One of the main concerns in the design of infrastructure earthworks on soft cohesive soils is the deformation of subsoil under traffic loading. A series of cyclic triaxial tests were conducted under undrained and partially-drained conditions on kaolinite specimens. A model based on the test results is presented to examine the partially-drained behaviour of an elastic-viscoplastic material considering different influence factors such as cyclic stress ratio and frequency. For a given cyclic stress ratio it is shown that a greater number of load cycles are required to dissipate the initial accumulation of pore pressures under partially-drained conditions for high frequency tests. The accumulated cyclic strain is reduced by partially-drained cyclic stress-controlled loading resulting in greater post-cyclic strength when compared to undrained test specimens. Numerical analyses for the prediction of the developent of partially drained pore pressures have been undertaken. Considering the long term response of a subsoil to cyclic loading, the residual pore pressures under cyclic loading can be predicted.