Democratizing Malaysia

Rajan Rishyakaran, October 26, 2007

English, Rajan, Columns |

By Rajan Rishyakaran

One of my favourite current classes is Democracy (yes, the irony of learning that in Singapore never ceases to amaze me). My favourite topic in it is transitions to democracy. According to Samuel Huntington, there exist three broad categories for democratization, namely transformation, replacement and “transplacement”.

For transformation, the idea here is that the dictatorship gradually moves itself to a democracy without significant pressure from the opposition. A good example here is Taiwan – Lee Teng-hui was not under any significant amount of pressure to democratize (in fact, he was probably under more pressure within the Kuomintang to retain the authoritarian strictures that existed before him).

Here’s the problem with transformation: the government needs to want to democratize. In Malaysia, there are too many vested interest within the current political system to make it hard to change the system “from within”. Abdullah had a chance when he first became Prime Minister, knowing that he had broad popular support (unlike many rent-seeking wings within the Barisan Nasional), but he didn’t capitalize on that.

It is important in this case that the leader has a vested interest to democratize. With Lee, it was simple: his succession after Chiang Chung-kuo was not taken with ease by the Kuomintang’s nationalist wing (Lee was an independence-leaning Taiwan native, most conservatives within the Kuomintang are Mainlanders leaning towards eventual reunification with China).

Thus democratic reform was necessary for continuity of his presidency beyond the first term (the immensely charismatic Lee was the first directly elected president in Taiwan).

Neither exists in Malaysia as it is.

Then we look at reformation, where the opposition gets so strong, but the government refuses to deal with it, leading to its overthrow. Examples are abundance – East Germany, Romania, the Philippines. The problem with such a shift is that it often lack the well-developed institutions needed by a democracy. Especially so in Malaysia, where the overthrow of the present government through popular protest or the similar may not lead to a democratic outcome.

The last, and seemingly most preferred, manner of transition is what Huntington called “transplacement” –essentially, where the government negotiates itself out of power and thus accorded with guarantees. A good example would be South Africa, where without a deal with the African National Congress, the Apartheid government would not last long – placing its current leaders at risk.

Yet on the other hand, it lacks the incentives to pursue a transformation (no white party would be elected by a predominantly black population, one that was severely persecuted at that).

In Malaysia, however, the government has no incentive to compromise with the opposition – the opposition is no where as strong as the opposition in Apartheid South Africa.

But let’s take a moment and look at the strategies of the opposition. Most seem content with fighting within the political system within Malaysia, despite Barisan Nasional having a structural advantage. In fact, it would seem, by working within the present political framework, it only legitimizes it, giving it some semblance of democratic credentials.

What’s harrowing about the opposition in Malaysia is the seeming lack of strategy in gaining power or pushing through democracy. While yes, I don’t particularly have a solution in mind – but opposition parties working through the present electoral system doesn’t seem to fit.

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