Understanding Malaysian politics can be a struggle for European observers.
How is it possible, that a country on the edge of becoming a first world nation, still deals with racial issues? The racial issue states an anachronism for many Europeans, a paradox of progress. Why is it so difficult for the west to understand the nation building process of Malaysia and its political setting?
There is a German quote, saying that ignorant people see the world through ‘pink colored sunglasses’, meaning they just see what they want to see and have no sense of empathy. This is what actually happens if one is referring to Malaysia and its political setting. Calling it racist, without taking any effort to highlight the historical and cultural backgrounds and the feelings of people involved.
Let us replace the sunglasses with spectacles and start with some simple analyzing of basic terms. Let’s take for instance a term often used in Malaysian politics, the word ‘race’. Malaysians and Europeans associate the word with something different .
European chauvinism and racism
To understand the European problem with the term ‘race’ it is necessary to know the background of its usage and its transition of meaning in the past.
The actual word ‘race’ derives from the Spanish term ‘rraça’ which simply meant ‘from good or bad origin’ in the 15th century and referred to horses or aristocratic families. In the following decades this word was adopted by other languages and it was soon to be used to classify human collectives. At first the term was used to refer to a ‘Christian race’ in contrast to the Jews, Pagans and later Muslims. After the recapture of the Iberian peninsula by the Spaniards in 1492 the Andalusian Jews and Muslims were forced to adopt the Christian faith. In fact, most converts still practiced their previous faith secretly and were accused of doing so. Thus, beside the purity of faith, the purity of blood became an issue and soon the word ‘race’ referred to origin, which, in the case of Andalusia, was either Christian, Jewish or Muslim.
The emergence of colonialism in the 15th and 16th century and the values of the Age of Enlightenment led to the development of the so-called ‘race theory’. The thinkers of the Enlightenment were convinced that there is a structured order in nature which led to the concept of ‘scala naturae’, an imagination of a natural hierarchy in which homo sapient is the most superior species and monkeys being the most superior animals. The black African was considered as the link between fauna and the species homo sapient. In this context many scholars of the Age of Enlightenment categorized the human species on behalf of their skin color, type of hair or character into races and concluded that one race is superior or inferior to another, thus making race a biological category.
In the 19th century Darwin’s theory of evolution accelerated this thinking in biological categories, leading to the concept of race-struggle. The heyday of race-struggle hysteria peaked in National Socialist Germany between 1933-1945, causing an ideology of aggressive racism and an attempt to conquer Eastern Europe, to wipe out its Jewish population and to enslave the original Slavic population. The aim was the founding of the so called ‘thousand year old reich’ with German-Aryan supremacy in Europe. In the Reich itself laws to protect ‘German blood and German honor’ were implemented and inter-marriages and sexual encounters between different races were prohibited and persecuted brutally.
Paradigm shift after World War 2.
The experience of the holocaust and the encounters with the cruelty of colonial regimes caused a major paradigm shift in Europe and in a dogma of unquestionable premises. The 60s student revolts in France, Germany, Japan and other western countries as well as the civil rights movement led by Martin Luther King in the USA are a result of a new set of values which is emphasizing the individual and a humanistic worldview, finally causing a sensibility on issues concerning social problems, including racism and on how to deal with social outcasts like homosexuals, disabled people etc.
Scientific attempts were made to disprove the race theory. Geneticists found out that gene-codes among individuals of a group who share a similar appearance have broader varieties compared to individuals with a different appearance. Thus, the term ‘race’ as a biological categorization of humans is scientifically wrong. Therefore the term ‘ethnic group’ is more accurate when referring to a group of people with a similar appearance and similar cultural background.
Since the 1960s societies in Europe are in transition and have lost their homogeneous setting due to an influx of immigrants from other parts of the world. In many European countries campaigns are launched to tackle stereotype thinking and to reduce prejudices to maintain social peace and promote integration. Somehow it’s leading to a form of exaggerated political correctness. For example the term ‘negro’ is absolutely unacceptable in contemporary German media. Instead the term ‘maximum pigmented’ is used in official forms and ‘German with African root’ is the term used in the media. Even the word foreigner is considered as judging when referring to non-Germans. The official language refers to these individuals as ‘person with migration background’. This phenomenon is not unique to Germany; it is a phenomenon in entire Europe. This is where Europeans got their ‘pink colored sunglasses’ from. It has to be seen in the context of the emergence of a humanistic, individualistic worldview which became an ideological dogma.
‘Race’ in Malaysia
Let’s come back to Malaysia. Prior to the British colonial regime, racism or thinking in racial categories as a biological term was alien to Southeast Asia. In the Malay language a word for ‘race’ as a biological category is missing. The term ‘bangsa’ is used to refer to ethnic groups, nations or people, but is not equivalent to ‘race’.
It were the Europeans, especially the British, who imported the idea of human ‘races’. Just skim over Frank Swettenham’s script ‘the Real Malay’ and notice his judgment on the culture of the original Malay during the heyday of British colonialism and link it to their ‘divide and rule’ policy. The ideological foundation in the shaping of race-based economic functions and roles like Malay farmers (the noble savage), Chinese tin miners or businessmen and Indian estate workers has to be seen in the context of the European concept of inferior and superior races.
Even though a consciousness of otherness and a identification with economic roles among the societies on the Malayan Peninsula emerged, there was never an understanding of being inferior or superior compared to another ethnic group, either Malay, Chinese or Indian. Malay nationalism developed not in a chauvinist manner. It emerged because there was a feeling that Malay culture is facing extinction after the proposal of the Malayan Union. In fact, the proposal of the Malayan Union was the first encounter of Malays with Europeans wearing the ‘pink colored sunglasses’.
Conclusion
The Western difficulty in dealing with the Malaysian ‘race-issue’ is caused by a major misunderstanding which goes beyond the semantics of the actual term. There is some kind of Western chauvinism in the context of norms and values. The Western encounter with its historical failures implemented a chauvinist dogma which is shaping the worldview of many Western observers.
The Malaysian race issue is questioning the dogmatic premise of the (formal and legal) equality of races (or, as we know now, ethnic groups). This premise is seen as universal and therefore unquestionable. In Malaysia the legal equality of races is relativised by the premise of economic power. Chinese (from a Malay perspective immigrant) economic supremacy which emerged from the colonial divide and rule policy placed them in a powerful position and threatened the political power of the local Malay rulers (‘ketuanan melayu’). This fact is ignored by western observers due to their dogmatic premise of equality, or in other words, their ‘pink sunglasses’.
In favor of a broader understanding, not just in the Malaysian race-issue,the book of Plea For Empathy should be sent to Western critics and observers who always emphasize the premises of their ideological dogma which emerged in a different culture and history. One should leave his ‘pink colored sunglasses’ at home and honestly try to understand other cultures
by Nurman Nowak
Nurman Nowak was an intern with JUST from August until September 2010. Currently, he is pursuing his degree in Asia Studies in University of Bonn, Germany