Elite Coalitions and Nation-Building in Post-Colonial Malaya: Colonial Legacies and Political Realignments during the Malayan Emergency

• In Event: 50460 - Section on Comparative-Historical Sociology Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 8: Colonial and Postcolonial Governance

Abstract

This article proposes a relational model to explain why, during the Malayan Emergency—the critical period of nation-state building in Peninsular Malaya—certain forms of elite coalitions persisted while others did not. Elite collaboration was not an inevitable response to communist insurgency but a contingent result of ethnic competition, colonial state policies, and contentious politics. Using a temporal comparison approach, I analyze why certain coalition schemes succeeded within a specific timeframe but later fall into failure, while others, despite lacking initial advantages, eventually became "locked in" as the cornerstone of nation-state building. Amid leftist mobilization and geopolitical pressures, Malayan Chinese elites faced mounting challenges in navigating their political positionality. To address the issue of nation-building, several schemes of coalition-building were proposed at different historical stages. While most of these efforts proved unsuccessful, the establishment of the Malaya Chinese Association (MCA) filled an institutional void within the Chinese community, uniting fragmented elite factions and strengthening their capacity to negotiate with Malay elites. Its subsequent ruling alliance with the United Malays National Organization (UMNO) laid the foundation for Malayan politics for decades to come. However, the eventual UMNO-MCA alliance was not preordained but emerged through a process of strategic recalibration, elite rivalry, and shifting political alignments. I categorize the historical alternatives into three types: integrationism, which emphasizes cohesion and unity; collaborationism, involving alliance between political parties of different races, and opposition, meaning posing a potential challenge to ruling party. Previous research on the elite collaboration lacks an epistemological foundation for explaining why various political elites perceive the same threat differently and how cooperation is possible despite these discrepancies. By comparing different cases of elite cooperation/division during Malaya Emergency, this article demonstrates how the political landscape was "locked in" through a dynamic interplay of elite divisions and coalition-building efforts, and further shaped post-independence political order.

Author

• Yusheng Wu, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO