Policies and Politics in Malaysian Education

Education Reforms, Nationalism and Neoliberalism

Cynthia Joseph

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351377331
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Educational Policy

This book draws on elements of critical social theory, research on globalization, neo liberalism and education, and Malaysian Studies to understand the interplay of globalization, nationalism, cultural politics and ethnicized neoliberalism in shaping the educational reforms in Malaysia. Using the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013-2025 (MEB) as a case study, a catalyst and a context, this collection critically explores some of the complex historical and contemporary push-pull politics and factors shaping Malaysia's education system, its reform and the experience of Malaysians – and others – within it. The authors in this volume focus on the interplay of neoliberalism, nationalism, ethnic and cultural politics in shaping the educational reforms in Malaysia. Their work captures and seeks to understand the enduring, though changing, hierarchy of access and differentiated rights to educational, social and economic resources and opportunities experienced by different individuals and collectives, including those involved in the neoliberal enterprise of international education. It looks at how inequities have been re-configured in different educational spaces in Malaysia, and at how these inequities have been addressed through reform policies and practices. The book will be a shaper and critical contributor to the assessment of the Malaysian Education Blueprint and related policies. It will also have wider relevance globally as a critical approach to policy discussion.

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Malaysian geopolitics, ethnoscapes and education policy

Cynthia Joseph

Introduction

Precolonial and colonial histories, nationalism and contemporary global trends such as hegemonic neoliberalism exert complex push-pull dynamics, which play important roles in shaping education systems in postcolonial societies such as Malaysia (Andreotti, 2011; Coloma, 2009), the focus of this collection. Malaysia’s education system, the collective authors argue, reflects the highly stratified, ethnicized and politicized contemporary postcolonial Malaysian condition (Joseph, 2014), and the Malaysian government’s contradictory aims to train and educate its citizens to participate successfully in the global economy, while –despite rhetoric of unification –maintaining social and cultural divisions inherited from the colonial past.

Materializing and illustrating the dynamics of this Malaysian ‘assemblage’ is the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013–2025 (Preschool to post-secondary education) (Ministry of Education, 2013), henceforth referred to as MEB or the Blueprint. This document sets out, states the Malaysian prime minister in the foreword, “a comprehensive plan for a rapid and sustainable transformation of our education system” because “we cannot stand still” if Malaysia wants “to meet our high aspirations amidst an increasingly competitive global environment”, an aspiration triggered, in part, by concerns about Malaysia’s achievements on international standardized testing scales.

This concern is highlighted by the prime minister who indicates a key target is for Malaysia to rise “from the bottom-third to the top-third of countries in international assessments like PISA and TIMSS in 15 years” (MEB, Foreword). The results from the 2009 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) ranked Malaysia below the international Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average (Ministry of Education, 2013). In 2011, Malaysia was again below the average score in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). On these indices, Malaysian school pupils were lagging behind Korea, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong and Japan, the countries which occupied the top five spots worldwide. These results were recorded despite Malaysia’s almost double the OECD average (8.7 per cent) expenditure on education (Ministry of Education, 2013). In 2011, the Malaysian government spent 3.8 per cent of GDP, or 16 per cent of total government spending, which was on par with, or more than, top-performing systems such as Singapore and South Korea (Ministry of Education, 2013).

Simultaneously, the Malaysian prime minister highlights in the foreword that another of the Blueprint’s targets is to halve in ten years “the achievement gaps between the rich and poor, urban and rural, and between the states that form Malaysia”. However, he is silent on achievement gaps between social and cultural groups, instead indicating that the Blueprint aims to develop “an education system that gives children an appreciation for our unique identity as Malaysians”, a statement that appears to tacitly support rather than seeking to transform, the stratified and categorized social and cultural status quo.

Using the complexity of the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013–2025 (the Blueprint) as a case study, a catalyst and a context, this collection explores some of the push–pull politics and factors shaping Malaysia’s education system and the experience of Malaysians, and others, within it. The Blueprint is described and contextualized in more detail in the following. I first provide a critical snapshot of Malaysia at a point in time, drawing attention to the politics of difference established during the colonial era, represented by differential access to educational opportunities and economic prosperity along ethnic lines, which has resulted in socio-economic inequities that continued through to the independence and post-independence periods (Joseph, 2014). It is not the focus here, though, to pursue a detailed discussion. For a more thorough and nuanced analysis please refer to Andaya and Andaya (2001); Joseph (2014); Joseph and Matthews (2014); Lee (2012, 2014); and Maznah (2008, 2012). It is through each of the individual chapters and diverse voices of Malaysia brought together in this edited collection that a more nuanced critical analysis of educational reforms in varied contexts of contemporary Malaysia is provided.

Malaysian geopolitics and ethnoscapes

Contemporary Malaysia is one of the 11 countries constituting Southeast Asia. The Southeast Asian region is emerging as a major world region with population numbers estimated to be approximately 625 million (9 per cent of the world’s population), and a combined GDP of US$2 trillion (United Nations Development Programme, 2014). The combined phenomena of rapid economic growth, an expanding middle class, strong consumption growth, highly skilled labour, rich natural resources and cultural heritage, complex knowledge systems, competitively priced raw materials, and government –private sector innovation in the Southeast Asian region have together resulted in its development as an important global socio-economic caucus (Asian Development Bank, 2012; OECD, 2013).

