Today Malaysia is witnessing what appears to be a re-run of a familiar national soap opera: The country's political temperature has risen as a result of competitive demands on the part of various ethno-linguistic groups, calling for the defence of vernacular education. The rationale, to put it simply, seems to be that Malaysia's multi-ethnic, multi-racial and multi-linguistic character can and should be defended via the medium of a differentiated schooling system where parents are allowed to send their children to schools of their choice, and some of these schools happen to be vernacular schools where the medium of instruction is in the language of that specific community.

Needless to say, education is a complex and often controversial topic in most countries. In Europe, for instance, we have witnessed the same debate over the future of national schools catering to specific minority groups. The ban on the use of headscarves for Muslim students in the schools in France and the attempts to regulate the development of Turkish schools in Germany both point to the same thing: the fear that the national educational system will not be able to accommodate multiculturalism and that the demands of culturally/religiously/linguistically-specific education will give rise to even more divisive communitarianism.

In a somewhat bizarre twist, the proponents of multiculturalism in both societies today happen to be among the most conservative, exclusive and communitarian-minded representatives of their communities. In both France and Germany, the groups calling for separate Muslim (or religious) education tend to be the most defensive representatives of the Muslim communities themselves. In contrast, defenders of the national education system now find themselves labeled as 'intolerant assimilationists' who wish to erase all diversity under the cloak of national consensus and integration. The torrid and spiteful debate lumbers on as the kids, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, slip into the school backyard to enjoy a quiet moment of glue-sniffing together

Communitarianism and centrifugal forces

Allow me to state my position clearly before we proceed: I am against all forms of communitarian politics and this would necessarily include communitarian education. Needless to say, I have never supported the idea of separate racial/ethnic/linguistic or religious education for the simple reason that such demands are invariably predicated on communitarian needs that are short-term, exclusive and ultimately self-defeating.

The problem with the situation we face today in Malaysia is evident when we see how the demands for separate vernacular education is being supported by none other than the hard-core Islamists of the country, who obviously spy an opportunity for them to further their own demands for separate religious schooling for the Malay-Muslim constituency.

Now it doesn't take a genius to realize the implications of these demands when they are put together as a set of interests: Should the Malay-Muslim religious educational lobby and the Malaysian Chinese-vernacular education lobby get their way, Malaysia's already fragile social fabric will be further torn apart by centrifugal forces bent on emphasizing differences, rather than commonalities, between Malaysians. One can project oneself into the not-too-distant future and imagine a society where Malay-Muslims will be going to madrasahs, learning Arabic and Arab-Muslim history; while the country's Chinese and Indian communities will be taught in their own respective languages. Where then will be the place for a common public and national culture? How, pray tell, will Malaysians ever be able to communicate in a common discursive space?

When Malaysia's right-wing Islamists support the Chinese vernacular educationists, we should be immediately aware of what this entails: This is not some partnership of equals, but rather a instrumental coalition between groups that are equally apprehensive of each other. The only common point that unites them is the fact that neither the Islamists nor the Chinese vernacularists want their kids to be sent to schools with the children of other communities. One is reminded of the ironic conjunction of interests between the Nazis of Germany and conservative German Jews: When the Nazis introduced new laws to keep Germans and Jews apart, they were supported by the conservative Jews who likewise did not want members of their community to interact with the German mainstream. (We all know where this divisive communitarian politics led in the case of Germany, but more of that later)

It is a clich perhaps to state that the singular factor that unites all Malaysians is racism, but it remains true nonetheless. The calls for separate religious and vernacular education reveals this subtext and for that reason the demands of the educational communitarians should be exposed for what it is, nothing more than divisive communitarianism fuelling the centrifugal tendencies that are tearing this nation apart.

But this in turns opens up another can of worms: If Malaysian society today is being torn apart at the seams; and more and more groups are calling for ethnic/linguistic/cultural and religious separatism, what does this say about Malaysia's efforts at nation-building? If Chinese parents want to send their kids to vernacular Chinese schools, what does this say about the performance of our national schools themselves? This is the real question that has not been addressed, least of all by the hot-headed demagogues of the ruling UMNO party and the Barisan Nasional coalition.

Where is Malaysia's Chinese and Indian history? Why nation-building has failed in Malaysia?

A nation-state is, by definition and praxis, an artificial entity that has to be constructed. In some cases, such as the nation-state of Pakistan, the nation-state itself may be a totally fictitious entity with no basis in history. In others, such as the case of Indonesia, it may fall back on a gamut of inter-connected histories that span the expanse of its political borders. Malaysia seems to be a combination of both.

It cannot be denied that 'Malaysia' as we know it today is a modern postcolonial construct. The colonial vestiges of the past can be seen in the political institutions of the Malaysian state itself, as well as the less-than-attractive set of colonial laws (such as the Internal Security Act) that the British left behind in the care of the 'natives'. Another colonial vestige from the past is the logic of colonial governmentality and the divisive politics of race, which the British used to legitimize and rationalize what was really a colonial politics of divide and rule.

So deeply entrenched is this logic of race and racism that Malaysian politics remains divided along ethnic/racial/cultural lines till today. And it is thanks to the right-wing ruling parties of the Barisan Nasional that Malaysian society has hardly progressed at all when it comes to the development of a broad, abstract and non-racialised sense of collective national identity that is inclusive and accommodating. Is it a surprise, therefore, that the spectre of ugly sectarianism is rearing its head today?

