The Evolution of Malay Nationhood and "Special rights" (1946-1948)

On 8^th December 1941, the Japanese army launched a land invasion into the northern states of Malaya via Siam. Brian C. Cooper, Decade of Change: Malaya and the Straits Settlements 1936-1945 (Singapore: Graham Brash, 1998), xxxviii The British navy at that time was stationed in Singapore, located south of Malaya. Cooper, Decade of Change, xxxiv Due to the autonomous nature of the administrative unit, the British were unable to coordinate a counterattack in time to curtail the Japanese invading force. In short, the Japanese caught the British off-guard, rendering them unprepared to defend the colonies in the region. This resulted in the Japanese occupation of Malaya which lasted until its surrender in 1945.

The Japanese occupation of Malaya posed a threat to the British Empire, particularly at the height of the Second World War. Malaya was rich with tin mines and rubber plantations, which at that moment proved crucial for the British war effort. Therefore, the re-colonisation of Malaya was made a priority. It was deemed so important that it led the British colonial force to cooperate with the Malayan Communist Party (MCP). Cooper, Decade of Change, 436-438 The MCP was formed in 1925 as the Malayan branch of the Kuomintang (KMT). Decade of Change 426 However, 3 years later, due to the ideological split between the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the alliance between the KMT and the MCP came to an end. Ibid Nevertheless, the party remained operational in Malaya, albeit numerous attempts by the British colonial administration in the Straits Settlements to dissolve the organization and to cease its operations throughout Malaya. Decade of change 427 Due to the KMT's brief alliance with the CCP, the MCP maintains its communist ideology and continued to appeal mainly to the Chinese population in Malaya, as reflected in its stronghold in the Straits Settlements, which had a significantly larger Chinese community than in the Malay states. As per the ideology, the MCP was extremely anti-imperialist, which translated into their leaders being consisted mainly of Chinese educated intellectuals, with its social base consisting mainly of the working class such as those employed in factories and shops. Decade of change 429

Regardless, despite being ideologically different and at odds with one another, both parties shared the same aim of removing the Japanese occupying force from Malaya. For the British, it was a matter of recapturing a rich colony while the MCP, which was largely consisted of Chinese immigrants, it was a matter of survival. During the Sino-Japanese war in 1937, Malayan Chinese sent remittances to Mainland China to help with the Chinese war efforts against the Japanese. Yoji Akashi, "Japanese Policy Towards the Malayan Chinese 1941-1945." Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 1, no. 2 (1970): 61. www.jstor.org/stable/20069873. Therefore, when the Japanese occupied Malaya, among the first to bear the brunt of their wrath was the Chinese population, as can be seen with records of arrests, tortures and massacres occurring throughout Malaya. Cooper, Decade of Change, 297 Out of necessity, the Malayan Communist Party cooperated with the British army to form and fund the Malayan People Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA), where the former provided manpower while the latter provided weapons and logistical support. Cooper, Decade of Change, 436-438 The MPAJA engaged the Japanese in guerilla warfare however it was the atomic bomb being dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki that caused the Japanese surrender in 1945. The Guardian, “World peace at last: Japan surrenders, archive 1945,” Guardian, August 15, 1945,

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/15/world-peace-at-last-japan-surrenders-archive-1945

However, instead of a smooth transition into re-colonisation by the British, the temporary power vacuum left by the Japanese led to the MCP to take control. Instead of laying down arms, the MCP took the British-supplied weapons to take control of the Malay peninsula. Cooper, Decade of Change, 500-502 This led to bloodshed and racial tension between the MCP, which mostly consists of Chinese immigrants with the local population i.e. the Malays. The cooperation between the Kesatuan Melayu Malaya (KMM) or the Yong Malay Union and the Japanese did not sit well with the anti-Japanese MCP. Cooper, Decade of Change, 52 The KMM, which consisted mainly of the left-wing anti-British Malay intellectuals had a history of anti-colonial movements and had opted to collaborate with Japanese in order to oust the colonial empire out of Malaya. This collaboration however was an exception since the rest of the population, particularly the Malay rulers and the political elites did not directly follow the same path as the KMM. Nevertheless, this collaboration became a part of the justification for the interracial tension that ensues after the Japanese army left Malaya. For the next 14 days that followed, Malaya was terrorised with bloodshed and racial infighting until the British arrived to take over.

This is where the first chapter would pick up, when the re-colonisation of Malaya began and with it, the formation of a new Malay nationhood with designated “special rights” to its members.

