The development of political interaction in Kuwait through the “Dīwānīyas” from their beginnings until the year 1999

Abstract

This study aims to highlight the functional role of Diwaniyas in the Kuwaiti society regarding the historical heritage including its role in getting involved in the process of figuring significant social and political changes. This is particularly regarding the separating historical periods of the succession of the State of Kuwait. We are satisfied only with investigating its nature since the emergence of the State of Kuwait until the last period of the 20^th century regarding our being interested with not changing the current period that its features would witnessed obviously in two or three coming decades. This is regarding the implicit overlap between the internal and external political statuses, and the impact of each of them on the other. This study also tries focusing on the Diwaniyah's role and significance such as activist social institutions that established a sort of the political activity in the society. These social institutions represented the first types of parliaments in which the first and the most significant based political election types on the people participation without concerning the tribal or ethnic unity were practiced in them. This study also highlights how the Diwaniyas could keep this role existent over several times and the repeating crisis. It influences that political change process in Kuwait, especially after the political crisis reflected their gravity in repeated manner regarding reflecting the role of Diwaniyas in terms of not meeting the expectations of some people who expected that the Diwaniyah's role would declined during the existence of crisis and their being stressed. It happened especially after the political participation subject, which counted as the first standard for any occurring real political and social development in any country.

Keywords:

• Kuwait Parliament
• Kuwait tribe
• Kuwait political participation
• Kuwaiti society
• Diwaniya
• democracy in Kuwait

Notes

¹Ibn Khaldūn stressed the importance of the tribe and its role within society, especially in connection with social organization and the political history of the state. For more information, see Ibn Manẓūr, Lisān al‐ʿArab [The Tongue of the Arabs] (Dār Ṣādir, Beirut 1968) I:602; and Ibn Khaldūn, Muqaddimat [Introduction], ed. Aḥmad al‐Zuʾbī (2nd edn Dār al‐Arqām, Beirut 2001) 62.

²Al‐Jābirī explains that the concept of the State in the ancient worldview meant the prevailing physical force and its domination of others; Muḥammad ʿĀbid Al‐Jābirī, Fikr Ibn Khaldūn: Al‐ʿaṣabīya wa‐al‐dawla, maʿālim naẓarīya Khaldūnīya fī al‐tārīkh al‐islāmī [Ibn Khaldūn’s Thought about Partisanship and the State: The Main Characteristics of a Khaldunian Theory of Islamic History] (6th edn Markaz Dirasāt al‐Waḥda al‐ʿArabīya, Beirut 1994) 216–18.

³It was known by Muslims in the reign of the caliph ʿUmar ibn Al‐Khaṭṭāb (13–23 AH) as the Khalīfa Dīwān, and it has been considered a point of connection between the public and the private spheres throughout Islamic history thereafter. Some scholars have located the starting point of the dīwāns in the time of the Persians after Kisra has called the clerics of his diwan, when they were talking (his diwan), i.e. the lunatics; Ibn al‐Athīr, Al‐Kāmil fī al‐Tārīkh [The Complete History] (4th edn Muʾassasat al‐Tārīkh al‐ʿArabī, Beirut 1994) I:428; also Ibn Khaldūn, Muqaddimat, I:121.

⁴The Hadith reads: “Allah has guards, they are Angels in the Heavens” Jawād ʿAlī, Al‐Mufaṣṣal fī Tārīkh al‐ʿArab qabl al‐Islām [The Detailed History of the Arabs before Islam] (4th edn Dār al‐Sāqī, Beirut 2004) IX:273; also Ibn Qutayba, ʿUyūn al‐Akhbār, ed. Muhammad Eskandarani (3rd edn Dar Arab Book House) I:85.

⁵Ibn Manẓūr, Lisān al‐ʿArab XV:463.

⁶For instance, dīwāns were used to register soldiers’ names and stipends, and to record other monetary donations and distributions, in the first ages of Islam and especially in the early Abbasid period (132–232 AH). Many early caliphs relied on tribes to strengthen the caliphal support base, as many of them divided the army into tribally based regiments. Therefore, the tribe has always been an important element in the political and social decisions of the Islamic State, as is exemplified by the policies of the caliph Mu‘ʿawiya (r. 41–66 AH).

