From Lawlessness to Imitative Legislation: An Examination and Etiology of the Evolution of Iran's Judicial System and the Rights of the Accused from the Qajar Era to the End of the Pahlavi Period.

Javan Jafari Bojnordi, Abdolreza; Mousavi, Seyyed Amir Mohammad; Sadati, Seyyed Mohammad Javad

doi:10.48300/jlr.2025.511469.2896

From Lawlessness to Imitative Legislation: An Examination and Etiology of the Evolution of Iran's Judicial System and the Rights of the Accused from the Qajar Era to the End of the Pahlavi Period.

Articles in Press

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

Abdolreza Javan Jafari Bojnordi ¹

Seyyed Amir Mohammad Mousavi ²

Seyyed Mohammad Javad Sadati ³

¹ Professor, Department of Criminal Law and Criminology, Faculty of Law and Political Science, Ferdowsi University, Mashhad, Iran.

² M.A Student in Criminal Law and Criminology, Faculty of Law and Political Science, Ferdowsi University, Mashhad, Iran.

³ Assistant Professor, Department of Criminal Law and Criminology, Faculty of Law and Political Science, Ferdowsi University, Mashhad, Iran.

10.48300/jlr.2025.511469.2896

Abstract

The establishment of the modern judiciary in Iran, marked by the enactment of codified laws (from the 1910s onwards), represents a pivotal moment in the history of the country's judicial system. In Iran's traditional judiciary, the concept of defendants' rights was absent within the judicial framework. Due to the lack of clear procedural rules, government officials investigating crimes and customary and religious courts operated at their own discretion, often infringing upon the lives, property, and freedoms of defendants under government authority. With the modernization of the judicial system during the Pahlavi era, the country's judicial process underwent transformation, and defendants' rights gained attention and protection from the government in both procedural and structural dimensions. The findings of this research indicate that the judicial system's alignment with the broader trend of imitative development, efforts to abolish capitulations by improving defendants' rights, and ultimately the Pahlavi government's policy of bureaucratic expansion were the primary factors driving the evolution of the judicial system and the focus on defendants' rights during this period.

Keywords

Defendant's Rights

Due process

General principles of criminal proceedings

bureaucracy

capitulation