1.2 Who is a “Malay”?

The use of the term “nationhood” and “nation” in this chapter pose an issue as they are in themselves contested concept in academia. However, as aforementioned, the parameters of “nation” are socially constructed and colonially affected. In the case of the Malays in the Malay peninsula, the concept of nation refers to a colonially constructed category of people who are grouped through economic activities, customs and bureaucratic function. This particular definition is derived from the aforementioned sources itself, where the categorization of the Malay nation is mentioned with relations to specific traits throughout the sources. These traits were mentioned to be used as a tool to distinguish or categorise the Malay from the “immigrant races”, or more often than not, the Chinese. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution of Malay Peninsula, 7 These traits were underlined in the first draft of the constitutional proposal for the Malay Peninsula. This particular version of the constitutional proposal serves as the initial draft that sets out the “future constitutional policy” for British Malaya. These proposed policies were derived from the War Cabinet Secret Paper that preceded the proposal by a year and was set out by the Secretary of State for the Colonies.

In this particular constitutional proposal for the Malay peninsula, there was a paragraph describing the differences between the Malays and the other races, such as the Chinese and Europeans. It explicitly states that “the Malay is essentially an agriculturalist” and further elaborated other economic activities that are monopolized by specific group of people, such as the Chinese with tin mining, the Europeans with the ownership of rubber plantation and the Indians as the labourers in said rubber plantation. Ibid The proposal also did note that although there were Malays owning businesses, their ownership were minor compared to the Europeans, Chinese or the Indians in Malaya. That particular paragraph seems to be meant to highlight the economic segregation between different groups of people in the Malay peninsula. The segregation on the basis of economic activities carries more consequences that extends beyond the economic sphere. Economic activities indicate geographical dispersion, with agriculture located mostly in the outskirts of the city or small villages. The implication of the categorisation through economic activities would also mean geographical segregation. In addition, the exclusion of the Malay, as a group of people from industrial activities would also indicate a socio-economic barrier between the Malays and the rest of the population. This was elaborated in the constitutional proposal as well, indicating that the “Malays generally have not had the capital necessary to open up large rubber estates”, which suggests a generalisation on the economic condition of this particular group of people. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 8 Therefore, economic activities remained the main indicating trait of determining the group of people the Malays belonged to.

Another important classificatory trait would be bureaucratic function. In this case, it seems that bureaucratic function seems to overlap with customs as an indicator of being categorized as a “Malay”. However, when discussing these two traits, it is important to understand the dynamic of relationship between the Malays and the Malay rulers. That is because the bureaucratic function of the Malay rulers as a guardian of the Malay customs plays into the categorization of a “Malay”. Here, the concept of subjecthood serves as the main binding agent between the role of the Malay rulers with the identity of the Malays being ruled. The most basic and general definition of a subject according to Sir Edward Coke in 1608 is those born within a monarch or a sovereign's dominion. Hannah Weiss Muller, "Bonds of Belonging: Subjecthood and the British Empire," Journal of British Studies 53, no. 1 (2014): 32, www.jstor.org/stable/24700955. In our case, if this definition were to be applied, it would be those born within a Malay state under the reign of a Malay Sultan or Raja. This reductionist definition is problematic due to few reasons. First, throughout the entire Malay Peninsula, British colonial administration was divided into 3 separate administrative units, namely the Federated Malay States (FMS), the Unfederated Malay States (UFMS) and the Straits Settlements. Of the three, only the Malay states are ruled under Malay sultans. If one were to take Coke's definition of subjecthood and apply it to the Malay Peninsula, it would mean that only those residing within those Malay states are subjects of the Malay sultans and thus can be categorised as a “Malay”. However, we know this is not the case as there are Malays residing in the Straits Settlements and those non-Malays born in the Malay states were not categorised as a Malay (see Figure 3). TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 26 The subjecthood and identity of the Malays were at that time tied to the bureaucratic function of the Malay sultans at that time. During the British colonial rule, the Malay rulers serve as a guardian of “Mohammedan religion and customs” for their subjects. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 1-2 The implication being that those subjects has to be practicing said religion and customs. Therefore, those who are not Muslims or not practicing Malay customs are not subject to the Malay rulers. However, a caveat should be noted in discussing the link between faith and national traits in this research. From the Memorandum written by Willan, it was noted that numerous times that the Malay rulers serve as the guardian for the “Mohammedan religion”, which translates to Islam in today's lexicon. That being said, despite numerous mentions of religion, there seems to be a lack of it in the primary sources, particularly on this census conducted by the British colonial administration as shown in Figure 3. This lack of religious markers could be attributed to the synonymisation of nationhood with faith, specifically with regards to the Malay community. The Malays, at least as shown on the sources produced by the British authorities would always be assumed to be Muslim. This assumption can be traced back to the subjecthood of the Malays to the Malay rulers.