⁷For more information, see Yūsuf ibn ʿĪsā al‐Qanāʿī, Ṣafaḥāt min Tārīkh al‐Kuwayt [Pages from the History of Kuwait] (5th edn Dhāt al‐Salāsil, Kuwait City 1987) 15–16; also ʿAbdallāh Khālid al‐Ḥātim, Min Hunā Badaʾat al‐Kuwayt [From Here Kuwait Started] (3rd edn al‐Maktaba al‐ʿAṣrīya, Beirut 2004) 362–4.

⁸Aḥmad Muṣṭafā Abū Ḥākima, Tārīkh al‐Kuwayt al‐Ḥadīth, 1750–1965 [The History of Modern Kuwait, 1750–1965] (Maktabat Dhāt al‐Salāsil, Kuwait City 1984) 17–18.

⁹Shaykh Ḥusayn Khalaf Khazʿal, Tārīkh al‐Kuwayt al‐Siyāsī [The Political History of Kuwait] (Dār al‐Hilāl, Beirut 1962) I:37; also idem, Tārīkh al‐Jazīra al‐ʿArabīya fī ʿAṣr al‐Shaykh Muḥammad Ibn ʿAbd al‐Wahhāb [History of al‐Jazīra al‐ʿArabīya in the Era of Shaykh Muḥammad Ibn ʿAbd al‐Wahhāb] (Dār al‐Kitāb, Beirut 1968).

¹⁰The first governor of the Al‐Sabah family; but the date of his reign of the principality is not known with certainty.

¹¹A British resident in the Arabian Gulf from 1862 to 1873.

¹²Maymūna al‐Khalīfa al‐Ṣabāḥ, Al‐Kuwayt: Ḥaḍḥāra wa‐Tārīkh [Kuwait: Civilization and History] (4th edn M. K. al‐Ṣabāḥ, Kuwait City 2003) I:108.

¹³ʿAbd al‐ʿAzīz al‐Rashīd, Tārīkh al‐Kuwayt [The History of Kuwait] (revd edn by Yaʿqūb al‐Rashīd Dār Maktabat al‐Ḥayāh, Beirut 1971) 339.

¹⁴Al‐Qanāʿī, Ṣafaḥāt 15.

¹⁵Khazʿal, Tārīkh al‐Kuwayt al‐Siyāsī pt 1, 43; Aḥmad al‐Rashīdī (ed.), Al‐Kuwayt min al‐Imāra ilā al‐Dawla: Dirāsa fī Nashʾ Dawlat al‐Kuwayt wa‐Taṭawwur Markazihā al‐Qānūnī wa‐ʿAlāqātihā al‐Dawlīya [Kuwait from an Emirate to a State: A Study in the Creation of the State of Kuwait and the Development of its Legal Status and International Relations] (2nd edn Dār al‐Ṣabāḥ, Kuwait City 1993) 33; al‐Ṣabāḥ, Al‐Kuwayt: Ḥaḍāra wa‐Tārīkh I:108, the first governor of the Kuwaiti Emirate.

¹⁶This is represented by al‐Qanāʿī, Ṣafaḥāt.

¹⁷Shafīq al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya wa‐al‐Sulṭa wa‐al‐Mujtamaʿa [Kuwait: A Study in the Mechanisms of the Regional State, Authority and Society) (Markaz Ibn Khaldūn lil‐Dirāsāt al‐, Dār al‐Amīn lil‐Nashr wa‐al‐, Cairo 1995) 10.

¹⁸The tribe might be known basically as a organizational principle that uses the field of tribal membership as its basis; Khaldūn Ḥasan al‐Naqīb, Ṣirā‘ al‐Qabīla wa‐al‐Dīmuqrāṭīya: Ḥālat al‐Kuwayt [The Conflict of Tribe and Democracy: The Case of Kuwait) (Dār al‐Sāqī, Beirut 1996) 9.

¹⁹Yaʿqūb Yūsuf al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya: Dawruhā al‐Ijtimāʿī wa‐al‐Siyāsī [The Kuwaiti Dīwānīya: Its Political and Social Role] (Y. Y. al‐Kandarī, Kuwait 2002) 59.

²⁰This was also true in earlier decades when Indian trade went through Baghdad, Aleppo and Constantinople. It should be mentioned that when the Persians encircled Basra and occupied it, the trade route was moved to Kuwait. At the same time, England sent its desert postal correspondence across Kuwaiti land; the British East Indian company also transferred its center there. Kuwait was then emerging as a prominent commercial outpost, which greatly helped to support its economic position. For more details, see Reader Bullard (ed.) for the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Information Department, The Middle East: A Political and Economic Survey (Kuwait Ministry of Information, Kuwait City 1976; repr. Macmillan, London 1950) 13.

²¹Al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya 61.

²²Khālid Muḥammad al‐Maqāmis, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya: Taʾthīruha al‐Siyāsī wa‐al‐Ijtimāʿī wa‐al‐Thaqāfī [The Kuwaiti Dīwānīya: Its Political, Social and Cultural Influence) (revd edn K. M. al‐Maqāmis, Kuwait City 1992) 27.

²³According to Sayf Marzūq Shamlān, Al‐Alʿāb al‐Shaʿbīya al‐Kuwaytīya: Waṣfuhā, wa‐adawātuhā, wa‐mā yataʿalliq bi‐hā hā [Kuwaiti Folk Games: Their Description, Equipment, and Related Matters] (Kuwait 1969) 34.

²⁴This means the areas of the city specialized for trade, especially re‐export and transit trade; Khaldūn Ḥasan al‐Naqīb, Al‐Mujtamaʿ wa‐al‐Dawla fī al‐Khalīj wa‐al‐Jazīra al‐ʿArabīya min Manẓūr Mukhtalif [Nation and Society in the Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula from a Different Perspective) (2nd edn Markaz Dirāsāt al‐Waḥda al‐ʿArabīya, Beirut 1989) 29.

²⁵Samuel Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late 20th Century, trs ʿAbd al‐Wahhāb Alūb (Markaz Ibn Khaldūn lil‐Dirāsāt al‐, Cairo 1993) 86–90.

²⁶Al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya 69.

²⁷Al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 19.

²⁸ʿAbdallāh al‐Ḥātim is a Kuwaiti historian born in 1917. In From Here Kuwait Started he collected accounts going back to the very first confirmed accounts of Kuwaiti history.

²⁹Such as Abd Al‐Nabie Maarefy’s Dīwān; al‐Ḥātim, Min Hunā Badaʾat al‐Kuwayt 223.

³⁰Khlaf Al‐Naqib and his father’s bureau; for more details, see ibid. 225.

³¹Ibid. 91.

³²Al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 47.

³³Mary Ann Tétreault, ‘Civil Society in Kuwait: Protected Spaces and Women’s Rights’, (1993) 47 Middle East Journal 275–91.

³⁴Al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya 81.

³⁵Ahmed Jafar Abul, ‘The Participation of Kuwaiti Intellectuals in the Development Process, 1961–1985’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Essex, Colchester 1992).

³⁶Muḥammad Jawād Riḍā, Ṣirāʿ al‐Dawla wa‐al‐Qabīla fī al‐Khalīj al‐ʿArabī: Azmāt al‐Tanmiyah wa‐tanmiyat al‐Azmāt [The Conflict between the State and the Tribe in the Arabian Gulf: Crisis of Development and Development of Crisis) (2nd edn Dār al‐Sāqī, Beirut 1997) 13.

³⁷Nasser Al‐Badr’s Dīwānīya. A rumor spread about who was to blame for the failure of this attempt. However, ʿAbd al‐Azīz al‐Rashīd, who was a contemporary of the incidents and a participant in them, absolved Sheikh Ahmad Al‐Jaber of the responsibility for the council’s failure. al‐Naqīb, Ṣirāʿ al‐Qabīla wa‐al‐Dīmuqrāṭīya: Ḥālat al‐Kuwayt 30; ʿAlī al‐Wardī, Manṭiq Ibn Khaldūn fī Ḍawʾ Ḥaḍāratihi wa‐Shakhsīyatihi [Ibn Khaldūn’s Logic in the Light of his Civilization and Personality] (Jāmiʿat al‐Duwal al‐ʿArabīya, Maʿhad al‐Dirāsāt al‐ʿArabīya al‐ʿĀlīya, Cairo 1962) 37–113; Abū Khaldūn Sāṭiʿal‐Ḥuṣrī, Dirāsāt ʿan Muqaddimat Ibn Khaldūn [Studies on Ibn Khaldūn’s Introduction] (3rd edn Dār al‐Kitāb al‐ʿArabī, Beirut 1967) 40–56; al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 9.

