Kuwait’s Political System: An Overview

The Kuwaiti political system combines a hereditary executive-branch structure and a freely elected national assembly. Its framers envisioned it as an attempt to avoid the personalistic tendencies of presidential rule and the excessive democratic instability of parliamentarism in interwar Europe (Al-Saleh Reference Al-Saleh2003). Institutionally, the emir—who is a member of the ruling Al-Sabah family—stands at the apex of this hybrid political system. The Kuwaiti National Assembly (KNA) was given considerable oversight and law-making power as well as checks on executive-branch power in the Kuwaiti constitution of 1962. Figure 1 illustrates the basic political structure of legislative–executive relations in Kuwait.

Figure 1

Legislative–Executive Relations in Kuwait

First, as shown in figure 1, the emir has considerable power, including dissolving parliament and issuing decrees of necessity. The emir also has the power to appoint the prime minister (by convention, also a member of the royal family). Through consultations with the emir and other key political players, the prime minister, in turn, appoints the cabinet ministers.

The KNA is composed of 50 Members of Parliament (MPs) who are elected directly by universal suffrage and secret ballot; MPs typically are self-nominated and they compete in multi-member districtsFootnote ¹ (Al-Saeedi Reference Al-Saeedi2003; Al-Shayeji Reference Al-Shayeji1988). In addition to elected MPs, cabinet ministers, appointed by the emir, are part of the parliament but they serve as ex-officio members. These cabinet ministers can vote on all issues except motions of confidence.

Similar to other parliamentary systems, elected members of the KNA can advance motions of confidence. The emir, in turn, has the right to dissolve the KNA (see figure 1). More precisely, the KNA as a legislature has three interconnected powers vis-à-vis the government and the executive branch. First, KNA MPs can interpellate cabinet ministers and the prime minister on matters within their jurisdiction, which can result in a motion of no-confidence against them. Second, the constitution grants the KNA a similar right called a motion of no-cooperation with the prime minister, but it is subject to slightly different rules. Third, the emir’s power to dissolve parliament is discretionary even if there are no votes of no-cooperation against the prime minister.Footnote ²

To summarize, the executive branch is composed of an appointed cabinet with dual responsibility to a popularly elected national assembly and an unelected hereditary emir (i.e., the head of state) with considerable constitutional power (Al-Saleh Reference Al-Saleh2003).

Causal Theory: Permissive Rules, a Nonpartisan System, and Legislative–Executive Paralysis

Interpellations and motions of confidence are crucial for parliamentary oversight. Yet, when left unregulated, they are destabilizing and create perpetual legislative–executive paralysis. This article proposes a causal theory, shown in figure 2, of several elements to explain this dynamic.

Figure 2

Causal Theory

First, interpellations and motions of confidence in Kuwait stem from multiple sources: charges of cabinet misconduct, policy disagreements, portfolio allocation, personal grievances, factional allegiances, and competition among power brokers (in particular, members of the royal family vying for the position of prime minister or crown prince).Footnote ³

Second, Cheibub and Rasch (Reference Cheibub and Rasch2021) classified the constitutions and amendments of European countries into three groups based on the details they contain about the government’s responsibility to the parliament: silent, incomplete, and complete. In the first group, the documents are silent, in the sense that interpellations and motions of confidence are not explicitly mentioned. In the second group, interpellations and motions of confidence are explicitly mentioned but the conditions and context under which they can happen remain unclear. The third group contains complete and detailed information about these procedures. Based on Cheibub and Rasch’s (Reference Cheibub and Rasch2021) classification of constitutions and amendments regarding censure motion, Kuwait’s constitution and parliamentary rules of procedure are closer to being incomplete documents, with permissible rules for initiating interpellations and motions of confidence. For example, interpellations can be advanced against cabinet ministers by individual MPs at any time and without limits on the number of times they can be targeted. Motions of confidence are more difficult to initiate because they must be preceded by an interpellation and they require the signature of 10 MPs. However, they nevertheless are permissible due to the lack of a specified limit on the number of motions per legislative term or session as well as the lack of specified limits per MP.

Third, Kuwait’s constitution and laws do not ban or regulate political parties. Kuwait’s system has political and parliamentary blocs that coalesce based on ideological and social affiliations and issue convergence, but they are un-institutionalized and experience high turnover (Al-Ghazali Reference Al-Ghazali2007).

Thus, Kuwait’s political system combines permissive and incomplete oversight procedures with a highly individualistic, nonpartisan system. It is prone to abusing tools of oversight and ineffective coordination among MPs. This results in a situation in which interpellations and motions of confidence are a constant feature of the political system, driven largely by individual MPs compared to organized political groups.

The strategies adopted by the executive branch to maneuver interpellations and motions of confidence often lead to delay, paralysis, and legislative–executive deadlock. The strategies include the emir’s prerogatives such as constitutionally dissolving parliament and, in extreme circumstances, decrees of necessity. Moreover, the executive branch—primarily the prime minister and his cabinet ministers—uses vagaries in the constitution and rules of procedure to delay or obstruct interpellations and motions of confidence, which can lead to constitutional crises.

Legislative–Executive Paralysis and Its Potential Consequences

Until the post-1991 period in Kuwait,Footnote ⁴ interpellations were not used frequently. However, beginning in 2006 and as shown in figure 3, there has been an increased number of interpellations per month. This is due primarily to what scholars have argued is the severing of the post of the prime minister from the crown prince.

Figure 3

Interpellations per Month by Legislative Term (1963–2020)

Note: Author’s own data compiled from multiple official sources.

More important, most of these interpellations were advanced by individual MPs as opposed to being co-sponsored (figure 4). Therefore, for instance, in 13 of 18 KNA sessions, interpellations raised by individual MPs comprised 50% or more of the total interpellations compared to co-sponsored interpellations. In fact, of 149 interpellations from 1963 to 2020, 92 (61.70%) were raised by individual MPs.

Figure 4

Sponsored and Co-Sponsored Interpellations by Legislative Term (1963–2020)

Note: Author’s own data compiled from multiple official sources.

Another notable feature of legislative–executive relations in Kuwait is frequent dissolutions, which illustrate the legislative–executive paralysis. As shown in table 1, of the 18 legislative terms in Kuwait’s history, 11 were dissolved prior to the end of their full term. Although interpellations and motions of confidence did not result in all of these dissolutions, the majority were directly or indirectly related to interpellations or motions of confidence.

Table 1

KNA Dissolutions 1975–2020

The institutional design of Kuwait’s political system is in need of reform to streamline and rationalize its oversight procedures. This needs to be accomplished similar to many Continental European parliaments, which were reformed precisely because of endemic legislative–executive deadlock in the interwar period. Yet, as long as Kuwait’s constitution continues to be viewed as a rigid document and serious reforms of parliamentary rules of procedure are generally unsuccessful and blocked by the executive branch, reform will remain elusive. Given these shortcomings and the way that the political system is set up, it was perhaps inevitable that the KNA was unconstitutionally dissolved by the emir on May 10, 2024, for the first time in 38 years.