As aforementioned, the Malay rulers occupy the position of guardianship when it comes to the religion of the Malays, which at this moment comes to mean Islam. However, the rulers are not the guardian of Islam because the Malays were Muslim. Instead, the Malays became a part of the Muslim community due to the Sultans themselves being Muslim. This can be traced back to the days of the Malacca Sultanate. The ethnic Malays have not always been Muslim by faith. In fact, prior to the spread of Islam, the local population were Hindus and Buddhist by faith. Winstedt, Richard. "Indian Influence in the Malay World." Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, no. 2 (1944): 187. www.jstor.org/stable/25221977 However, this came to change in the 15^th century with the arrival of Islam in the Malacca Sultanate, which in turns propelled its spread throughout the peninsula. John Leyden, Malay Annals, ed. Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, (Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme and Brown, 1821), 94 The conversion of Malays into Islam can be attributed to the Malay rulers. When a Sultan converts, the people followed suit. Leyden, Malay Annals, 93 For this reason, there is a lack of discussion on Malays and Muslims as separate communities as at this time. It also appears that the British-produced sources would synonymize the two terms as one and the same, which would explain why there is no data in documenting faith within the census, only ethnicities. However, sources produced by the Malay elites, such as the counter proposal prepared by UMNO and the Malay rulers would specify Islam as an essential trait in determining the membership to the Malay nation. The National Archives of the UK (TNA): FCO 141/7427, f. Proposals of Their Highnesses the Rulers of the Malay States and of the United Malays National Organisation From the way the two sources were structured, it is clear that Islam was viewed as an essential trait for someone to be called a Malay, albeit in differently nuanced perspective. Nevertheless, this research did not include religion as a part of the parameters in determining membership to the Malay nation. In fact, the shift from Hindu-Buddhism to Islam within the Malay community went on to reinforce the significance of Malay subjecthood to the Malay rulers as the marker of nationhood. It goes to show how important of a role that the Malay rulers played in determining the identity of a Malay. It was this role and bond that made the Malay subjecthood to the Malay rulers a part of the parameters of Malay nationhood.

Figure 3: The estimated population of Malay States, by race, in the Unfederated Malay States, Federated Malay States and the Straits Settlements 1941. Source: The National Archives of the UK

In addition to the practical bond between the two, there is also an explicit and official indication binding the Malay rulers to the Malay people as their subject in the constitutional proposal. It was stated that the Malay rulers were the “natural leaders of their Malay people within their state territory.” TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 15 The usage of the possessive pronoun “their” is indicative of possession or in this case, subjecthood of the Malays to their sovereign. Again, this subjecthood is conditional of them falling into a category of people that practice “Mohammedan religion and [Malay] customs” as indicated in the bureaucratic function assigned by the British colonial force to the Malay rulers.

The three aforementioned traits are consistently used throughout the documents from the British Colonial Office to describe and distinguish this group of people labeled as the “Malay” from other groups of people such as the Chinese, the Indians or the Europeans. The general framework of nation used for this chapter is derived from Benedict Anderson's socially constructivist notion of nation being an “imagined community”. In the case of the Malay people, it is a community constructed from the imagination of the British colonial empire. This notion of a community constructed from the imagination outside said community is supported by Partha Chatterjee, where he initiated a dialogue with Anderson's landmark study by questioning on whose imagined community that these newer post-colonial nations were built upon? Chatterjee argues that the so-called “imagined community” for post-colonial spaces is not really a result of an independent imagination of the members of the community but of a model of a pre-existing community imagined by others. Chatterjee, Empire and Nation, 61-67 In the case of the Malay community, the categorization of this group of people is a result of the “imagination” of the historical actor at that time i.e the British Colonial administration. The designation of what constitute a “Malay” was a result of British bureaucratic process of categorising the population of its colonial territory.

However, does this categorization constitute a nation or is it just a classification based on racial or ethnic grounds?

In analyzing the construction of Malay nationhood, it should be noted that most of the earlier, founding principles of nation and nationalism are rather Eurocentric in concept. The clear segregation between an ethnie or race with a nation is not universally applicable, as such in the case of the Malay nation. In the Malay language, there is no distinction between a nation and a racial group. The word “bangsa” in the Malay language is both used to describe “nation” and “race”. Although there is a less often used word “ras” that does translate to “race”, the etymology of this word seems to be a loanword from the English “race”. The lack of linguistic parallel for nation and race in the Malay language seems to suggest that the two concepts are interchangeable. It appears that for the evolution of the Malay nation, there seems to be a rather seamless (or undetermined) transition between its form as a race to its form as a nation. The point of transition could not be determined since there was no distinction within this community between the two concepts after all. However, as suggested by the title of this dissertation, the evolution of Malay nationhood can only be studied under the assumption that there is a former self i.e. the ethnie to evolve from into a nation. This idea of the Malay nation having a former origin in the form of an ethnie goes in line with Anthony Smith's approach to nation. Smith defines a nation as such;

“a named human population sharing an historic territory, common myths and historical memories, a mass, public culture, a common economy and common legal rights and duties for all members” Smith, National Identity, 14

Although Smith did attribute the formation of nation to ethnic origins, his classification of an ethnie could still be an additional feature to Anderson's social constructivist theory of nation. In the case of the Malay nation, if we were to name it as such at this point, Smith's theory complemented Anderson's general idea of the construction of nation, supplemented by Chatterjee's caveat on the post-colonial element of this particular form of “imagined community”.

