberth establishes a subtle yet significant distinction in tribal history between the violent transfer of wealth as an act of 'chivalry' versus the ignoble act of theft. She observes: 'Just as in ancient times brigandage—namely, the transfer of wealth through violence—was regarded as an honorable endeavor, theft was considered a base act associated with humiliation and disgrace. I encountered a commoner who had lost the upper portion of his left ear; years prior, he had stolen a cow, and the Khan had severed his ear as a punishment to ensure he would not repeat such an act.' In this light, 'insecurity' cannot be reduced to an alleged 'evil nature' or 'savage disposition' of the tribes, nor can it be narrated in stark contradiction to their 'sincerity,' 'hospitality,' and 'kind-heartedness.' The issue is far more complex than the aforementioned colonial-orientalist (and subsequently statist) formulations.