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- From 1941 to 1979, Iran was ruled by King Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the Shah.
- On February 11, 1979, the Islamic Revolution swept the country.
- The government was replaced with an Islamic republic, which continues to this day.
In the decades before the Islamic revolution of 1979, Iran was ruled by the Shah, whose dictatorship repressed dissent and restricted political freedoms.
But he also pushed the country to adopt Western-oriented secular modernization, allowing some degree of cultural freedom.