The practitioner of politics and the political scientist who studies the former's vocation are both obliged to labour under the same conditions, the first of which happens to be the necessity of basing all their actions, thoughts and deeds on objective facts.

Yet oddly enough the art of politics has often taken into account values and ideas that can hardly be described as objective or factual in nature - indeed, some of the key concepts in daily politics can be downright irrational. Machiavellian instincts aside, the dark art of realpolitik often ascribes merit to deeds achieved and less to nobler intentions professed or aspired to. As long as the maxim 'the ends justify the means' holds sway, then even instrumental fictions will remain the cornerstones of political life and practice - often to the detriment of us all.

Of all the vain conceits and hypocritical lies that have crept into the everyday practice of politics, none have caused more damage or incurred a higher cost than the bane of sectarianism and communitarianism. Simple and simplistic as they are, the appeal to communitarian and/or sectarian interests is the first refuge of the scoundrel-turned-politician. When all else fails and rhetoric alone will no longer suffice, there is nothing easier than to turn to the common thread of fellow-feeling and to revert to the destructive dialectics of 'Us' against 'Them'.

Distorted picture

Underlying the communitarian and sectarian politics of Malaysia is the lie that we are separated into distinct blocs that come under the rubric of 'race'. Since childhood Malaysians have been taught first by their parents and then their teachers that they are divided into separate 'races', notably the Malays, Chinese, Indians and that troublesome category summarily denoted as 'Others'.

Our history books invariably paint a distorted picture of Malaysian history as a linear progression that leads to its teleological conclusion: the creation and maintenance of the so-called 'racial compromise' that is intended to keep this fragile racial balance in check and society in order.

Yet it doesn't take a professor of history to tell you that much of this official, state-sanctioned and state-reproduced historiography is pure fiction. In fact, the premises of the Malaysian national compromise itself is pure fiction; a fictional compromise that is used to disguise the collusion of class elites across the racial divide; and the so-called 'remedy' to the so-called 'problem' of racial instability itself another fable woven to beguile the masses.

If we were to interrogate the premises of the Malaysian narrative further, it will become clear how this state of affairs first came about and whose interests it really serves.

Colonial census

'Race' is a fictional category. Let that be our starting premise. The notion that the human race can be divided into separate races is a fiction coined up by generations of Western Orientalist scholars from Count Gobineau up to T E Lawrence and Rudyard Kipling, in order to rationalise and justify a divisive politics of divide and rule that was meant to help the colonial powers carve up the world into manageable chunks of humanity that could be divided against each other.

In Africa entire nations were divided according to this logic where tribes and communities were suddenly endowed with traits and essential characteristics deemed irreconcilable. The same was the case in Asia - particularly India - where the British colonial powers decided to divide the Indians into different racial blocs, summarily describing the Bengalese, for instance, as 'effeminate' while others such as the Rajputs and Pathans were described as 'martial races'.

It doesn't require much intelligence to see where this would all lead and whose interests were being served in the long run: The net result was an artificial society divided along the lines of 'race', which was in turn supervised, owned and maintained by the British.

The same logic of divide and rule was at work in British Burma and Malaya and here too the logic of racial division was maintained. The British divided the Burmese population into Burmans, Shans, Karens, etc. - who were in turn allocated specific roles in the divided colonial set up. In the case of Malaya, the British made great efforts to ensure that the various ethnic groups were kept apart, with separate cantonments and areas allocated to different ethnic groupings.

Charles Hirshman (1) has noted that the British colonial authorities from the time of Stamford Raffles were not primarily concerned with the massive inflow of Chinese migrant workers into the Malay states and Straits Settlements. The Chinese coolies served both as a source of cheap exploitable labour as well as a market for goods that the British themselves enjoyed a monopoly over: 'The British colonial establishment, both in the Straits Settlements and for the early decades of their rule in the Malay states, was almost completely dependent upon Chinese entrepreneurial activity for their economic base' (1986, pg. 346), he notes.

To keep this inherently unjust condition in check, the colonial authorities enforced a series of measures that heralded the era of colonial 'race-relations' which was effectively based on the principle of divide and rule. Charles Hirshman has noted that 'modern race relations... in the sense of impenetrable group boundaries, were a by-product of British colonialism of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Direct colonial rule brought European racial theory and constructed a social and economic order

structured by 'race'. Racial theories of difference that explained and justified the necessity of 'paternalistic' domination over the coloured races further allowed the British to intrude into the affairs of the Malay kingdoms.(2) The hardening of ethnic cleavages in turn allowed the creation of segregated communities, each with its own internal power-structures and vertical ruling hierarchies, all of which turned to the Western colonising power as the arbiter and final policing authority that would keep these groups apart as well as manage the allocation of wealth and resources among them.

Crucial apparatus

To this end, the colonial census was the most crucial ideological apparatus at the disposal of the colonial government, for it was through the use of the colonial census that the creation and enforcement of these racial and ethnic divisions could be achieved. In his study of the making of 'race' in colonial Malaya, Hirshman considers how the political economy of the colonial- capitalist state in Malaya was founded in part upon a racial ideology that helped to facilitate and justify both British intervention in Malay affairs as well as their continued presence in the colonies.

The impact of this ideology made itself most acutely felt in the way that it rigidly categorised and compartmentalised the different cultural and racial groupings into their appointed spaces. Hirshman's comparative study of the ethnic labels used in the different census from 1871 to 1931 and beyond is very instructive in this respect.

In the 1891 and 1911 census of the Federated Malay States (FMS), for instance, there was no unitary definition of 'Malay'. Instead the 'Malay race' was divided into groups and subgroups that included Malays, Achinese, Amboinese, Balinese, Bandong, Bahjarese, Bantamese, Bataks, Boyanese, Bugis, Bundu, Dayaks, Dusuns, Javanese, Jawipekans, Kadayans, Korinchi, Rawanese, Sulu, Sundanese and Tutongs.