Per the aforementioned justifications, the form taken by the group of Malay people prior to 1946 will still be referred to as a “nation” in this chapter and throughout the entire thesis. Admittedly, it may appear that this form of categorising the Malay community may not fulfil some prerequisite of a modern nation, therefore, although it will be assumed to be a nation, at this stage, it can also be assumed to be a form of a proto-nation in the form of a colonially constructed community by the British colonial force as a means of categorising the population in the Malay peninsula for the purpose of administering colonial rule, among many others. Similar justification will emerge later on in 1946 with a more concrete and officialised nation-building efforts by the same colonial force after the re-colonisation of Malaya. For now, this definition reflects state of the Malay “nation” prior to the British re-occupation of the Malay Peninsula in 1945 and their newly proposed nation-building project that will take place in 1946.

1.3 Malay or Malayan?

It was made clear at the beginning of the re-occupation of Malaya that nation-building should be made a priority as it was deemed crucial for the reconstruction and stabilization of the British colonial rule in the Malay peninsula. The Japanese occupation had divided the peninsula multiracial population and caused considerable racial tension, particularly between the Malay and the Chinese communities in Malaya. This resulted in the British decision to shift the national dynamic in the Malay peninsula instead of just continuing the policies that has been in place up till 1941. To understand the policy shift with regards to the nation building process, it is useful to understand the mechanism on power and decision making the newly re-occupied Malaya. Prior to the disruption to the British rule in 1941, Malaya was ruled in three separate administrative units. It would be the most obvious choice for the colonial force to revert to those administrative arrangements upon the re-occupation of the Malay peninsula. However, as aforementioned, the Japanese occupation gave rise to extreme racial tension between the local Malay community and the Chinese community due to the activities of the Malay-dominated Kesatuan Melayu Muda (KMM) who helped the Japanese army take over Malaya. Cooper, Decade of Change, 52 This betrayal exerted a heavy toll on the Chinese community due to the enormity between them and the Japanese due to the issue of the Japanese war effort in 1937 in Mainland China. The tension could have been kept under control if it were not for the British being keen on keeping the Japanese occupation as short as possible by cooperating with the MCP to form the MPAJA. Cooper, Decade of Change, 436-438 The British basically armed, trained and funded the guerilla war effort against the Japanese throughout its occupation in Malaya. Similar to the way the Taliban turned against their sponsors and the population, the MCP went on a killing spree for 14 days during the time period it took for the British Army to return and restore order. Cooper, Decade of Change, 510 By the time the British re-occupy Malaya, the peninsula was in chaos. Therefore, the first order of business was to restore order, and this was done by establishing a military government aptly named the British Military Administration. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 21 However, the nature of this government is temporary and did not provide a permanent solution to the British main concern at that time; security.

The British War Cabinet and the War Office acknowledged that security is of utmost concern. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 6 Here, security lies in two things. First, the capability to defend the colony, so as not to be caught off-guard as the Japanese invasion had proven, and second the internal security of the new colonial order from the MCP. In order to do so, the British colonial force would have to address the issue of its separate administrative units; the Federated Malay States (FMS), Unfederated Malay States (UFMS) and the Straits Settlements. This is where the Malayan Union came into picture. The Malayan Union is a proposed union whereby the Malay states of UFMS, FMS and the Straits Settlements (with the exception of Singapore) were to be included and ruled by a Governor General. By having a single administrative unit, defense arrangement can be centralised instead of fragmented over three separate autonomous units, which would address the first security hurdle in the re-construction of colonial order in Malaya. However, it is the mechanism put in place to overcome the second security hurdle i.e. internal security that would pose an issue which would disrupt the status-quo of the previously established parameters of the Malay nation prior to the Japanese invasion.

