The incorrect problem definition often leads to the wrong solution. Therefore, in the course I teach at Universiti Malaya, we spend an inordinate amount of time talking about \”problem definitions\” for this very reason.

The ISA was a solution to a real problem: in the 1960s Malaya was faced with the genuine threat of an armed struggle to get rid of a newly formed and independent government.

Today, such a problem of internal security is not really an issue anymore. That is why I was hard pressed when my 17-year-old asked me what the ISA was and why the government was using the ISA to arrest journalists, politicians and bloggers. I suppose implicit in that query was the fear whether his dad would also be arrested in due course, since he is considered to be all three.

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My answer to the 17 and 14 year-olds was as follows: The Internal Security Act was devised to ensure the internal security of the newly independent nation-state. There were then genuine threats of an armed struggle by communist sympathisers to overthrow the elected and independent government of the day by unlawful means.

Therefore, the ISA was designed to protect the nation state and the newly independent people. The obvious next question was, \”how then can these Malaysian citizens who are not acting in concert, be accused of seeking to overthrow the duly elected government?\”

Same old fear tactics

I simply said that the government was \”using the old fear tactic\” to try to frighten and fight new modes and models being applied by the citizenry to get rid of corruption, abuse of power and weak governance. Before the general elections, they tried the \”May 13th fear tactic\” and now they are trying to use \”the ISA fear tactic\”.

My 17-year-old replied, \”Dad, I know that the teacher in my scripture class did not know what the ISA was when he wrongly used the term.\” Yes, many people do not know the spirit of the ISA when they use it, including the home minister, who again justified his wrong interpretation and use of the ISA by the police \”force\”.

That force was needed to deal with illegal and illegitimate forces. Today, force is used against the power of truth, media and the pen. There is a lot of misinformation and dis-information masquerading as ‘truth’ and even the police are confused as to who the real crooks are and who the good guys are!

Therefore, as a result of such confusion of categories, we are moving from the boiling pot into the fire in our penchant for wrong problem definitions and incorrect solutions. It is now \”the new Race Relations Act\” to solve the problem of race relations. Can laws or such \’acts\’ ever moderate or modulate race-relations, asked a close friend of mine?

For that matter what is this new animal of an elephant called the Race Relations Act, asks even Azly Abdul Rahman? To answer these queries, I must again turn to Wikipedia which defines the concept quite clearly and highlights some issues and problems as well. Below is the full definition:

Problematic concept of race

\”The term race or racial group usually refers to the concept of dividing humans into populations or groups on the basis of various sets of characteristics. The most widely used human racial categories are based on visible traits (especially skin color, cranial or facial features and hair texture), and self-identification.

Conceptions of race, as well as specific ways of grouping races, vary by culture and over time, and are often controversial for scientific as well as social and political reasons. The controversy ultimately revolves around whether or not races are natural types or socially constructed, and the degree to which perceived differences in ability and achievement, categorised on the basis of race, are a product of inherited (i.e. genetic) traits or environmental, social and cultural factors.

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Some argue that although race is a valid taxonomic concept in other species, it cannot be applied to humans. Many scientists have argued that race definitions are imprecise, arbitrary, derived from custom, have many exceptions, have many gradations, and that the numbers of races delineated vary according to the culture making the racial distinctions; thus they reject the notion that any definition of race pertaining to humans can have taxonomic rigour and validity.

Today, most scientists study human genotypic and phenotypic variation using concepts such as population and clinal gradation. Many contend that while racial categorisations may be marked by phenotypic or genotypic traits, the idea of race itself, and actual divisions of persons into races or racial groups, are social constructs.\”

It is obvious from the above definition that the concept of race is simply problematic to start with because it is a social-political construct. While Wikipedia did not specifically develop this definition for the Malaysian case, the warnings and scientific rejection of this concept applies very closely with the problems already highlighted and experienced in Malaysia.

I personally prefer the term \”ethnicity\”. Based on the only clearer definition and demarcation of the two concepts which are often used interchangeably, the US Census Bureau (USCB) defines race and ethnicity as \”self-identification data items in which residents choose the race or races with which they most closely identify, and indicate whether or not they are of Hispanic or Latino origin (ethnicity).\”

The USCB considers race a socio-political self-identification of a group of people, but which is not scientific or genetic in origin. In the specific case of Latino or Hispanic peoples, they have gone one step further in classifying their \”ethnic self-identification\” of either one of these, or not these. Interestingly, the broad race categories in the US include: White, Black or African, Indian or Alaskan national, Asian, Hawaiian national or South Pacific Islands, to name a few.

Is definition even possible?

Now my question to the ministers of national unity and integration, and that of national security (including defence and home affairs), what are our definitions of race, however broadly defined? Is Malay a race, only because the constitution defines it? Are Chinese and Indian also races? What about Kadazans, Muruts, Ibans, Kelabits, Bidayuhs or the Kadazandusuns or the Orang Ulu or even the Orang Asli or Orang Asal?

In a paper now published by Malaysia Project , I have argued a similar thesis and question more thoroughly, for those interested. Comments and views are welcomed for beginning a new and continuing dialogue and discourse on this subject there.

But what is of concern and consequence here is that if we define the problem of race relations wrongly, we will \”act\” wrongly too! (pun intended). I do not think ours is a problem of race relations, ours is a problem of ethnicity, class and unequal socio-economic distribution of the fruits of development.

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To me, the only race relations problem is the overt concern of the Umno-types for ketuanan Melayu . As Zaid Ibrahim put it so well in an interview recently, this over-concern with race superiority is the real problem.

Mokhzani Mahathir too defines it as a majority people issue and not one of racial superiority. He thinks the problem is merely in the translation of concepts from Malay to English. Really?

It is my contention that if we can re-frame the problem, as an ethnic one instead of a racial one, for example based on class and the socio-economic distribution of the rewards of development, we can quite easily improve national unity and integration. All the Malays are not poor anymore; there are some poor Malays of different ethnic origins; but so also many Ibans or Kadazans, Muruts, Tamils, Telugu and Orang Asli and New Village Chinese.

I, therefore, propose that all true Malaysians welcome Zaid’s efforts to set up the My Future Foundation to spearhead real integration with integrity in Malaysia; without undue consideration of race or economic structure but rather with full concern for ethnicity and economic and social distribution of the fruits of development. But this can only start with first freeing RPK and all ISA prisoners of political misintent. May God continue to bless Malaysia.