Hungry for hegemony
Politics, race, religion, economics, education and national integration are today very much linked to the battle for national hegemony and the lack of ethics in Malaysia.
Politics, besides being a game of numbers (the one with the highest votes gets power), it is also a game of deception, lies, half truths, threats, fear mongering, false hopes, and grand promises.
Raymond Tombung, Free Malaysia Today
Chandra Muzaffar’s book, ‘Global Ethic or Global Hegemony: Reflection on Religion, Human Dignity and Civilisational Interaction (London: Asian Academic Press, 2005), presents an excellent analysis of the root causes of problems in the current world disorder.
Muzaffar’s premise for the whole book is quite simple – The Parliament of World Religions (yes, there is such a thing) adopted a declaration of a Global Ethic on Sept 4, 1993 at Grand Park, Chicago, Illinois.
Another book on the issue makes the following vague definition: “By global ethic we do not mean a global ideology or a single unified religion beyond all existing religions, and certainly not the domination of one religion over all others.
“By a global ethic we mean a fundamental consensus on binding values, irrevocable standards, and personal attitudes.”
To clarify, what global ethic really means in this discussion is the moral behaviour by which all nations would obey the golden rule: “Do unto others as you’d want others do unto you,” or “Don’t do unto others what you don’t want others to do unto you.” The rule that does not apply here is – “those who have the gold makes the rule”).
Islam-centric Muzaffar has long argued in previous books and papers that the root problem of the world today is the uncontrolled hunger for world dominance by the West (led by the world’s last superpower, the United States of America) which imposes its will on the rest of the world by using its military, economic and technological powers to full advantage.
Muzaffar writes: “…we regard (America’s) imperial ambition as a major cause of war and violence in today’s world. Its massive military expenditure – US$400 billion a year – is a manifestation of its imperial power. So are the American military bases in no less than 60 countries” (pp 16).
This is what Muzaffar means by global hegemony, or global control.
“Hegemony – the very human desire to control and dominate – is indisputably one of the root causes for our failure to move forward a global ethic…. It is hegemony in the global politics which more than anything else subverts the emergence of a just, humane world…. Dominant power exercised by a few will always remain a major hurdle in the way of a global ethic committed to treating every human being with dignity” (pp 22).
Hungry for hegemony
But my purpose here is not to present an argument against Muzaffar; his analysis and rationale for global ethic are solid.
But with his proposed solution, which is for the world’s nations to abide by the golden rule, he is standing on shaky ground because he is pursuing a solution to world problems with moral and religious idealism, something which is decidedly impossible to achieve, given the global political realities.
What I find really puzzling is that Muzaffar has failed to use the same model of ethic and hegemony as a basis for analysing our problems in Malaysia.
But his idea on the issue of ethic and hegemony immediately directed my attention to what is happening in the country, and I realised that a smaller version of the problem exists in Malaysia.
We can see that most of the problems in Malaysia are caused by the violation of the golden rule and by the hunger for national hegemony by Malays!
By blaming the United States for the world’s (and Islam’s) problems and ignoring that the Malays must be blamed for problems in Malaysia, Muzaffar must admit to being an intellectual hypocrite.
If we look at our biggest problems in the areas of politics, race, religion, economics, commerce and industry, education, and national integration, we would realise that these are very much linked to the battle for national hegemony and the lack of national ethic.
We are a people deeply divided politically due to the culture of cronyism and patronage politics, with top leaders seeking hegemony or power to control and dominate, and this unavoidably involves race and religions because these two highly emotive elements have their way of provoking people into supporting or opposing certain struggles.
Game of deception
Politics, besides being a game of numbers (the one with the highest votes gets power), it is also a game of deception, lies, half truths, threats, fear mongering, false hopes, and grand promises.
Aristotle said, “politics is a game of who gets what and how” in which the ends justify the means.
This violation of moral and ethics alone causes social disorder, which spills over into governance and economics in the forms of interracial suspicion and discrimination as well as inter-religious loathing.
Policies which promote discrimination were enacted to give the Malays higher privileges in business and education, causing resentment in other groups.
Certain Malaysians have to compete in business and seek education on an uneven playing field, dashing their hope for true national integration for a so-called Bangsa Malaysia.
The fight for national hegemony has showed up a prevailing breach in ethics.
Good manners, solemn ceremonies and fine languages are used, of course, giving a strong veneer of civility and elegance for public display, but the daggers are always in easy reach under the cloak.
As a result we have problems between sexes, political parties, races, religions, classes of society and sub-ethnic groups. All because of greed for superiority and control.
Malays-Chinese tango
The Malays fight to keep the national hegemony they believe was theirs in the first place, while the Chinese play out their natural skills at gaining national economic hegemony.
Both groups have long entered into a refined choreography of political and diplomatic game for mutual benefit with one group having the power to approve or reject, and the other the power to turn even rubbish into cash.
While the two elephants dance their half-a-century silat and kungfu, deftly scratching each other’s backs, the other groups – the natives of Sabah and Sarawak – have tried to fit into the power plays and convince themselves and others of their politico-economic relevance.
Meanwhile the true natives of Malaya, the Negritos Orang Asli community have been living beyond the fringes of national life as the totally irrelevant and powerless national irritants or dependents.
Muzaffar writes that the US conquered Iraq under the guise of eradicating a dictator who had developed and hoarded weapons of mass destruction (WMD) but the real and ultimate motive was for the control of the country’s oil, the second largest reserve in the world.
“Needless to say, control over the vital resources of the nation that one has conquered has always been the agenda of empires in history. The American Empire is no exception” (pp 16).
At our national scale of politics, the same thing is happening. Although Sabah is definitely not a territory conquered through an act of war, we are certainly subjugated, politically and economically, with our resources being taken away by those holding the national hegemony.