That being said, the establishment of the Union meant for the interest of the colonisers did not translate to the interest of the colonised, at least not for the local Malay community. Prior to the Japanese invasion, the Malays, or the Malay elites specifically serve as important actors in the maintenance of British rule in Malaya as their support would signify a mandate for the British to remain in Malaya. However, due to the mobilisation of the Malayan Communist Party, whose social base was mainly derived from the Chinese community, the British colonial administration would need to appease a different section of society in order to further its interest of colonial reconstruction in Malaya. Therefore, the establishment of the Malayan Union created a repercussion in a form of a switch in the status-quo, where the Malay community would lose out while their non-Malay counterpart would gain a more significant political footing in the new Union. This switch was most likely executed due to the need to appease the Chinese community in order hinder them from joining the ranks of the MCP, thus compromising the British reconstructive project in Malaya. This concern was also voiced out in a memo of Force 136, the British special military organization involved in World War II operations in British territories, which also includes Malaya. In the memo, Willan, the Deputy Chief Civil Affairs Officer of Malaya voiced his concerns that the Chinese members of the force would at least “expect some betterment in their political position as a reward for their efforts against the Japanese.” TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Force 136 This “reward” combined with the current situation with the MCP made the Chinese community an extremely important asset for the British colonial reconstructive project in Malaya. Despite the Chinese being a part of the immigrant community, they were only outnumbered by the Malays by 252,629. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 10 If the British were to lose the loyalty of the Chinese community, they ran a risk of civil war erupting in Malaya. In addition, the British colonial administration also came to a realisation that the Malay support alone would not be sufficient nor reliable as there were also Malay left-wing anti-British political organisations operating in Malaya. This section of society costed the British its colony in Malaya in 1941 when the KMM aided the Japanese invasion of the Malay peninsula. In order for the British to maintain order and support in the Malay peninsula, they would need the Chinese to remain loyal and in favour for British rule in Malaya This attempt at appeasement led to the repercussion that led the Malay to lose out on their previously established special status in Malaya. This repercussion was made possible due to these two features of the Union; centralization of power and jus soli-based citizenship. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 1-7 It was these features that drastically changed the parameters of Malay nationhood, as well as the previously accorded “special rights” to the Malay community.

First, with regards to the centralisation of power in the Malayan Union, such shift in administrative style requires a constitutional and legal overhaul from how Malaya was ruled before. In order to do so, the Malay sultans, who were the rulers of the Malay states within UFMS and FMS would have to cede jurisdiction to the Governor of the future Union. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 2-4 This cessation of jurisdiction and sovereignty spells the end of the Malay dominance not only in politics also in the economy of British Malaya as the rulers would also have to give away their hold over public assets located in the Malay states that they were reigning in. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 37 Prior to the centralization of power, each Malay rulers had complete autonomy over the Malay states, where they were located outside of the jurisdiction of any form British authority through the Foreign Jurisdiction Act. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 1 However, the centralisation of power would dissolve this protection. By integrating the Malay states into a centralised administrative unit such as the Malayan Union, the Malay rulers were no longer at the top of the political hierarchy in their states. This impact of this loss of privilege of the Malay Sultans was not isolated to only the rulers, but also to the Malay nation as a whole.

This can be seen in Future Constitution of the Malaya peninsula sent by the Colonial Office that showed how much economic interest and assets were ceded into the care of the Governor of the newly established Union. According to this set of constitution, the control of “all state lands, public works, mines and minerals” along with the revenues that came along with it would have to be handed over to the central authority of the Malayan Union. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 37 As per the parameters of Malay nationhood up till 1941, the membership to the Malay nation is dependent on the subjecthood to the Malay rulers. The Malay rulers here act as a gatekeeper as well as representative of Malay interests in British Malaya. For this reason, when the jurisdiction and sovereignty of the rulers were ceded to the Governor of the Malayan Union, it spelt the end of the manifestation of those interest within Malaya. The stripping of economic assets and autonomy over the revenue of those assets were translated into the stripping of the economic privilege of the Malays, or at least the Malay elites.

However, the main significance of the ceding of jurisdiction lies in its impact of re-defining what it means to be a Malay, or in this case, a Malayan. In the Malay language, Malaya was called “Tanah Melayu”, which directly translates as the Land of the Malays. The role of the Malay as the titular and native nation of the Malay peninsula was made apparent in this instance and acknowledged by the British colonizing force through their assignment of bureaucratic functions to the Malay people. In this instance, the Malays would occupy administrative position, as well as given economic privilege and political rights that their non-Malay counterparts were deprived off. This comparative case of the have and have-nots in terms of rights is documented in the Future Constitution of the Malayan Union where it was made apparent that the Malays disproportionately benefited economically in comparison to the non-Malays who in fact contributed more in terms of their labour towards the economy. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution of Malay Peninsula, 7-8 The documents did not specify how this disproportionate allocation of sources were executed. However, from the documents, it seems to hint at the economic benefit to the Malays as a collective and not to any individual Malays. This is most likely in relation to the role of the Malay elites in the political scene of Malaya. Supported by the British colonial administration, the autonomy of the Malay rulers in the UFMS and FMS would mean a Malay-oriented economic policy. Co 675/11 14 However, the impact of this economic policy did not seem to be restrictive to the social mobility of the non-Malay community. In the same document, it was stated that the mines were largely owned by Europeans and Chinese, with the Malays mainly restricted to agrarian economic activities. CO 675/11 P13 The economic benefit in this sense comes in the form of financing social services provided to the Malay states as a result of the wealth and development resulting from migrant economic activities. Instead of being allocated based on proportion of contribution to the economy, the social services seem to favour the Malay since most of the mines would have been located under the jurisdiction of the Malay rulers. In short, economic benefit in Malaya comes in the form of unfair distribution of resources. According to the Memorandum of Future Constitution of Malay Peninsula put forward by Willan, the Malays were “reluctant” to join the labour force in tin and rubber mining. Ibid The gap was at a staggering ratio of 1:6, with only one Malay employed for every 6 Chinese in the Federated Malay States. However, with tin and rubber constituting 90% of Malaya's export, it is hard to overlook how equal distribution of resources would appear to be disproportionately beneficial to the Malay community. Ibid

