INTRODUCTION

Despite the obsession with race and religion in public discourse, Malaysia has made many strides towards nationhood since 1957:

1. • The identification of race with social and economic function has been weakened.

2. • The vibrant economy has united our disparate racial groups.

3. • Sabah and Sarawak have given to pluralism a territorial dimension.

4. • Malaysia has successfully used the economy to create and maintain social harmony. By encouraging entrepreneurship and allowing the minority communities to provide leadership in the economic arena, twin objectives have been achieved: the economy has developed fabulously. Every community has acquired a stake in the country.

NOT ALL IS WELL, HOWEVER

Sadly, since the nineties racial and religious polarization has reached alarming levels. We have become a “nation of strangers”. In many corners of the world walls of separation are being dismantled. Sadly, in our society these walls are being fortified. Recently the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an advisory body of the U.S. Government, placed us on Tier 2 of a Watch List over concerns about limitations in Malaysia on freedom of religion. To this bleak picture two qualifications must be added.

One, some of the racial and religious discord that exists in our society is a natural process of democratic freedoms. As a transforming society opens up, pent up feelings are expressed, often in ways that are deeply hurtful to others.

Second, many of the conflicts between the Muslims and non–Muslims of this country are actually not about Islam versus non–Islamic religions but about a resurgent Eastern society seeking an alternative to the hegemony of “Western” values.