opinion

The differentiation of Dr Mahathir Mohamad on the basis of personality/character and ideology is simply an ideational attempt to reveal differentiation for the sake of differentiation.

Such an attempt provides little understanding as how to decipher this man who has administered the country in a most authoritarian manner for the past twenty years.

Superstructural considerations are important, but they cannot be simply regarded as devoid of any laws that link the ideational realm to the material one. In fact, I would tend to argue that too much focus on the ideational realm reveals too much contradictions about his personality, character, his ideology and others.

While investigation into this realm is important without the temptation of reductionism, the ideational realm alone cannot fully explain Mahathir in the larger political economy context. In others words, a more holistic understanding of the man must emerge by linking the ideational with the material realm.

Focusing on the ideational basically displays features of his character, his family background, his humble beginnings, his character and his political ideology in terms of a number of salient features of Malaysian politics such as race, religion, development and others.

There are two aspects to this ideational focus; one seeks to show his positive qualities such as strong and able leadership qualities - a leader very much focused in taking Malaysia to great heights, a critique of the West, a no-nonsense person, and others.

The other aspect seeks to highlight the negative qualities of Mahathir such as his dictatorship-like qualities, a person who has no respect for laws, not inclined to promote democracy, surrounded by corrupted cronies and sycophants, a very cruel person and others.

Avowed objective

The problem with the ideational perspective is that this two-sided focus is often seen as mutually exclusive, but in reality it is not. In fact, an actual investigation of the character and personality of Mahathir would easily reveal that he has come to possess very contradictory qualities; qualities that are often selectively appropriated by others for their own political and ideological reasons.

While the ideational realm might have the tendency to project contradictory qualities of Mahathir as a person, leader and an ideologue, the material realm might project the real Mahathir.

In this respect, Marx's analysis reveals very clearly that despite the notion of Louis Bonaparte as a popular emperor, he was for all intents and purposes the spokesperson for the capitalist class.

Similarly, while we can engage in endless debate on Mahathir's personal and leadership qualities, he is after all an agent of the country's capitalist class. Two decades of his stewardship has shown to us very clearly that Mahathir, despite his humble beginnings, is a leader who came to power with avowed objective of creating a Malay capitalist class.

For the last twenty years, he was so enthused in creating and sustaining a Malay capitalist class that he lost all sense of balance in effecting a proper administration that would cater for the interests of all groups and classes.

Ironically, it was the inability of his administration in creating and sustaining this class that propelled him to seek accommodation with other fractions of capitalist classes, notably the Chinese and foreigners.

In fact, there are no major contradictions between Mahathir and other non-Malay fractions of the capitalist class. In later years, when the main objective of the New Economic Policy (NEP) failed, he turned to foreigners to help the Malay fraction out.

Capitalist heaven

He had no great love for ordinary Malays, peasants, workers and other subaltern sections of the Malaysian society. His numerous speeches easily reveal that he has more faith in the capitalist classes resolving problems of unemployment and material growth of the poor sections of the Malaysian society.

He often chided workers to cooperate with employers rather than using trade unions to for their material advancement. During economic crises, his government was more prone to assist the capitalists, the elite and other higher echelons of the Malaysian society.

During the recent financial crises, he defended reasons the government had to bail out the rich and the powerful. The most affected sections of the society were left to fend for themselves.

He was against the Opposition and the populist politics of PAS simply because they interfered with his dream of turning Malaysia into a capitalist heaven. Demonstrations, resistance to his administration and others, were considered anti-development.

When they went beyond a certain parameter, Mahathir, despite his occasional shedding of tears, did not hesitate to use the Internal Security Act (ISA) and other draconian laws to stifle opposition to his grandiose capitalist plans.

He ousted his deputy Anwar Ibrahim as the latter had the potential to unseat him in the political realm. Of course, such an attempt might have prevented him from delivering the 'promised land' to Malaysians.

Great service

I will argue that the differentiation of the qualities of Mahathir as person and as a leader at the ideational realm has projected him as very strong and positive leader to many. But this differentiation, often taken very naively, does not pay attention to the highly consistent character and role of Mahathir as the defender of capitalist interests in the country.

Thus, if the ideational and material realms are considered together in the analysis of Mahathir, we are forced to conclude that the former acts as the legitimating realm of the latter. Without this legitimating factor often found in the realm of politics and culture, it would be difficult to understand why the prime minister has survived so long in politics.

Inadvertently, many critics of Mahathir have done a great service for the man, the prime minister of Malaysia.

P RAMASAMY is a professor of political economy at the Political Science Department, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and has academic interests in Malaysian politics and labour. He has written quite extensively and is currently focusing on conflict management in Sri Lanka.