Therefore, being a “Malay” in Malaya is much more than a bureaucratic label, it's a privilege in itself. In times of colonial peace i.e. prior to the disruption of the colonial rule, this arrangement of the privileged Malays living among their non-privileged non-Malay counterparts held its ground. However, with the rupture in the status-quo, such arrangement has and did become a potential point of contention, not only between the colonized people of Malaya but also towards the British Empire. With the MCP coming to fill the power vacuum left by the Japanese, the Chinese population of Malaya was now presented with an option to side with an institution that serve an ideology preaching a more egalitarian-based arrangement. Presented with this option, there was a serious threat of the Chinese population of Malaya to side with MCP against the return of British colonial force to the peninsula. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Force 136

Having arrived in Malaya at the time of chaos, the British Military Administration (BMA) acknowledged the need to quell the communist insurgency and to hinder more Chinese from siding with the MCP. In order to do so, the British seek to remedy the problem by uniting a fragmented social movement divided by nation, by which a solution was found in the creating of a Malayan nation and Malayan nationalism. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 11 From this line of argument, it is apparent that the BMA saw that there was no longer a need for a “culturalist” policy in Malaya, whereby the local i.e. the Malay interest took precedence in shaping the colonial policy in the Malay peninsula. This brings upon the shift towards a more liberal imperial ideology to which Karuna Mantena spoke off. However, the direction of the policy change seems to be in the opposite direction. In Mantena's “Alibis of Empires”, the British Empire shifted its liberal imperial ideology in favour of a more-traditionally oriented policies in order to appease the locals after the Sepoy mutiny. Mantena, Alibis of Empire, 7-11 Although the intent in both colonies were the same, i.e. to quell dissent, the demographics of those rising up against the British played a crucial role in determining the direction of the shift in colonial policies.

In Mantena's work, the shift imperial or colonial ideology serves the purpose of the maintenance or providing the alibi for the empire to continue to exist in a position of power. In the case of the Sepoy mutiny, the dilution of the religious and caste status quo was a part of the causes of dissent that led to the nationwide mutiny. Henry Sumner Maine,“India,”in The Reign of Queen Victoria :A Survey of Fifty Years of Progress, ed. Humphry Ward (London, 1887) cited in Alibis of Empire, ed. Karuna Mantena, Alibis of Empire: Henry Maine and the Ends of Liberal Imperialism (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2010), 49-50 Due to this reason, the shift from liberal imperial ideology into a more culturalist one that was in favour of interest of the tradition of the locals was meant to remedy this dissent. Mantena, Alibis of Empire, 5 In the case of Malaya, the disruption to the British colonial rule came not in the form of dissent directly, but in the form of the Japanese occupation. The dissent from a section of the population came as a result of this disruption. Therefore, in order to justify their re-colonisation of Malaya, the British empire needed to pacify this section of the demography. The dissent in Malaya was the Communist 14-day violence that followed the Japanese surrender after their defeat in the Second World War. Cooper, Decade of Change, 510 The MCP consists mainly of those of Chinese descent and this potential appeal to other members of the Chinese community in Malaya was brought into attention in a memo by Force 136, entailing the need to grant some political rights to this section of society, which was previously only reserved for the Malays. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Force 136 In doing so, the British took a departure from their culturalist imperial ideology, which in comparison to Mantena's case of the Sepoy mutiny, moving in the opposite direction. Nevertheless, it still follows the same premise of providing an alibi for the reconstruction of colonial or imperial rule in both Malaya and India. The shifting policies were influenced by which section of society holding most power that can oppose or threaten the Empire. In the case of Malaya, by the time the British returned to the peninsula in 1945, the Chinese community was that section of society as they can shift the balance of power simply by joining either side. By that logic, the policies implemented were geared towards satisfying this section of the society so that the odds remain favourable for a smooth reconstruction of colonial rule in Malaya.