³⁸The absence of the official political parties helped the dīwānīya become so crucial to Kuwaiti society. Perhaps the political role of many dīwānīyas intensified in times of political crisis; however, some of the dīwānīyas maintained their political role in all circumstances. Yet, some researchers have declared that the dīwānīya represented a parliament despite its lack of official parliamentary status.

³⁹Mohamed Saleh Al‐Gawaan’s Diwan with Ali El Amer’s Dīwānīya Library. For more details, see al‐Ḥātim, Min Hunā Badaʾat al‐Kuwayt 66.

⁴⁰Salah Aqqad, The Intellectual Streams in the Arabian Gulf, 1938–1971 59.

⁴¹Al Mzrouk and Al Sakr Diwans; al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya 111.

⁴²Ibid.

⁴³Al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 51.

⁴⁴Ṣalāḥ al‐ʿAqqād, Al‐Tayyārāt al‐Siyāsīya fī al‐Khalīj al‐ʿArabī [The Political Currents in the Arabian Gulf] (Maktabat al‐Anjlū al‐Miṣrīya, Cairo 1974) 247–53.

⁴⁵Aḥmad al‐Khaṭīb, Al‐Kuwayt min al‐Imāra ilā al‐Dawla [Kuwait from an Emirate to a State) (2nd edn al‐Markaz al‐Thaqafī, Casablanca 2007) 289; ʿAbd al‐Riḍā Asīrī, Al‐Niẓām al‐Siyāsī fī al‐Kuwayt: Mabādiʾ wa‐Mumārasāt [The Political System in Kuwait: Principles and Practices] (8th edn Kuwait City 2005) 43–4.

⁴⁶Aḥmad al‐Dayīn, Al‐Dīmuqrāṭīya fi al‐Kuwayt: Masāruhā, Wāqiʿuhā, Taḥdīyātuhā, Āfquh [Democracy in Kuwait: Its Path, Reality, Challenges, and Horizons] (Dār Qurṭās lil‐Nashr, Kuwait City 2005) 14.

⁴⁷Muḥammad ʿAbd al‐Qādir al‐Jāsim, Al‐Kuwayt: Muthallath al‐Dīmuqrāṭīṭyah [Kuwait: Triangle of Democracy] (M. A. Q. al‐Jāsim, Kuwait City 1992) 54.

⁴⁸Al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 90.

⁴⁹Al‐Ghabrā, ‘Voluntary Associations in Kuwait: The Foundation of a New System?’ (1991) 45 Middle East Journal 199–215.

⁵⁰Al‐Ghabrā, Al‐Kuwayt: Dirāsa fī Āliyāt al‐Dawla al‐Quṭrīya 93.

⁵¹Hādī Rāshid, Ḥall Majlis al‐Umma wa‐al‐Ḥaraka al‐Dustūrīya [Dissolution of the Kuwait National Assembly and the Constitutional Movement] (Kuwait City 1992) 21.

⁵²Ibid. 28.

⁵³Ibid. 31.

⁵⁴Ibid.

⁵⁵al‐Khaṭīb, Al‐Kuwayt min al‐Imāra ilā al‐Dawla.

⁵⁶Tétreault, ‘Civil Society in Kuwait’; al‐Ghabrā, ‘Voluntary Association in Kuwait’.

⁵⁷Such as the dīwānīya of the al‐Maʿārifī family.

⁵⁸Al‐Kandarī, Al‐Dīwānīya al‐Kuwaytīya 135.

⁵⁹Yoosuf G. Abbass Ali, ‘Political Participation in a Developing Nation: The Case of Kuwait’ (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 1989).

⁶⁰Ali al‐Zubi, ‘Tribal Solidarity as Reflected in the Election of the Kuwaiti Parliament’ (unpublished master’s thesis, Ball State University, Muncie, IN 1995).