Segāneh-ye Sargozasht-e Moderniteh dar Iran: 20 Moʿalefeh-ye Moderniteh Persian 2025

The book The Trilogy: The Fate of Modernity in Iran – 20 Components of Modernity by Ardalan Faraji is the first volume of a three-part series devoted to the history and trajectory of modernity in Iran. It seeks to identify and analyze, to the extent possible, the most significant components and defining features of global modernity—particularly as developed in the West. By offering a comprehensive and general definition of modernity, the author examines its roots and characteristics within the broader course of human history, presenting it as a pivotal turning point in the transformation of human societies.

This volume serves as an introduction to the two subsequent books and poses a set of central questions: Why did modernity remain incomplete in Iran? Why did a society that once aspired to schools, newspapers, law, and freedom revert to tradition and entrenched structures? Is it possible to move once again toward emancipation?

The book reexamines twenty key components of modernity—from individualism and rationality to secularism, civil institutions, and technology—not merely within theoretical and philosophical frameworks, but in the lived and historical experience of Iran, with all its advances, suspensions, and regressions.

For readers concerned with the roots and trajectories of modernity in Iran, this work offers a thoughtful and critical perspective. Drawing on a blend of personal narrative, objective analysis, and documented evidence, the author explores how modernity entered Iran, how it was internalized, why it receded, and whether its fate in Iran is predetermined or still open to reimagining.

Ultimately, the book is an invitation to reflection, inquiry, and perhaps the beginning of a renewed dialogue about the future—for those who believe that becoming modern is not an imitation of the West, but a fundamental right of the Iranian people.