Why Islamic Revolution Failed to Spread

For many in the Muslim world, the success of the 1979 Iranian Revolution was viewed as a harbinger of a bright new future for Islamic politics; it was a sign that Islam as the foundation for a government could triumph over a strongly embedded ruler. The fact that the Shah of Iran had numerous ties to the superpowers of the West, including the United States, and was still toppled by the revolution only strengthened the belief that Islam could serve as the basis of a political system. To many, it was just a matter of time before other governments in the Middle East succumbed to the rising tide of Islamic politics; two of the most prominent states in the region, Saudi Arabia and Iraq, were seen as prime candidates for undergoing an Islamic revolution. 

As the 1980s progressed, however, and then the 1990s, neither state underwent anything remotely similar to Iran’s revolution; certainly, both Iraq and Saudi Arabia faced Islamic opposition from domestic and foreign sources, but never on as grand a scale as Iran had. The reason Iraq and Saudi Arabia didn’t experience the same type of Islamic upheaval is evident in viewing the fundamental structures of the states under their respective leaders. Every single factor that combined to allow the success of an Islamic revolution in Iran was absent from both Iraq and Saudi Arabia: a strong, financially-secure religious institution independent of and alienated by the state, an alienated merchant or middle class, and a weak, vacillating leader who was no longer seen as a nationalist, and was instead seen as a puppet of the West. Interestingly, despite both states sharing a lack of these factors, Saudi Arabia and Iraq staved off Islamic revolutions in very different ways. By closely examining these factors in Iran, and comparing them to the state of affairs in Iraq and Saudi Arabia, it is easy to see why the Islamic revolution was unable to spread to these two countries.