The area of Guyana was originally settled by the Dutch as three colonies. These three colonies were captured by the British in 1796 and officially relinquish to the United Kingdom in 1814, and consolidated into the single colony of British Guiana in 1831.

The Guyanese economy was completely dominated by sugarcane production until the 1880s, when a decline in the price of sugar cane forced an industry shift toward rice farming, mining and forestry. Until the British Empire abolished slavery in 1834, sugar planters relied heavily reliant on slave labor. The abolition of slavery in 1834 led to black settlement of urban areas and the importation of indentured laborers from Portugal, Germany, Ireland, Scotland, Malta, China and India to work on the sugar plantations.

In 1928, Britain retired the Dutch-influenced constitution and replaced it with their own crown colony constitution. A Legislative Council with an appointed majority was established, and the administrative powers of the Governor were strengthened. These constitutional changes were not popular among the Guyanese, who viewed them as an increasing in colonial rule and ultimately, as a step backward.

In 1938 the West India Royal Commission was appointed to investigate the economic and social conditions of all West Indian British colonies after a number of civil and labor disturbances. Among the changes made, the Commission recommended some constitutional reforms and in 1943 a majority of the Legislative Council seats became elective, the property qualifications for voters and for candidates for the Council were lowered, and the bar on women and clergy serving on the Council was abolished. The Governor still retained control of the Executive Council, which had the power to veto or pass laws against the wishes of the Legislative Council. A bicameral legislature was established in 1953 consisting of a lower House of Assembly and an upper State Council. A Court of Policy became the executive body, consisting of the Governor and other colonial officials. The voting membership of the House of Assembly was entirely elective. The State Council had a nominated membership appointed by both the Governor and the House of Assembly and possessed limited revisionary powers. In addition to these changes made to the legislature, universal suffrage was given to all adults, and the property requirement for office was abolished.

The election of 1953, however, did create a new crisis with the new form of governement. The People's Progressive Party won a majority of the seats in the House of Assembly resulting causing alarm in the British Government, which was surprised by the strong support for the PPP, and which viewed the PPP as having too close of ties with communist organizations. As a result of these fears of communist influence in the colony, the British Government suspended the constitution, declared a state of emergency, and militarily occupied British Guiana on October 9, 1953.

With direction from the British Colonial Office, the Governor assumed and held direct rule of the colony under an interim government, which continued until 1957. On August 12, 1957 elections were again held in which the PPP won nine of fourteen elective seats in a new legislature.

A constitutional convention in March 1960 reached an agreement on yet another new legislature, to consist of an elected House of Assembly (35 seats) and a nominated Senate (13 seats). In the election of August 21, 1961 the PPP won 20 seats in the House of Assembly, entitling it to appoint eight senators as the majority party. Upon the 1961 election, British Guiana also became self-governing, except as to defense and external matters. The leader of the majority party was appointed prime minister, and named a Council of Ministers which would replace the former Executive Council.

During a period between 1962 and 1964, riots, strikes and other disturbances broke out, stemming from racial, social and economic conflicts which delayed Guyana on its path toward independence. With the leaders of the political parties unable to reach agreements on the remaining details in their formation of an independent government, the British Colonial Office intervened by imposing its own independence plan, in part requiring another election under a new proportional representation system. This new election was put in place in the hopes and assumptions that it would reduce the number of seats won by the PPP and prevent it from obtaining the majority.

The December 7, 1964 elections for the new legislature gave the PPP 24 seats, the People's National Congress (PNC) 22 seats, and the United Force (UF) 7 seats. The UF agreed to form a coalition government and merge with PNC, thereby making the PNC the new Prime Minister. In November 1965 an independence conference in London reached an agreement on the formation of an independent constitution, and set a date for independence. On May 26, 1966, the former British Guiana ceased to be, and the new independent Guyana emerged from its wake.

The PPP was founded on January 1, 1950, by Indo-Guyanese Cheddi Jagan, one of the Guyana's most charismatic and famous leaders. Jagan was a founder of the PPP which led Guyana's struggle for independence with the crucial support of organized labor, it emerged victorious in the legislative election of April 1953, and Jagan became chief minister. After the new government attempted to modernize the colony's labor laws, British Governor Sir Alfred Savage sacked the government just months after it took office, due to fears of Communist infiltration.

Since the split of the multiracial PPP in 1955, politics has been based more on ethnicity than on ideology. From 1964 to 1992, the PNC dominated Guyana's politics. The PNC draws its support primarily from urban Blacks, and for many years declared itself a socialist party whose purpose was to make Guyana a nonaligned socialist state, in which the party, as in other communist countries, was above all other institutions.

An overwhelming majority of Guyanese of East Indian descent traditionally have been the supporters for the People's Progressive Party. The bulk of support for the PPP comes from rice farmers and sugar workers in rural areas, but the country’s Indo-Guyanese urban business community has also provided important support.

The political split along ethnic lines came about when supporters of the PPP's Afro-Guyanese chairman Forbes Burnham broke away and formed the People's National Congress (PNC) in 1957. This left the original party dependent on the support of demographically superior Indo-Guyanese and more radical elements of the political spectrum. The election of August 1961, despite the split, won in favor of the PPP.

Because of fears that Jagan was a Communist, colonial authorities with assistance from the CIA aided a campaign by conservatives and Burnham loyalists to discredit the PPP government. In 1964, the PPP again won an election in terms of percentage and total votes. Governor Sir Richard Luyt, however, went against parliamentary tradition and invited the PNC in coalition with the small, white-supported United Front conservative party to form the government instead of Jagan.

Although the political scene became increasingly defined by ethnicity, the Burnham government officially declared itself a republic organized on socialist principles; an action that co-opted much of the PPP's program. The PPP eventually extended limited support to the ruling PNC on the basis of appeals to patriotism and national unity.

Historically, politics has been a source of tension in the country and violent riots have often broken out during elections. During the 1980s, the political landscape was dominated by The People's National Congress, who retained their power by allegedly doctoring election results. Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter oversaw the first "free and fair" elections in 1992 in which the PPP took power, which it has retained since.

There has been a recent crime spate that has been linked to escaped convicts and corruption in the ranks of the government. The middle class has been the victims of ever-increasing robberies, kidnapping, carjacking, and home invasions in the past few years. The murder rate of Guyana is quite high for a country of its size, with a rate that is three times that of the United States.

Although actually located in South America, Guyana's culture is very similar to that of the English-speaking Caribbean, and is accepted as a Caribbean nation.

The major religions in Guyana include Christianity, comprising 57% of the population, Hinduism at 37%, and Islam at 9%. Most Guyanese Christians are Protestants and include a mix of all races. Hinduism is heavily dominated by the Indo-Guyanese, while Islam varies between Afro-Guyanese and Indian-Guyanese.

Guyana's educational system, which at one time was considered to be among the best in the Caribbean, has undergone a significant deterioration in the 1980s due to the emigration of its highly educated citizens and the lack of appropriate funding. Although the education system has recovered somewhat in the 1990s, it still does not produce the quality of education necessary for Guyana to modernize its workforce. The country lacks a critical mass of expertise in many of the disciplines and activities on which it depends.

Further adding to the problems of the educational system, many of the better-educated professional teachers have emigrated to other countries mainly due to low pay, lack of opportunities and crime. As a result, there is a lack of trained teachers at every level of Guyana's educational system.

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