دانشگاه شهید بهشتی مجله تاریخ ایران 2008-7357 19 1 2026 03 21 Conceptual-Theoretical Possibilities of Douglas North's Historical Institutional in State Studies Pre-Modern Iranian State (Monarchy) امکان‌های مفهومی- نظری رویکرد نهادباوری تاریخی داگلاس نورث در مطالعات سلطنت قدمایی ایران 181 217 106851 10.48308/irhj.2026.242695.1485 FA محمدعلی اکبری استاد گروه تاریخ، دانشکده ادبیات وعلوم انسانی، دانشگاه شهیدبهشتی، تهران، ایران. Journal Article 2025 12 30 Douglas North, the historical institutionalist economist, together with his collaborators, addressed the problem of controlling violence as a central challenge in the discussion of sustainable development and placed the institution of the state at the core of their theoretical framework. In developing this perspective, they explained the relationship between the state and the control of violence through several key concepts: the distinction between institutions and organizations in the structure of the state, the typology of limited access and open access social orders, the dual forms of the limited access state (the natural state) and the open access state (the democratic state), the dominant coalition of elites, and the system of rent distribution. Within the access order framework, natural states are understood as the historical forms of governance that prevailed throughout the long pre‑modern era and are analyzed through the theory of limited access orders. The state as an institution and organization of governance in the longue durée of pre‑modern Iran possesses distinctive characteristics that universal and highly generalizing theories often fail to explain comprehensively. Nevertheless, the conceptual and theoretical framework developed by North and his collaborators offers important analytical possibilities for theorizing about the political order and the nature of the Iranian pre‑modern state. The main research question of this study therefore asks to what extent the conceptual framework of limited access orders and the theory of the natural state can provide analytical tools for understanding the structure of governance and monarchy in pre‑modern Iran. The study employs a historical–thematic method in which historical phenomena are interpreted through theoretical concepts, while those concepts are simultaneously conditioned and reconfigured by the concrete historical characteristics of the subject under investigation.The findings indicate that the concepts of natural state theory and limited access social orders provide a useful framework for explaining the structure, internal mechanisms, and long-term durability of the Iranian pre‑modern monarchy. Introduction Douglas North is regarded as a historical institutionalist economist who, by focusing on the problem of violence control as a fundamental challenge in debates on sustainable development, brought the institution of the state to the center of his inquiries. This orientation led him and his collaborators to systematic efforts to study the state from a historical-institutionalist perspective. North’s core question can in many respects be seen as a continuation of Hobbes’s concern with the central problem of order and the state, namely violence and the ways it is controlled in society. On this basis, North proposed a conceptual framework for interpreting recorded human history, distinguishing three broad types of social orders: the primitive and first social order, the limited access order, and the open access order. By “access order,” North does not mean a particular set of political, economic, or religious institutions, but rather a fundamental mode of political organization. Institutions, as he defines them, encompass shared ideas, dispositions, emotions, and collective symbols. Addressing the problem of violence control as a central challenge of sustainable development, he turned to the question of the state. North and his colleagues, by introducing concepts such as limited and open access social orders, the natural state, patterns of rent distribution, historical institutionalism, and the theory of transition from limited to open access orders via the shift from natural to democratic states, and by emphasizing the role of social organization, systematized their theoretical endeavor. Among these, the concepts of limited access order and the natural state are particularly important, as they enabled North and his associates to formulate a theoretical account of the nature, inner mechanisms, and functional roles of pre‑modern states. They treat the limited access order as the most durable form of violence control and order creation through the establishment of the natural state, devoting a substantial part of their work to explaining the nature and function of the natural state in controlling violence and maintaining social order. In this theory, the concept of the natural state is applied to elucidate the nature and functioning of pre‑modern states and thus provides historians with a conceptual tool for interpreting the state in Iran. Building on these contributions, the present study formulates its central questions as follows: first, what theoretical possibilities does this historically oriented institutionalist framework offer for understanding states in pre‑modern polities; and second, how can its conceptual resources