Race, Ethnicity, and the State in Malaysia and Singapore

Because Malaysia and Singapore share a common colonial, migration, and political history the racial/ethnic composition of the two societies are unsurprisingly similar. However since 1965 state/nation-formation has taken separate trajectories, and this has had a differential impact on the processes of racialization and ethnicization in the two countries.The contributions in this volume examine how various groups - namely the Chinese, Malays, Tamils, Eurasian, and Orang Asli - have accomodated or resisted the dominant influence of the state in incorporating and subordinating them.Students and scholars of race and ethnicity will be interested in this work as it is the first attempt to bring together the work of several writers in documenting the consequences of state policies on ethnic-formation in the region, and raises theoretical issues relevant to this.

Lian Kwen Fee, Ph.D. (1986) in Sociology, Victoria University of Wellington, is Associate Professor and chairs the Department of Sociology at the National University of Singapore. His research and publication interests are in race and ethnicity, nation-state, migration , and citizenship.