Malaysians today stand at the crossroads of history. To go further than ever before, Malaysians need to look beyond economic growth and into strengthening our institutions.
Malaysians alive on 9th of May 2018 were privileged to witness an important moment in the history of our nation. For many of us, we directly took part in this historic moment – joining in the public discourse, debating issues that gripped our nation, campaigning for causes we believe in or even as simple as performing our citizenry duties of exercising the right to vote. The country spoke and overnight, everyone witnessed the nation evolving into something new. The big question that looms over us: what will Malaysia evolve into?
For many decades, the general direction of most of Malaysia’s policies has been in the name of development, together as one nation. While this remains a respectable objective, Malaysians will need to strive for a more holistic idea of development that goes beyond the narrow confines of purely achieving economic growth.
From our roots of a former British colony to the middle-income country we see today, that simple vision of development can only get us this far. What Malaysia today needs – to go further than our forefathers have ever been – is to look beyond what we materially produce and examine who we are and how we function as a society. This means that Malaysians should seriously examine the institutional strength of this nation. And by institutional strength, Malaysians would need to start asking and seriously evaluate matters such as (to name a few):
- the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain;
- the extent to which the government is “captured” by elites and private interests;
- quality of our public services;
- quality of our civil services;
- quality of policy formulation and implementation;
- independence of civil service from political pressures; and other questions of similar nature.
These qualities have severely deteriorated in the Malaysian government in the years prior to the 14th General Elections (GE14), as seen in Figures 1 and 2.
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Why should this matter at all? How does focusing on institutions help Malaysia develop economically?
The key insight to these questions is to realise that institutions do not function in a vacuum. Instead, institutions can only function within the societies that bestow them the mandate for their existence. These institutions in turn, exercise their powers over society. Their powers allow them to shape the incentive structures within society which consequently determine the behaviours and actions of agents under different circumstances. These in turn produces the outcomes we observe in the economy and our everyday lives. To summarise the idea in a sentence, our institutions essentially set the rules of the game in our society. If the odds are stacked in favour of a select few, only the few will prosper. If the rules are set in a justly manner for all, collectively as a society, we will thrive.
Institutions therefore hold a lot of weight in determining the trajectory of a country’s development[1]. Hence, it is crucial that Malaysians develop a stronger sense of collective self-determination and have a stronger say in the direction of our institutions and how they govern us. These changes are arguably subtle and intangible, but its impacts are real and long-lasting. Taking into account the progress of our institutional development captures an important and often neglected dimension in our nation’s overall development progress.
It is rare for a seismic event of a similar order of magnitude to GE14 taking place in any country in the world, let alone Malaysia. Therefore, Malaysians today are given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reshape Malaysia for the better. Done wrong, many will not see such an opportunity arising again for a long time. Done right, future Malaysians will look back to these days as the days Malaysia took significant steps forward in our development journey.