Social Contracts

by batsman

I do not know what the fuss is about with regard to social contracts. As far as I know, Dato’ Onn never mentioned it. Neither did the Tunku or Tun Razak or Tun Hussein or Tun Dr. Ismail for that matter.

It is only recently that people started to harp upon it. As far as I know not even TDM talked about it until recently when it became a favourite topic and he jumped on the bandwagon.

So what is this famous social contract that nobody seemed to talk about in the past but suddenly became so important? Is it some sort of a new invention?

In case you wish to find out more about social contracts, visit Wikipedia or whatever site you are especially fond of.

As far as I am concerned, social contacts need to be distinguished from political contracts. But even then there are so many types of social contracts that the mind boggles.

The way UMNO talks, it seems to me that they are actually talking about a political contract whereby some non-defined non-identified forefathers sat down and made an agreement. This sounds more like a political contract than a social contract. However, if the forefathers are not properly identified and there is no written contract, it becomes more convenient to describe it as a social contract so that there is more room to maneuver and manipulate.

There are 2 instances that come immediately to mind when discussing social contracts. The first was when the English Parliamentarians made an agreement with their constitutional monarch that they are willing to be ruled by him provided he respected their rights and that if he strayed from this, they, the people had a right to rebel and remove him. But then again such an agreement was actually put down on paper. So with readily identified persons involved and a written agreement, it properly belongs to the category of a political contract.

The other social contract has now become infamous. It was actually the title of a book written by Rousseau. In it Rousseau propounded his ideas that free men could band together such that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, but in doing so, they submitted to the authority of the group or to the “ general will” . This was called the Despotism of the General Will by some other people a bit later.

Apparently Rousseau was just trying to a good democrat, but during the French Revolution, Robespierre used his ideas to launch the Reign of Terror and excused the free use of guillotines as an expression of the General Will. Judge for yourself how
Rousseau’s ideas can be both democratic as well as despotic at the same time depending on how you interpret them.

“The problem is to find a form of association … in which each, while uniting himself with all, may still obey himself alone, and remain as free as before. This is the fundamental problem which the Social Contract provides the solution … the total alienation of each associate, together with all his rights to the whole community …. Each man, in giving his all, gives himself to nobody …. Each of us puts his person and all his power in common under the supreme direction of the general will …. In order that the social contract may not be an empty formula, it tacitly includes the undertaking, which alone can give force to the rest, that whoever refuses to obey the general will shall be compelled to do so by the whole body. This means nothing less than that he will be forced to be free.”

This seems to be exactly what UMNO means by social contract. The non-Malay immigrants in wanting to be citizens of the association known as Malaysia submit themselves to the general will and since the Malays are the majority and were the original residents, they represent the general will and since UMNO represents the Malays, UMNO is the single sole representative of the general will of the people.

UMNO therefore has the right to force the immigrants to be free (of course as long as they pay taxes, put up with a discriminatory government, be content to be second class citizens and keep their mouths shut). In the meantime, UMNO can also use it powers to force dissident Malays who disagree with UMNO to be free as well and it can exercise the powers of this general will on the descendents of the immigrants and dissenting Malays for all time and to eternity. The only way to avoid enjoying this freedom while you are still alive is to emigrate to another country where I suppose you are subject to the general will of the people of your new home.

The funny thing is that this particular version of the social contract is very recent. In fact, Dato’ Onn wanted to invite non-Malays to be part of UMNO while Tun Razak in framing the NEP envisaged only a limited time of about 30 years before everything reverted to normal.

Did Dato’ Onn and Tun Razak have this recent version of the social contract in their minds? Were they the famous forefathers that UMNO mentioned who framed the social contract?

However if UMNO meant a social contract by way of the Constitution, it properly belongs to the arena of political contracts and there is absolutely no problem with debating and analyzing the Constitution at all. In fact it would be funny indeed if we are barred from learning more about our own Constitution and understanding it better.

Still it is ominous that volunteers who distribute copies of the Constitution or any legal documents for that matter can get arrested by the police. It does not bode well at all. In fact some of the people who much later made good use of Rousseau’s ideas were the Nazis and Communists each with their very own interpretation of freedom. Hopefully UMNO does not get it into their heads to try and interpret freedom as well – then we will all be in serious trouble, Malay and non-Malay alike.