This article “The Effect of Government Policy and Institution on Chinese

Overseas Acculturation: The Case of Malaysia” is written by Amy. L. Freedman

(Department of Government Franklin and Marshall College) in 2001.

The aim of this article focuses on how Malaysia’s political institution and

policies have constrained Chinese acculturation with the dominant Malay population.

As education is the most important aspect of acculturation, the author narrowed down

her attention on how the political institutions and Malaysia’s education policy have

attempted to incorporate the Malaysian Chinese in to Malaysian society under clear

Malay leadership and dominance. The methodology used in this study is a literary

analysis, survey, and data from secondary sources. Students of Malaysian politics and

sociology will find this article is useful information.

This article gave various definition and approach of acculturation or

immigrant assimilation adapted from American Sociologists. Among these

sociologists, cultural adaptation approach is best suited with Malaysia situation.

Eileen Tamura used this sort of cultural adaptation approach to analyse Japanese

acculturation into American life of Hawaii (1994). The result shows that Japanese

Americans in Hawaii have maintain a distinct sense of their Japanese heritage. While

David Brown’s (1994) approach suggests that ethnicity can be manipulated by

political elites to mobilize people into ethno-nationalist movement, or it can nurture

the understanding that such divisions natural within society. State can manipulate an

ideology of a dominant cultural community which can then be used to legitimate the

political order. Malaysia is a strong example for this theory.

The author begins the articles by giving an overview on the history of Chinese

immigrant into Malaysia more than one hundred years ago, but still maintained a

distinct Chinese identity and culture. This article suggest that Chinese in Malaysia are
less acculturated than Chinese in neighbouring country such as Thailand and

Philippine. This is happened due to nature of political system in Malaysia that

separates political parties (Malay-UMNO, Chinese- MCA, and Indian- MIC) and

educational institutions (national schools versus Chinese schools and Indian schools).

This article is, then, about controversial topic- the NEP and how Malaysia’s education

policies are shaped by ethnic factors. Politics and institutions had played an important

role in shaping the education policy in Malaysia. The Independence Constitution of

1957 has institutionalized the Malay special rights that evolved as part of complex

negotiation for multi-ethnic rule in post-colonial Malaysia. An agreement was reached

where Malays would retain their political pre-eminence while the Chinese

community’s economic position would be undisturbed. Furthermore, Chinese and

Indian would be allowed to maintain their heritage.

However, the ethnic riot that happened in May 1969 due to the economic

imbalance between wealthier Chinese and the less well-off native Malays had resulted

to the declaration of New Economic Policy (NEP). The author suggests the NEP as a

translation of Malay constitutional privileges into actual policy. The government had

imposed language, education, and employment policies favouring Malays that

contribute to the ethnic boundary maintenance. These policies have impacted the

Chinese communal political influence and economic opportunities. The author argues

that NEP and the development of economic growth and dynamism in Malaysia only

benefited the upper-class of economic elite of both Malays and non-Malays. Malays

of all socio-economic class may have enjoyed greater political status, but economic

gains were not distributed across all divides

The third part of this article discussed on the role of political institutions in

maintaining ethnic distinction in Malaysia; the party system and the strength of the
executive. UMNO as a domination party in political system in Malaysia, acting in

autonomous manner of controlling the main institution in Malaysia; the bureaucracy,

the armed forced, judiciary and the monarchy, which in favour of Malay interest. This

article suggests that the limitation on public sector and department minister of non-

Malay employment led to Malay bias in policy implementation, particularly in

education policy.

Since independence, Malaysian government policy that allowed Chinese

vernacular school had constraint the process of Chinese acculturation in Malaysia.

After several changes in education policy regarding Chinese in Malaysia, Chinese

schools compelled to adopt a Malay-centred curriculum, but there is still

discrimination against Chinese in tertiary education such as quotas in educational

opportunities; particularly in scholarships and college admissions. The author strongly

stressed that not all Chinese want their children to be educated in Chinese-type

school, but they want fair access to tertiary institution and job market.

In order to promote acculturation, government should take actions to close

Chinese schools. But no educational policy had tried seriously to do so, due to the

nature of political parties in Malaysia that based on ethnic communal, the role of

community activism that promotes vernacular education, and significantly most of the

leaders tended to focus only on the stability and economic growth rather than taking

step towards cultural accommodation.

Even though declarations have been made about Malaysian citizenship in

which all citizens share a national identity, but the preferential treatments favouring

Malays in education and government still distinguish Malay from non-Malay. Efforts

to create more nationalist discourse and identity seem to be difficult because the

benefits and opportunities of government policies are not distributed blindly.

The author concluded the article by suggesting that Chinese political and social

acculturation within Malay population faces institutional and political barriers. Based

on typology used in this article has shown that Malaysia has a modest degree of

acculturation compared to Thailand (high) and Indonesia (modest). What is

significantly different for these countries is their political institution and policies

which have resulted not only on how Chinese are treated, but to the extent on which

cultural practices of the Chinese have been accepted and incorporated with the large

population. In order to promote acculturation of the Chinese with the Malay

population, political institutions and policy-making should be based on interest rather

than on identity.