The state is regarded as a macro-institution encompassing many other significant institutions; consequently, the process of state-building is of considerable importance. One of the fundamental challenges in the formation of state institutions is the existence of patronage institutions, which, through rent-seeking and favoritism, generate numerous social and political conflicts. The present study analyzes the process of state-building during the Second Pahlavi period from the perspective of historical institutionalism. Within this framework, the coup d’état of 19 August 1953 (28 Mordad 1332) is considered a critical juncture, since the principal structure
of Mohammad Reza Shah’s rule took shape after this event and became institutionalized as a military authoritarian state. Measures such as the Land Reform and the White Revolution can likewise be analyzed within this context. Furthermore, the principal institutions involved in state-building during this period are examined, demonstrating that all of them functioned through patronage and essentially served as the primary instruments for extending state power throughout society. This institutional structure intensified social inequality and discrimination while accelerating the process of unbalanced development, because the principal social groups benefiting from the regime’s patronage policies belonged to the urban upper classes, and even the human and financial resources of the lower classes were utilized to promote the economic growth of the upper strata. Consequently, during the early 1970s, class inequality in Iran reached its highest level compared with the preceding twenty years and even with the subsequent period (the first two decades following the Islamic Revolution), while organized corruption became deeply entrenched within the Pahlavi political system. Ultimately, this pattern of state-building prevented a substantial segment of society from pursuing its demands through peaceful means. As a result, reformist tendencies weakened, revolutionary orientations intensified, and opponents and non-supporters of the regime, who had long been marginalized, entered the political arena and laid the groundwork for the collapse of the Pahlavi regime.