Abstract
Although the wave of globalization is washing the shore of oil producing countries in the Arabian Gulf region, there are still big gaps between the values of the Arab and the western. Recent turmoil in Iraq after falling down of the regime of Saddam Hussain is a very example of the trouble caused by the difference of values.
It is essential for foreign oil companies to recognize such difference of values and to have enough knowledge about domestic political situation and social system of these countries for avoiding unnecessary conflicts with local society, maintaining advantageous position in the business and seeking a seed of new business.
Taking Kuwait as a sample of such oil producing countries, this report tries to analyze political and social aspects affecting its national oil policy, and then depicts the decision making mechanism in the oil sector.
These years, in Kuwait, the authority of decision making in oil policy has seemed to be centralized to the newly assigned Prime Minister, H.H. Shaikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah but many complicated political and social factors still remain as obstacles.
For instant, the government of Kuwait has been tackling a project for upgrading its oil fields with applying advanced technology and fund of International Oil Companies but the project has shown little progress in the past years because of the loud objection from National Assembly.
However, the recent changes of political factors inside and outside Kuwait has brought the sign of positive progress in this project, and other development plan of an offshore gas field is now discussed in the government with much reality.
