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People, especially people in the developing world, like to point to the state of race and ethnic relations in the United States as symbolic of the evils of a subordinating race or ethnic privileging culture. Those systems of subordination, of social constructions of race and ethnic hierarchy, people believe, are at the root of flawed legal systems, and through them, of flawed approached to international law and governance. The developing world might provide a place where important lessons in how to manage multi ethnic and multi religious societies might be learned. And where better than Malaysia--a model of a nation whose previous leaders might from time to time advertise to the world as a model of forward thinking and progressive innovation in matters of race and ethnic harmony.

It was with that in mind that the recent elections in Malaysia remind us that race and ethnic subordination is not solely a problem of rich states with majority European populations. Nor is it necessarily an issue of Christian or European arrogance. The techniques and imperatives of subordination, and privileging appear to bedevil many societies. In the case of Malaysia, the players are not white Christian Europeans but Malay Muslims, Indians and Chinese. Malaysian Prime Minister Sworn In, BBC News Online, March 10, 2008.

Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has been sworn in, two days after his coalition suffered its worst election result in five decades. . . . The ruling National Front won more than half of all seats in parliament, but it still suffered unprecedented losses and lost its two-thirds majority. The government had expected a drop in support amid growing concern over ethnic tensions in multi-cultural Malaysia and unease over rising food prices.

Id. As a consequence, marginalized populations of Indians and Chinese also failed to vote. "But the result was worse than anticipated, with the opposition making sizeable gains. Many voters from Indian and Chinese minorities - who make up more than a third of the population - failed to turn out for the coalition." Id.

So what is going on in Malaysia? And how does it relate to law? "Modern Malaysia is built on the co-existence of three ethnic groups - Malays, Chinese and Indians." Robin Brant, Malaysia's Lingering Ethnic Divide, BBC News Online, March 4, 2008. But the reality, like that of racial and ethnic neutrality in the United States, points in a different direction. First, law serves as a technique of subordination and distinction--that is, of dividing society into its various classes and ordering them vertically. Emblematic, perhaps, is the recent legislation on the use of the word "Allah." See Malaysian Row Over Word for God, BBC News Online, Dec. 28, 2007. after passage of an act limiting the use of the word "Allah" to Muslims in in Malaysia, officials began targeting a Catholic newspaper in Malaysia. That newspaper, along with a the Sabah Evangelical Church of Borneo sued.

In the Malay language "Allah" is used to mean any god, and Christians say they have used the term for centuries. Opponents of the ban say it is unconstitutional and unreasonable. It is the latest in a series of religious rows in largely Muslim Malaysia, where minority groups claim their rights are being eroded. A spokesman for the Herald, the newspaper of the Catholic Church in Malaysia, said a legal suit was filed after they received repeated official warnings that the newspaper could have its licence revoked if it continued to use the word.

Malaysian Row Over Word for God. A victory for the Christians might inflame Muslim sentiment, especially if that inflammation is allowed to ignite at carefully orchestrated Friday sermons. A victory for the state suggests the difficulty of multiculturalism and tolerance the consequence of which is inevitably the deepening of hierarchy in fact all the while preserving the forms of equality.

But equally symptomatic are the responses to assemblies of non-Muslim peoples in Malaysia. Scores Charged Over Hindu Rally, BBC News Online, Nov. 28, 2007. In this case, the law of assembly was the touchstone for the construction of verticle hierarchy with a vigorous horizontal enforcement of law.

At least 80 ethnic Indians have been charged with illegal assembly in Malaysia, after a weekend of protests in the capital, Kuala Lumpur. Activists appeared in several courts around the country to deny the charges, and many were freed on bail. Thousands of Hindu activists took to the streets to protest at what they regard as decades of discrimination by the mainly Malay-Muslim government.

Scores Charged Over Hindu Rally. The issues here are both ethnic and linguistic The protesters used Tamil language and were targeted as South Asians. The courts freed many of the arrested on the grounds that the allegedly seditious statements had not been translated from the Tamil, andf the government sought to overturn that determination. Id. "At least 80 ethnic Indians have been charged with illegal assembly in Malaysia, after a weekend of protests in the capital, Kuala Lumpur. Activists appeared in several courts around the country to deny the charges, and many were freed on bail. Thousands of Hindu activists took to the streets to protest at what they regard as decades of discrimination by the mainly Malay-Muslim government." Id. These protests continued and produced the appearance of a response of the eve of the election. Robin Brant, Malaysia's Lingering Ethnic Divide, BBC News Online, March 4, 2008 ("Malaysia's prime minister has ordered his government to take a fresh look at recruitment levels of non-Malays, after thousands of ethnic Indians took to the streets to protest against what they say is years of discrimination." Id.). As in the United States under apartheid, and thereafter, the points of contention include the use of law to effect differences in treatment--from unequal funding of education to employment opportunities, for minority South Asians and ethnic Chinese. See Id.

"Concern about racial tension boiling over is not just because of what might happen, but because of what did happen. Hundreds died in racial riots in Malaysia in 1969, when the country was barely a decade old." Robin Brant, Malaysia's Lingering Ethnic Divide, BBC News Online, March 4, 2008. But the solution of the government has been to suppress all discussion of inequality, especially public expression that is orgainzed.

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