The Interplay of Race, Religion and Royalty in Contemporary Malaysian Politics

Abstract

The lengthy years of the Perikatan (Alliance) and its successor Barisan Nasional (BN) administrations (1957–2018) gave Malaysia the opportunity to construct and mould the practice of democracy. Democracy is reflected through the existence of various political parties, the holding of regular elections under closely administered electoral processes, the upholding of rights and freedoms of the people to participate in party politics and civil society, the heated interactions among multi-ethnic citizens over mainstream and social media and the limited avenues provided by the law for the populace to express and display dissent. In Peninsular Malaysian politics, fault lines along the divisive racial and religious lines appear to dominate the discursive scene, with related issues over the role of Malay royalty trailing not too distantly behind. The past decade or so has seen political fortunes of the opposition, defined here as parties that oppose BN whether separately or together in coalitions during general elections, progressively improving, culminating in Pakatan Harapan’s (PH) trouncing of BN in the fourteenth general elections (GE14) in 2018. However, in Malaysian politics, elected politicians do not by themselves fill all political gaps. In uncertain times, as have prevailed in Malaysia since Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia’s (PPBM) betrayal of PH in February 2020, the Malay monarchy has become more important than ever in deciding who and which political coalition gets to form the country’s executive branch. This chapter presents an overview of how race, religion and royalty are routinely encountered in the country’s politics, particularly over the last decade.