Since 1957, Malaysia's political culture has been determined by the three cardinal points of Malaysian politics: Malay communitarianism, modern authoritarianism (that is founded on neo-feudalism) and politicized Islam. Demographic realities point to the growing dominance and political clout of the Malay-Muslims, a factor that is further compounded by the narrow and self-destructive 'Islamisation race' between the two dominant Malay-Muslim parties UMNO and PAS. This self-referential politics, which focuses almost exclusively on winning the Malay-Muslim vote, has effectively sidelined and silenced the other voices in the country on all levels, from the political to the economic and cultural. Of course one of its first victims was the educational system itself.

For a new and artificial country like Malaysia, our priority should have been the cobbling together of a national educational system that was inclusive, open, plural and abstract enough to include as many cultural/ethnic/linguistic groups into the national imaginary. Successful instances of nation-building include the United States of America which, despite its legacy of imperialism, colonialism, slavery and racism managed to put together a sense of collective identity which allowed individual citizens to claim their place as Americans. Proof of this success is evident when we see American minority groups (ranging from ethnic minorities to gender minorities) articulate their demands as Americans and for Americans.

Sadly, this never happened in Malaysia for the simple reason that the other minority groups were never made to feel welcomed as Malaysians. The divisive communitarian politics of the first four decades of post-independence witnessed instead the rise of ethnic/racial/religious sectarianism, with key Malay-Muslim leaders (ranging from the 'ultras' of UMNO in the 1960s to Asri Muda's PAS in the 1970s right up to the hot-heads in UMNO Youth today) insisting on the superiority and dominance of the Malays above all else. 'Ketuanan Melayu' (which today is further compounded by 'Ketuanan Islam') guaranteed the failure of nation-building by systematically marginalizing the other communities in the country.

Proof of this is found in our national educational system today: For those hot-headed Malay chauvinists in UMNO who claim that Malaysian Chinese are being 'unpatriotic' by demanding separate education, one presents this simple question: IF you were born as a Chinese or Indian woman in this country, where is your place in the nation's history? Official Malaysian historiography leaves no space and gives no mention to the contribution of women and the other non-Malay communities in the cultural, economic and political development of what is now known as Malaysia. When was the last time you read about a non-Malay or a Malaysian woman who played an active and important role in the birth of the nation? Centuries of cross-cultural contact and interaction have been deliberately neglected in the writing of our history books, and in the teaching of history in our schools we overlook the contribution of ALL the racial/cultural/ethnic groups that went into the creation of Malaysia. Is it a surprise, then, that non-Malays feel the need to pull out of the system?

The question can be broadened to include the question of language itself.

Related to Malaysia's racial and ethnic diversity is its rich linguistic diversity as well. Yet none of the Chinese languages (Mandarin, Hokkein, Cantonese, etc) or the Indian languages (Urdu/Hindi, Tamil, etc) that are spoken by Malaysians are even deemed worthy of being included in the national curriculum as legitimate subjects for Malaysian students to choose. So if a Malay or Indian student wishes to learn Mandarin, does he/she have to go to a Chinese vernacular school then? Why is this option not available in our national education system itself?

This is the impasse that we have created for ourselves in Malaysia: Our collective failure to pursue a national destiny that includes all of us opens the way for right-wing sectarian demagogues who play the racial/communitarian card and pander to our communitarian insecurities. Malay supremacists harp on and on about the 'decline of the Malay race'; Chinese communitarians talk about the eventual 'erasure of Chinese identity'; while conservative Islamists scare the wits out of their followers with sordid conspiracy theories about the 'war against Islam'. All of these groups be they the majoritarian-supremacists of the Malay community or the sectarians among the Islamists and Chinese vernacularists can only think in the limited terms of their own communitarian politics; and none of them have the nation as a whole at heart.

Compounding the problem even further are the obvious differentials of power and demographics that determine that some communitarian groups are seen and portrayed as 'more unreasonable' than others (while the fact remains that all communitarian groups are equally unreasonable in their exclusive demands). This is why, for instance, the Chinese educationist lobby is constantly attacked on the grounds of their so-called 'racial exclusivism' while the proponents of the Islamic educational system (SAR) who happen to be Malay Muslims are treated more lightly in comparison. Proof of this can be seen in the fiery rhetoric of the vernacular Malay press and the language used by some Umno leaders, who have gone as far as re-casting the Chinese education lobby as 'closet communists' and fifth columnists in the country; while the logic of 'Malay communal ties' guarantees that the proponents of the Sekolah Agama Rakyat are still seen as 'Malay brothers'.

Is there a way out of this mess that we ourselves have created? Well, one step would be to vote into power a government that is more inclined to put the nation as a whole as its main concern but that can only happen in a few years time. The immediate thing to do is to remind ourselves, time and again, of the inter-connectedness of Malaysian identity and the fact that this national space is one for each and every one of us. We are still a long way off from a conscious rejection of the divisive politics of race (as most Malaysians still think in terms of race and cannot even think of each other as fellow Malaysians, how pathetic); and have not even begun a conscious internal critique of our mixed, hybrid and artificial national identity.

Malaysia needs an educational system that is truly national, and speaks to and of the diversity within the national body politic. But this would have to be a national educational system that reflects the diversity within us, as well as the numerous grey-zones of hybridity that exists in our mixed-up popular language, pop culture and even our private lives. Can such a deconstructive and self-interrogating educational system ever emerge in Malaysia? Unless we are prepared to question some of our most basic assumptions, beliefs and prejudices, don't bet on it.