contribute to the analysis of the nature, internal mechanisms, and functions of the pre‑modern Iranian state? Materials And Methods The present study adopts what may be described as a “thematic–historical” research method. In this approach, the historical phenomenon is explained and interpreted through recourse to concepts and theoretical constructs; however, unlike ahistorical or trans-historical conceptual schemes, the concepts and theories are themselves conditioned by, and reorganized in light of, the concrete, context-bound features of the historical subject under investigation. Thus, instead of mechanically applying a universal theory to an empirical case, the study seeks to enter into a critical dialogue with the theoretical framework and to reshape its categories in response to the specificities of the Iranian historical experience. Accordingly, the research does not intend to “apply” Douglas North’s theory of limited access orders and the natural state in a complete and unmodified form to the case of pre-modern Iran. Rather, it aims at a creative utilization of the conceptual and theoretical possibilities that historical institutionalism offers for state studies in the context of Iran’s long pre-modern monarchy. In this sense, the study explicitly distances itself from those works which, relying on the generalized applicability of universal theories, have pursued a maximalist “fit” between an abstract model and a particular historical phenomenon, often at the expense of the phenomenon’s historical specificity. On the empirical side, the research proceeds through a close reading of primary and secondary historical sources on the Iranian pre-modern monarchy, focusing on patterns of violence control, coalitions among elites, modes of rent distribution, and forms of hierarchical patronage. These empirical findings are then placed in a structured dialogue with the categories of limited access social orders, the natural state, dominant coalitions, and path dependence as developed by North and his colleagues. The method is thus both concept-driven and empirically grounded: theory guides the questions posed to the historical material, while the historical material, in turn, constrains, refracts, and partially reshapes the theoretical categories. Result and Discussion The findings of this study indicate that Douglas North’s historical‑institutionalist framework, particularly the concepts of limited access order and the natural state, offers a powerful lens for interpreting the structure and functioning of pre‑modern Iranian monarchy. In North’s view, institutions-understood as patterned norms, rules, and shared beliefs-provide the basic architecture through which societies create social order and control violence. This institution‑centered perspective, rooted in the Durkheim-Parson’s tradition, conceives of social order as an outcome of relatively stable institutional arrangements that both enable and constrain collective action. Applied to historical analysis, this framework highlights the path‑dependent character of institutional evolution: previous institutional choices restrict subsequent options and link present decisions to long trajectories of change. Thus, to understand the long‑term persistence of the Iranian monarchical order, one must trace the gradual formation and transformation of its institutional arrangements for distributing rents, structuring patron–client networks, and organizing coercive capacities. Within this framework, North and his collaborators distinguish three ideal‑typical forms of natural state-fragile, basic, and mature-each representing a specific configuration of the dominant coalition, state capacity, and mechanisms of rent distribution. In fragile natural states, commitments among elites are unstable, the state’s ability to control violence is low, and patronage networks are highly personalized and volatile. Basic natural states exhibit more durable institutional arrangements and a clearer public‑law structure, but remain limited in their capacity to support organizations independent of the state and to sustain credible long‑term commitments. Mature natural states, by contrast, possess more robust public institutions, clearer rule structures, and more institutionalized mechanisms for resolving intra‑elite conflicts, including a partial rule of law for elites. When this typology is brought into dialogue with the historical experience of Iranian monarchy, the pre‑modern Iranian polity can be conceptualized as a limited access order whose stability and reproduction rested on a particular form of natural state. The Islamic‑era Iranian monarchy-often theorized as “saltanat‑i Islamiyyah”-crystallized as a historically specific variant of a basic (and in certain periods proto‑mature) natural state. Its stability depended on a dominant coalition composed of the sultan and royal household, high‑ranking military commanders (tribal and nomadic elites), key bureaucratic figures (viziers and senior officials), and religious authorities (jurists and scholars). Violence control and the maintenance of order were achieved not through impersonal, generalized citizenship rights, but through a dense network of patronage relations, rent‑generating privileges, and selective access to organizational forms. The crown’s control over