Malaysia is a member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), a political and economic organization of eleven Southeast Asian countries. Malaysia, together with Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Brunei comprise of the six largest economies in Southeast Asia. Singapore and Brunei are categorized by the World Bank as high-income level economies. Malaysia and Thailand are upper-middle-income-level economies; Indonesia, The Philippines, Vietnam, Lao PDR, Burma, Timor-Leste and Cambodia have lower-middle-income economies (World Bank, 2016).

Present-day Malaysia comprises Peninsular Malaysia or West Malaysia, which is the southern-most peninsula of mainland Southeast Asia, and East Malaysia, which is the northern third of the island of Borneo. Peninsular Malaysia or West Malaysia consists of 11 states; Perlis, Kedah, Penang, Perak, Kelantan, Terengganu, Pahang, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Melaka and Johor, and the federal territories of Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya. East Malaysia comprises the states of Sabah and Sarawak and the federal territory of Labuan.

Malaysia is a federal constitutional monarchy, nominally headed by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong (a Malay word meaning paramount ruler), customarily referred to as the king. Kings are elected for five-year terms from among the nine sultans of the peninsular Malaysian states. The king is also the leader of the Islamic faith in Malaysia. Executive power is vested in the cabinet led by the prime minister; the Malaysian constitution stipulates that the prime minister must be a member of the lower house of parliament who, in the opinion of the Yang di-Pertuan Agong, commands a majority in parliament. The cabinet is chosen from among members of both houses of parliament and is responsible to that body.

The total population in Malaysia at the latest 2010 census was 28.3 million, of which 91.8 per cent were Malaysian citizens and 8.2 per cent non-citizens (Malaysian Government, 2010). In this latest 2010 Census, Malaysian citizens consisted of the ethnic groups Bumiputera (67.4 per cent), Chinese (24.6 per cent), Indians (7.3 per cent) and Others (0.7 per cent) (Malaysian Government, 2010). Bumiputera is a Malay word meaning sons/daughters of the soil. The Bumiputeras are Malays and other indigenous people who constitute 67.4% of the society (Malaysian Government, 2010). This group has indigenous status, and their status guarantees attendant privileges. The Malay–Muslims, who compose 80 per cent of the Bumiputera category, are the largest ethnic group, exercizing political dominance and monopolizing the public and government sector. This group is known as Bumiputera –Malays and are primarily on Pen-insular Malaysia. Non-Malay Bumiputeras (including indigenous Orang Asli, natives of East Malaysia such as Iban, Bidayuh, Melanau, Kadazan, Bajaus) form the remaining 20 per cent of the Bumiputera category. There is a hierarchy of power within the Bumiputera category, with the Malay–Muslims at the top of the economic and political hierarchy (Nah, 2003). Non-Malay Bumiputeras do not enjoy the same social and economic privileges as the Malay–Muslim Bumiputeras.

The Orang Asli (Original Peoples) compose 0.5 per cent of the present Malaysian population and are mainly located on Peninsular Malaysia (Nicholas, 2000). Centuries ago, prior to the migration of the Malays from South China and colonization, disparate groups of people comprising hunters, harvesters and gatherers were scattered across the Malay peninsula (present-day Peninsular Malaysia) (Nah, 2003). Collectively, these indigenous groups are now known as the Orang Asli. The native non-Malay Bumiputera ethnic groups such as Iban, Bidayuh, Melanau, Kadazan, and Bajaus are the earliest settlers of East Malaysia. Native Ibans are 30.3 per cent and Melanaus are 6 per cent of the total citizens in Sarawak. Native Kadazan/Dusun total 24.5 per cent, and Bajaus make up 14 per cent of the Sabah population.

Malaysian citizens are required to categorize themselves according to their ethnicity as Malays, Bumiputera, Chinese, Indians, or ‘Others’ and to their religious affiliation as Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Buddhists, Taoists or ‘Other Religions’. Ethnic categories were introduced with British colonialist practices as a mechanism to manage and control different segments of colonial Malaya (Andaya & Andaya, 2001).

These social categories continue to be deployed by the Malaysian State and ethnic collectives to define the parameters of political, economic, educational and cultural power and distribute resources within and between the collectives (Joseph, 2014; Maznah, 2008). The categories are constantly evoked in public and official documents such as birth certificates, national identity cards, passports, school records, university and college applications, and applications for bank and housing loans. The numerical dominance of the Malay–Muslims repre...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Illustrations
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Introducing the collection: a brief foreword
• 1 Malaysian geopolitics, ethnoscapes and education policy
• 2 Malaysia’s ‘ethnicized neoliberalism’, ethnoscapes and education politics
• 3 Islamic education in Malaysia: between neoliberalism and political priorities in light of the Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013–2025
• 4 Poverty and primary education of the Orang Asli children
• 5 Beyond the Blueprint: exploring educational exclusion through refugee voices
• 6 MARA Junior Science Colleges and the Malaysia Education Blueprint: a critical discourse analysis
• 7 Assessing the impact of trade liberalization on Malaysia’s private higher education
• 8 Malaysia’s higher education policies: impact on access, quality and equity issues
• 9 Solidarity in an oppressive world? The paradox of Malaysia–Africa interactions in higher education
• 10 African international students in the Malaysia Education Blueprint: experiences of racialization and othering
• 11 Malaysian students and graduates of UK universities: international education, social reproduction and mobility
• 12 The need for decentralization: a historical analysis of Malaysia’s education system
• 13 Discourses, voices, contradictions and silences in Malaysia’s education reform: about this book and its editor
• Index