This policy shift manifested in the form of the Common Citizenship Policy in the Malayan Union, whereby race played no role in the granting of citizenship and the rights that came along with it. with the common citizenship, political and economic privilege previously held by the Malay would come to an end. With economic privilege, the aforementioned cessation of jurisdiction by the Malay rulers to the Governor of Malayan Union would also mean relinquishing their rights to the revenue from assets belonging to said jurisdiction, as explained in Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula issued by the Colonial Office. It was established that there is a correlation between the rulers' position with the Malays economic privilege, despite them contributing less than the non-Malay communities. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 7-9 As for the political privilege, the rulers were previously assigned a British Resident or Resident General as an advisor, with the rulers having the final say in matters of the Malay state. However, with the Malayan Union, this position of political power was stripped away and thus leaving the Malay community in a sense without any advantage over their non - Malay counterparts, which puts them at an equal position with their non-Malay counterparts in terms of political rights as dictated by the new administration. That being said, although the political advantage has been taken away, the Malay rulers still retain their position as the guardian of Malay customs and Mohammedan religion, which relegates their role from political powerhouse into symbolic figures in the Malayan Union.

In the new constitution, every “persons born in the Union” would have the right to automatically acquire a citizenship and every citizen by default will be given similar rights, with no racially based discriminatory policy favouring one section of society over the other. The National Archives of the UK(TNA): CO 273/675/21, f. Malaya Long Term Policy Directives Creation of Malayan Union Citizenship, 1 With the Malay rulers no longer occupying position of power, the Malays in Malayan Union have basically lost all the special rights they were accorded to up till 1941.

By 1946, with the Malayan Union having been established, the parameters of the Malay nation remain mainly unchanged except for the shift in its bureaucratic function, which was altered due to the change in the status quo of the Malay rulers. However, the categorization of the nation itself changed, with the Malayan Union bringing about the all-inclusive category of the “Malayan” nation, which the Malay would be integrated into along with their non-Malay counterparts. In the proposal for the Malayan Union, the British again reiterated the need for a singular nation, i.e. the Malayan nation to fix the fragmented social fabric after the MCP-sponsored fortnight of violence during the power vacuum. TNA: CO 273/675/11, f. Future Constitution for Malay Peninsula, 11 By incorporating non-Malays such as the Chinese community into this nation, it was hoped to draw the Chinese away from the MCP cause.

1.4 Institutionalising Nationality and Rights

In charting the evolution of the Malay nationhood and its “special rights”, the establishment of Malayan Union signifies a turning point in the way nations function and were perceived by the public. Although the Malay nation did serve a bureaucratic function prior to 1946, the institutionalization of nationality through the mechanism of citizenship changed what it means to be a part of a nation. Nation, in the case of the Malays, is a social construct, be it derived from the coloniser or the colonised. It was a malleable category in accordance to the social dynamic and changes. However, by attaching nationhood or nationality to citizenship, the British colonial administration effectively made their version of social construct the standard. With the Common Citizenship policy in the Malayan Union, a citizen is a member of the Malayan nation, and thus beginning the trend of equating nationality with citizenship, which will play a crucial role later in 1948. TNA: CO 273/675/21, f. Long Term Policy Directive, 1-2 By equating nationality with citizenship, any change on the mechanism to which citizenship is granted would effectively affect the way a nation in constructed. With the Malayan Union, the broad-based citizenship policy would also mean a broader demographic can be included into the Malayan nation, which in turn dilutes the previously distinct status of the Malay nation as the titular nation or the “native”. TNA: CO 273/675/21, f. Long Term Policy Directive, 1 The removal of the Malay rulers from decision-making position also meant further diminishing of the previously accorded rights that safeguard said distinction. This loss of distinction also meant, to a certain extent, the loss of the “special rights” that were previously reserved only for the members of the Malay nation and as the nation is no longer exclusive, those rights are now being accorded to anyone qualified to be a citizen of the Malayan Union. However, what constitute “special rights” and how does it differ from basic rights that should be given to citizens of the Union? After all, the fact that the “conferring the rights to an alien of those of the native” seems to suggest that these rights have been the standard, which citizens or subjects are entitled to. Ibid

Although it can be argued that these rights such as rights for political representation and economic participation are basic rights that should be accorded to citizens of the Union, these were the same rights that have helped preserve the national identity of the Malay community. Using Kymlicka's argument in “Multicultural Citizenship” as a reference, these “special rights” refer to the allocated collective rights that serve as a protective measure against the “impact of external decisions”. Kymlicka explained this way;

“External protections involve inter-group relations--that is, the ethnic or national group may seek to protect its distinct existence and identity by limiting the impact of the decisions of the larger society.” Kymlicka, Multicultural Citizenship, 36