land, taxation, and appointments functioned as a central reservoir of rents, which were strategically allocated to elites in exchange for military support, political loyalty, and local governance. At the lower levels, hierarchical patron–client networks tied non‑elite groups to powerful intermediaries, embedding them within a structure of protection and obligation rather than formal legal equality. This arrangement reveals why pre‑modern Iranian monarchy simultaneously exhibited strong central symbols of kingship and chronic structural fragility. Stability depended on the continual recalibration of rents and privileges within the dominant coalition; when this balance was disrupted—by succession crises, external shocks, or breakdown of fiscal capacity—the system tended to revert toward the fragile natural state type. Nonetheless, the persistent reliance on limited access to organizational forms, rent‑based elite cohesion, and personalized patronage indicates that the Iranian monarchical order is best understood as a historically specific, path‑dependent realization of North’s limited access social order, rather than as a deviation from an abstract ideal of absolutism or popular sovereignty. Conclusions As noted, North and his collaborators, in their theory of limited access social orders and the natural state, sought to explain the emergence and persistence of pre-modern social orders in human history as mechanisms for controlling violence and establishing relatively stable order. Violence control, in their account, is accomplished through two vertically articulated hierarchies: a system of privilege (rent) distribution and a hierarchical structure of generalized patronage and protection. At the same time, as was clarified in the discussion of the relationship between this theory and the description and analysis of the Iranian pre-modern monarchy and its practices and functions, there are evident differences at the conceptual level and in the overall structure of access in North’s framework and in the Iranian monarchical order. Nevertheless, the historical institutionalist model developed by North and his colleagues contains conceptual themes that, if employed with due attention to Iran’s specific historical conditions, can enhance our understanding of this type of social order and its corresponding state. For example, the role of military organization—tribes and nomadic groups—in controlling violence, maintaining relative stability, and shaping the Iranian limited access order within the framework of monarchy is highly illuminating. Likewise, the distinction between fragile and basic natural states can be used, with appropriate qualifications, to conceptualize the contrast between weak and strong forms of monarchy in Iran. The extensive and diversified system of privilege distribution under the Iranian monarchy closely parallels the rent distribution system in the general theory of limited access orders. Finally, the notion of path dependence offers a powerful conceptual tool for explaining the long-term reproduction of the Iranian monarchical governance pattern across the medieval and early modern periods. . داگلاس نورث، اقتصاددان نهاد باور تاریخی و همکارانش، با پرداختن به معضله ی کنترل خشونت، به عنوان یک چالش اساسی در بحث توسعه پایدار، نهاد دولت را در کانون نظرورزی های خود قرار دادند. آنها در مسیر این کوشش نظری، فهم خود از نهاد دولت و نسبت آن را با کنترل خشونت در قالب مفاهیم بنیادی چون: دو گانه نهاد و سازمان در پیکربندی مفهومی دولت، نظم های اجتماعی دسترسی محدود و باز، اشکال دو گانه دولت دسترسی محدود ( دولت طبیعی) و دولت دسترسی باز (دولت دموکراتیک)، ائتلاف مسلط فرادستان و نظام توزیع رانت صورت بندی کردند. بر اساس نظریه نظام دسترسی، پدیدار دولت های طبیعی به عنوان اشکال تاریخیِ نهاد و سازمان حکومت در دوران بلند پیشا_مدرن، در چهارچوب مفهوم – نظریه ی «نظم دسترسی محدود و دولت طبیعی» تحلیل کردند. دولت، به مثابه نهاد و سازمان حکمرانی در دوران بلند قدمایی ایران، از آن خاص بودگی برخوردار است که نظریه های جهان روا، بنابر میل به تعمیم گرایی حداکثری، قادر به تبیین جامع آن نیستند. با این حال، در منظومه ی مفهوم پردازی و سامانه ی نظری این نوع از دستگاه های نظری امکان هایی برای نظری ورزی درباره دولت قدمایی ایران را می توان سراغ گرفت. این رویکرد البته تمرینی برای مساله مواجهه مورخان با نظریه ها نیز می تواند محسوب شود. مسئله ی اصلی تحقیق از گفت و گوی خلاق با این دستاوردها شکل گرفت و نهایتاً این صورت بندی از پرسش اصلی را سامان بخشید که با عطف توجه به دستاوردهای ارزشمند نورث و همکارانش، که اولاً مفهوم – نظریه ی نظم دسترسی محدود و دولت طبیعی، کدام امکان های نظری را برای نظرورزی درباره ی نظم حکمرانی و دولت قدمایی ایران، ممکن می کند؟ روش تحقیق تحقیق حاضر را باید روش «موضوعی- تاریخی» دانست. در روش موضوعی- تاریخی، پدیدار تاریخی با استفاده از مفاهیم و نظریه توضیح داده و تبیین می شود. با این تفاوت نسبت به چهارچوب های مفهومی و نظری غیر تاریخی که در روش موضوعی - تاریخی مفاهیم و نظریه به وسیله وجه انضمامی سوژه ی تحقیق، مشروط و باز آرایی مجدد می شود. در نتیجه تحقیق حاضر، این امر آشکار شد که مفاهیم پایه در دولت شناسی دولت طبیعی (پیشامدرن) و نظریه نظم اجتماعی دسترسی محدود، قابلیت های مناسبی برای مطالعه دولت قدمایی ایران فراهم می سازد. البته مفهوم دولت طبیعی و نظریه نظم دسترسی محدود، با لحاظ کردن ویژگی های خاص تجربه تاریخی ایران، تبیین ماهیت و سازوکار درونی سلطنت قدمایی و رمز حیات طولانی مدت آن را امکان پذیر می کند.

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