The 'Chinese race' in turn included China-born and Straits-born Cantonese, Hokkiens, Hylams, Khehs, Nanyangs and Teo-Chews. While the 'Indian races' included Tamils, Telugus, Punjabis, Bengalis, Malayalis, Hindustanis, Afghans, Gujeratis, Maharattas and Burmese.

It was only much later that these complex categories were simplified into the general groups 'Malay', 'Chinese' and 'Indian' - to help the colonial authorities simplify the process of domination and colonisation even further. The colonial census was crucial in the process, for it ensured that the boundaries of race would be maintained and policed as the colonial power extended its influence.

Lasting legacy

In time the colonial census and the logic of racial differentiation would serve as the foundation for modern Malaya and the post-colonial Malaysian state. Try as they might, the ruling elite of the country cannot deny the fact that they too have become the inheritors of the coloniser's logic and mind-set and nowhere is this more embarrassingly evident than in the set up of the ruling parties themselves: The ruling Barisan Nasional coalition in Malaysia is made up of more than a dozen parties that are ideologically similar save one respect: they are divided along racial lines.

Racial politics has thus become the most lasting legacy of the colonial era in Malaysia. Despite the rhetoric that we have been fed since the 1980s - about how Malaysia needs to shed its links to its colonial past - the way in which the country is governed and the logic that animates the process of government itself in Malaysia, is deeply rooted in the logic of race and communitarian politics. But now, as then, this cosmetic facade is used to hide the underlying co-operation and consensus among the ruling business and political elite that cuts across boundaries of race and communities.

The corruption scandals of the 1980s for instance point to the extent to which the Malay and Chinese ruling and business elite have been working closely together, and how this intra-elite compromise has served to keep Malaysian society divided all along.

Yet this is a form of politics that is highly unstable and unpredictable. For a start the constant erasure and foreclosure of other legitimate concerns (such as the possibility of inter-racial co-operation on class-based issues) requires an active vigilance on the part of the ruling elite, who in turn have to 'buy off' opposition via the distribution of funds and patronage.

In order to keep the BN formula in operation the state is forced to play off one constituency against each other, issuing promises of reward (and/or threats of retribution) to those who co-operate. It leads to a distorted political economy where universal citizenship becomes secondary to one's racial identity and belonging to a particular racial grouping.

The question is: how long can such an artificial and unstable compromise be maintained? How long can the Malaysian governmental apparatus be used to perpetuate a system that is fundamentally artificial, contradictory and based on premises that are patently false? And how long can we - the citizens of Malaysia - stand by and allow this state of affairs to continue?

As long as 'Race' remains the cornerstone of Malaysian political life and political practice, we shall remain a society divided against itself and unable to see beyond the fictions of the colonial era. After half a century of being in power the ruling coalition has proven that it is unable and/or unwilling to interrogate the premises of its own political project, and we, the Malaysian people, remain divided as our forefathers. Are we prepared to allow ourselves and the generations to come to be deluded by the same fictions that have divided us for so long?

Change needed

It is for this reason that Malaysians must take stock of their achievements to date and consider the cost of their apathy and casual neglect. The Malaysian middle-class in particular have proven to be the most stalwart defenders of the status quo, fearful of change and the contingencies that will arise as a result of it. But ironically the middle-classes - who mostly reside in the more developed cosmopolitan urban areas of Malaysia - are the ones who have the most to benefit from a radical change to the status quo.

A rejection of race-based politics is not and will not lead to the end of the world; indeed for many it is the only way to move on to a better world where pluralism, tolerance, meritocracy and democratic values may prevail. It would mean that Malaysian society would have evolved to the point where one's ethnic or religious identity does not determine one's fate or one's place in society on a permanent basis, but rather opens up opportunities to the best and most able among us. It would mean that we would have evolved to the point where we support politicians and leaders who take into account the welfare of all Malaysians (regardless of their ethnic or religious background) and whose constituency happens to be the Malaysian public itself.

In the light of today's realities, when Malaysia has plugged itself into the cosmopolitan global current and is open to the latest developments abroad, Malaysian society needs to evolve to be able to adapt to present-day demands. A country that hopes to ride the wave of globalisation cannot be stuck in the primordial morass of ethnic or race-based politics, for we all know where that will lead us to: The examples of the Balkans and Rwanda come to mind.

Yet the middle-classes in countries like Malaysia have yet to garner the courage and foresight to make that vital step that will allow them to vote for positive change; even though as a group they are the ones who will benefit the most. For the sake of Malaysia's future, and the future of all Malaysians; and to ensure that this country will be able to adapt to the changes of the age we live in, we need to make that decisive step now:

Vote for the candidate who is committed to a politics of anti-racism and anti-communitarianism; or make it clear to your prospective member of Parliament that that is what you want her/him to fight for. We have lived under the yoke of a colonial mindset long enough. This time round, vote for change and vote to break away from the colonial fallacy of race politics once and for all.

Endnotes:

(1) See: Charles Hirshman, The Making of Race in Colonial Malaya: Political Economy and Racial Ideology , in Sociological Forum (SF), Vol. 1. no.2. 1986. Cornell University Press. and The Meaning and Measurement of Ethnicity in Malaysia: An Analysis of Census Classifications in Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 46: 3. 1987.

(2) See: Syed Hussein Alatas, The Myth of the Lazy Native: A Study of the image of the Malays, Filipinos and Javanese from the 16th to the 20th century and its function in the ideology of Colonial Capitalism , Frank Cass, London. 1977.