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Category: Religion

The article presents a discussion on Islam, society and political behaviour by considering the case of the West Malaysian state of Kelantan. Religion, like myth, turns often upon the relation between morality and reality. Thus many religiously inspired world views, and especially those of the universalistic religions, are in tension with social reality. A collision occurs between the exhortation towards the behavioral requisites of an ennobling vision of the human situation and the facts of human social experience, and its impact is felt in the steering-mechanism of individual behaviour. Sociologically it can be argued that despite the traditional Islamic prescription that political authority must implement institutions in accordance with legal-religious theory, there is no reason why an injunction that there should be a close relationship between theory and practice must necessarily produce a greater effect on political behaviour. [Download]

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Category: Housing

Using the case of Peninsular Malaysia, this article examines how the question of housing provision addresses a wide variety of social, political and ideological meanings which link the masses of third world urban populations to the changing pace of development, the expansion of capitalism in the periphery, and to the activities of the state. The long-standing shortage of accommodation for the ever increasing strata of urban poor, the persistence of illegal and substandard dwellings and regional disc parities in the quantity and quality of housing constructed continue to be consequences of the existing system of residential construction. Governments have seen squatters as a barrier to development because the latter's need for land is usually in conflict with the demands of an expanding modern sector. In this way, illegal land occupation reflects the way the urban masses come into conflict with capital and the state over how the appropriation, use and structure of urban space, is defined. [Download]

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Category: Human Rights

The present chapter focuses on the Malaysian state’s human rights policies and practices in response to increased civil society participation in governance through the venue of non-electoral politics. A central question to be addressed in assessing the Malaysian human rights movement concerns whether, and to what degree, a political culture of participatory democracy may be evolving in the country.  Publication: 4th International Malaysian Studies Conference; 3-5 August 2004, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Bangi. Authors: López, C. Carolina & Saliha Hassan. [Download]

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Category: Housing

This article presents information about urban landownership in Southeast Asian cities. The control over urban land, the exertion of property rights also means control over the reproduction of labor power. Ownership of urban land is, therefore, also ownership of the means of production. In the same way as rural land is the base for the production of food, urban land is the base for the production of living space. Despite the importance of the topic, data on urban landownership are extremely rare. This contrasts sharply with research on land tenure in rural areas. Theories and studies on landlords and peasants abound and very sophisticated schemes have been developed to deal with land tenure systems and with conflicts arising out of land concentration. Conflict between landlords and squatters is frequent but also rural urban migrants compete among themselves for urban land to be able to take part in the higher income opportunities that, in their perception, exist in third world cities. [Download]

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