Political Kuwait before and after oil Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Political Kuwait before and after oil - Essay Example Prior to the discovery of oil in Kuwait, their political structure was that different political classes were indebted to one another. This included the pearl divers, the captains, the merchants, the international merchants, and the ruling family, including the Sheikh. The entire political and governance structure was supported by debt that could not be rapid due to its amount. This, however, changed with discovery of oil as the government began to distribute wealth deliberately among all its recognized citizens. Kuwait also became a welfare state, while money was also funneled into the private sector through land purchases from the government at inflated prices (Slot 106). This worked to wipe out almost all debts owed by citizens. Prior to the discovery of oil, the Sheikh in Kuwait carried out all the executive functions of government, including the arbitration of disputes, using customary rules. Those disputes that he felt were covered under Sharia law were sent to the judges, although this was only to allow him make an informed and just decision (Slot 102). For this reason, it was important that the ruler availed himself to the people through open Majlis that enabled them to present grievances and disputes directly to the ruler. However, with the discovery of oil, government work expanded rapidly to include numerous agencies as required. The machinery of government diversified to include the Supreme Council that was constituted by various heads of government agencies. The Supreme Council became almost like a Politburo in that it reflected sharing of power among individuals linked to the ruling family, while the Amir’s continued absence from its sittings gave it a level of independence despite his con tinued chairmanship. In a further change to political structure away from the centralized figure of the Amir, the Organizing Body was formed to reform government

The gravedigger scene may be taken as a key to the play Hamlet as a Essay

The gravedigger scene may be taken as a key to the play Hamlet as a whole. Why - Essay Example Thus Hamlet says, "that skull had a tongue in it, and could sing once: how the knave jowls it to the ground, as if it were Cain's jaw-bone that did the first murder." This aspect of the scene also shows how Hamlet, whether he likes it or not, constantly returns to the same themes whatever situation he is in. The fact that the jawbone could be that of Cain, leads him to the subject of murder which in turn leads him to the fact that he believes his father was murdered by his Uncle and mother. Hamlet makes fun of all the titles, property and pride that make him a "Prince", but which will eventually disappear into that great equalizer. The fact that he has felt uneasy with the idea of being a royalty occurs through the play and is persistent in this scene as he looks at skull that might have been "a lawyer's" or a "great buyer of land". They are all equal now within death. The theme of death taking away the innocence of childhood appears as Hamlet says the famous line, "alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well". Death's bit is even more keen when it has occurred to someone that we fondly remember from out childhood. Again, Hamlet asks a series of questions that he knows the answer to before he has spoken them. These are perhaps the ultimate rhetorical questions: "where be your gibes now, Your gambols Your songs Your flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table on a roar Not one now, to mock your own grinning." The fact that Yorick, who apparently displayed all the vitality and zest for life that Hamlet sorely lacks, is dead, makes Hamlet's own attempts to both cheat death and to avenge it seem rather pathetic. The idea that there is no-one to "mock" the permanent "grin" that Yorick's skull is showing is perhaps the most telling fact of all. Hamlet suggests that death is mocking all mortals - so no mortal mocking is actually needed. The unfairness of death is a theme that resounds throughout the play. It is unfair that his father has been killed while his useless uncle lives. It was unfair that Polonius was killed needlessly (even though Hamlet cares little himself), and it is unfair that Ophelia has been driven to madness and hence to suicide. Death, it seems, takes those who are most innately suited to life. While those such as Hamlet himself, so thinks the Prince, are left to suffer within a tortured life. The fact that death makes all equal is expounded upon by making the dead seem to be part of death's joke on the prideful ambitions of life. Thus the stinking skull that Hamlet is handling (that of Yorick) brings him to consideration of the fact that the "imagination trace the novel dust of Alexander, till he find it stopping a bung hole" Throughout Hamlet the title character is unable to stop his flights of imagination, and all of these turn into a kind of reduction ad absurdum in which the whole of life is rendered meaningless and somewhat laughable by the cold facts of death. Life is very short, mutable and transient in its importance while death is eternal and majestically terrible in its permanence and resonance. Alexander may be the dust bunging up one hole or another for much longer than he was ever a great ruler. This sense of futility is resoundingly summed up within the following rhyming couplets: Imperious Caesar, dead and turn'd to