My two good friends, AB Sulaiman and Commander (Rtd) S Thayaparan, asked to meet up and whether I would consider helping them to organise a forum for Thayaparan’s book launch. I thought, why not?
After all, we have a think-tank that focused on going beyond talk to action. It used to be linked to a university, but after some experience, I realised that there is greater merit in working with any university, or anyone with any kind of academic interest or issue but who willingly and honestly pursues that interest into action! Publishing a book is one such action.
Therefore, and after I realised that Thayaparan’s book had so challenging a topic, and moreover it even addressed the issue of “a culture of offendedness”. So, I agreed to try and organise the forum for the book launch. We re-titled it as a question about any culture of exceptionalism.
Exceptionalism and Offendedness
What do these two words mean, that even Microsoft Word does not recognise?
Exceptionalism is the perception that a country, society, institution, movement, or time period is \”exceptional\” (i.e. unusual or extraordinary) in some way and thus does not need to conform to normal rules or general principles. Used in this sense, the term reflects a belief formed by lived experience, ideology, perceptual frames, or perspectives influenced by knowledge of historical or comparative circumstances.
It is well known that there is what is called American Exceptionalism, but one may wonder, or we may need to understand, where Malaysian Exceptionalism comes from? In what areas does Malaysia view herself as exceptional in a very positive way?
Well for one, few countries in the world can claim, “Malaysia Truly Asia!” Even if we are only the Malay version of Asia; we are Asian in every sense of the word! We are also very fortunate that because of the British heritage of both language and education systems and all ranges of public services, we have tried to maintain much of the standards of the British parliamentary system.
We are no more exemplars for these standards when compared to India or Pakistan but the fact is that, as a composite whole, we have a healthy democracy, even if we base this on the localised version and standards in every area and arena.
What then is the “offendedness” that Thayaparan is talking about? He quotes Salam Rushdie as follows:
\”I do think that one of the characteristics of this age is the growth of this culture of offendedness. It has to do with the rise of identity politics, where you’re invited to define your identity quite narrowly – you know, Western, Islamic, whatever it might be.\”
Why is such offendedness present in our rather exceptional country? Or, should the question be the obverse, why should we not all struggle to a definable common identity within such a unique country for which there is really no equivalent out there?
Where and how should such an identity be developed or evolved? Will it have scope for all our differences and our commonalities? But, will our primary commonality help us define and appreciate our differences? Or, as Salman Rushdie postulates; are we worse for it? How can we become both unique and same at one and the same time?
Dignity in the workplace
I struggled with these exact ideals, or dreams, as I was pursuing my doctoral studies. My research question was: How can an individual have a unique dignity of purpose, meaning, and relevance at the workplace, and yet fit totally into the organisation and her imperatives?
Or, framed differently, can the person’s and the organisational goals and intentions overlap completely? If not, how then do we find ways to resolve matters of difference, or does the organization always have to totally subsume the person into every situation while demanding compliance?
I argue and have argued that our Malaysian dilemma is the key question: can we become 1Bangsa of Malaysians? Yes, but currently it is neither Bangsa Malaysia or even 1Malaysia.
The first is badly misunderstood by the Malays, as if it only means, an extension of Malay culture through assimilation, and the other is even weaker concept, as it only talks about the nation-state and the government but has little or nothing to do with people and their specific responses!
Our Malaysian dilemma is whether we are Malaysia truly Asia, or really without stating it, we are “Melayusia” (or the Malay version of Malaysia). I argue that Malay is an English word and therefore we are truly an Asian migration country wherein the original citizens are only the “pri-bumiputera” who were here even before the British, or Portuguese or even the Dutch.
But, is that even relevant any more? It was their representatives and their Alliance Government, and the Representatives of the Rulers who brokered, negotiated, and agreed to the independence negotiations. And, when Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra said, “Merdeka,” it meant we were free to organise our own nation-state.
Therefore we grew to become a nation-state of four ex-British colonies and then we even allowed Singapore to leave. We are now a clear three-member nation-state called Malaysia by choice of will and by mutual agreement.
We have only one way forward; we must now become a Malaysia that is truly Asian, in our being, in our thinking, and in our actions! Otherwise we are doomed to break up this nation-state; especially as far as the Sabahans and Sarawakians are concerned, since we cannot impose our peninsula values and mindsets on them forcibly.
I think we need to think through three core issues together about what is good and proper governance of this nation-state we call Malaysia; our home:
- Who really are owners/shareholders of this nation we call Malaysia?
What is the proper system of governance for this multi-ethnic, multi-religious, multi-lingual nation state? Is any simplistic model workable?What operational system works and what systems do not; is the use of power and authority to force compliance really relevant any more; andAre the citizens’ really afraid of the authority of the government? What are the lessons from the global scenes of today?We need to think through these issues and we had an amply qualified panel of speakers to do just that.
