ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief historical background and a description of major events in Kuwait. It also provides basic political, economic, and social data arranged in the following categories: polity, economy, population, purchasing power parities, life expectancy, ethnic groups, capital, political rights, civil liberties, and status. The chapter discusses the progress and decline of political rights and civil liberties in Kuwait. The al-Sabah family has ruled Kuwait since 1756. Under a special treaty, Kuwait ceded control of its foreign affairs and defence to Britain in 1899. Political parties are illegal, although de facto groupings of Bedouins, merchants, Sunni and Shiite Muslims, secularist leftists, and nationalists are tolerated. The government maintains financial control over unions through subsidies that account for 90 percent of some union budgets. Only one union is permitted per industry or profession, and only one labour federation, the pro-government Kuwaiti Trade Union Federation, exists.