In the case of Malaya, the external protections consist of the group relations between the Malays and the non-Malays, whereby the former seek to distinguish itself from the latter in order to preserve its customs and religions in case there is an external change in society such as the influx of migration into Malaya. The external protection came in the form of these “special rights”, which includes the political hierarchy that puts the advocates of Malay interests i.e. the Malay rulers, at the top. The interests would include customs, religion, and economic shares within British Malaya. This particular mechanism of external protection effectively bound the Malay rulers to the Malay people not only in terms of their nationhood but also in terms of “special rights” accorded to them from this bond. It was this particular bond that institutionalised the Malay nation and special rights into the royal establishment. That being said, Kymlicka's work was mainly based on a system operating within a liberal democracy. Although the Malayan Union and its Common Citizenship Policy marked a shift towards a more liberal imperial ideology, the allocation of these “special rights” should still be put in the context of an imperial rights regime, such as the one discussed by Jane Burbank. In her work discussing the imperial rights regime during the Russian Empire, rights and categorization of groups of people within the empire were intertwined, where the differentiated citizenship of the empire would translate into differentiated allocation of rights. Burbank, “An Imperial Rights Regime,” 397 Both the allocation of rights and categorisation of the citizens of the empire were conducted for the interest of the Russian Empire. Burbank made it clear that these legislations served the purpose to both appease and control the elites. Burbank, “An Imperial Rights Regime,” 401 A parallel can be drawn from Burbank's Russian case with Malaya. In the case of Malaya, we have established that the categorization of the population into communities, which we called “nation”, were done by the British colonial empires. It is also established that allocation of “special rights” was dependent on the membership of the population into the colonially constructed groups. By having control over these “special rights” or “external protection”, the British colonial administration has the ability to either serve or undermine the Malay elites, and the Malay community as a whole.

With the Malayan Union, the removal of the Malay rulers from the political hierarchy basically meant the removal of the institution representing the Malay nation and their “special rights.” However, the institution linking nation with rights itself was not abolished but was modified to become more extensive. Instead of binding nationality and rights to an ethnically exclusive institution such as the Malay rulers, the Malayan Union used its Common Citizenship policy to extend the external protection of this institution to all its citizens i.e. those who would make up the new Malayan nation. By doing so, the establishment of the Malayan Union effectively altered the position of the Malay nation and removed the special rights that were previously accorded to the Malays.

1.5 What constitutes a Malay in 1946?

Both the Malay and the Malayan nation were colonial constructs meant to serve a bureaucratic function at different times of the period of British colonial rule in Malaya. From the British perspective, the Malayan nation was a continuation and expansion of the Malay nation. However, judging from the reaction of the Malay community, similar thoughts were not shared. Upon the establishment of the Malayan Union, a Pan-Malay Congress was organised by UMNO and the Malay Conference of Rulers, whereby around 40 Malay political parties were mobilised as a reaction against the Union. The National Archive of the UK(TNA): CO 537/2145, f. Malaya's Constitution, 2 This marks the divergence between the two construct that made up the concept of the Malay nation, whereby on the British side, the Malay nation has evolved into the Malayan nation yet from the Malay perspective, the Malay nation remained distinct from the Malayan nation. instead of adhering to the colonial constructed parameters of nation set by the British, the Malay community, which at this point was represented by UMNO and the Malay Conference of Rulers, took it upon themselves to initiate a political movement in order to assert their own construct of what the Malay nation should look like. TNA: FCO 141/7427, f. Proposals of Their Highnesses the Rulers of the Malay States and of the United Malays National Organisation This goes is line with Gellner's approach to nation being a political movement initiated internally instead of the previous form of Malay nation, whereby nation is a construct imagined by an external force i.e. the British.Ernst Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, 1 This assertion from within the Malay community can be argued to be a step in the evolutionary process of Malay nationhood, whereby not only the parameters defining the nation have been changed, but also the way the nation would operate i.e. through internal change instead of being externally affected.

By the time the Malayan Union was established, Malay nationhood has changed, although not beyond recognition but nevertheless, changed significantly. Prior to 15^th February 1942, a Malay was defined by their economic position, political participation and bureaucratic function in British Malaya, with special rights encompassing political monopoly and economic privilege being accorded to him/her. Although the Japanese invasion began in December 1941, the official starting date of the Japanese occupation of Malaya is 15^th February 1942. However, as of now, a member of the Malay nation would carry two definition, one by the British and the other by the definition set by the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and the Malay rulers. From the British perspective, a Malay is simply a member of a Malayan nation, with no distinction, be it in terms of rights or status in comparison to his/her non-Malay counterparts. However, this definition was rebutted by the Malay community, as manifested by a counter-proposal prepared by UMNO and the Malay Conference of Rulers that define a Malay as “natural born subjects [who] habitually speak Malay, profess the Mohammedan religion, and conform to Malay customs.” TNA: FCO 141/7427, f. Proposals of Their Highnesses the Rulers of the Malay States and of the United Malays National Organisation