User:Saraalgubaa/sandbox

Status of Bidoon
Kuwait has historically comprised of three different nationalities that include official Kuwait nationality citizens, non-Kuwait official population (which consists of immigrants, workers, and travellers into the nation), and then finally there is the Bidoon population or the unofficial third group of Kuwaitis, who do not have an official nationality. As a result, of this notion of official vs unofficial status for the Bidoon, the Gulf countries and Iraq do not officially recognize them as citizens of immigrants but as nomads and stateless people. The government of Kuwait’s census after the year 1989 did not count the Bidoon as citizens of the nation of Kuwait, which shows the transition of their value in the Kuwaiti official perspectives from citizens to nomads and members of a lower social class.

Factors affecting Bidoon
The notion of a healthy and unified migrant worker class is essential for the GCC countries to have a strong backbone for the economy; otherwise, backlash and other social eruptions could lead to the breakdown of social order. The Bidoon should be treated with care and their social rights, which stem from the human rights fundamentals of the United Nations mandate, should be safeguarded for greater assimilation and strengthening of the Kuwaiti and Middle-Eastern social classes. The Bidoons are discriminated in Kuwait based on various predictor variables such as socio-economic characteristics, language proficiency, social network opportunities with the official Kuwait citizens, and the ability to obtain a job and job-related attributes of the individuals in Kuwait.

The racial dichotomy of the Middle East includes the Arab-Asian differences, and the nature of this difference extends into the Bidoon and Arab differences. Although the Bidoon are Arabs, they are usually considered to be the lower classes of Arabs and the governments do not provide the same socio-economic benefits for them as the official citizens of Kuwait. The language proficiency in spoken Arabic for the Bidoon does not match those of the official Kuwaiti citizens, which also confirms their status in the lowest social class and it even reduces the number of opportunities for them.

The extent to which the stateless Bidoon and the temporary foreign and migrant workers, including housemaids, get abused in Kuwait cannot be understated. The Bidoons were suspicious of the national governments and the process of registering with the authorities in the 1960s and the 1970s, as a result of which the Bidoons segregated themselves from the mainstream Kuwaiti culture. However, Bidoons have been used to a tremendously large extent by the Kuwaiti government since they have been continuously recruited into the army, security, and police forces of the country’s government. The only benefits the Bidoons have obtained from the government of Kuwait is that they have been able to receive free healthcare, housing, and education so that they can enjoy the various benefits of citizenship, without actually being citizens.

Reflection on their status in Kuwait
Sometimes, Kuwait views the Bidoons population as the direct result of early immigration from other countries such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. However, the consensus is that they are stateless, which leaves room for oppression and marginalization from mainstream society. The government of Kuwait claims that many of these Bidoon individuals have arrived from various neighbouring countries after the 1950s while the oil boom and exploration happened. As a result of which the government does not want to create any special allocation and social benefits for the Bidoons on a larger scale since they are considered to be immigrants from foreign countries on one level.