ABSTRACT
In May 2018, the ruling coalition which had governed Malaysia since independence in 1957 was defeated, paving the way for regime change. The first part of the chapter elaborates on the making of a multi-ethnic, multi-religious George Town in the colonial era. Occasionally inter-ethnic but also intra-ethnic conflict occurred. Various conflicts occurred in George Town too, during the Japanese Occupation (1941–45) and the struggle for independence (1945–57), largely of the inter-ethnic variant which overlapped with ideological differences. The second part elaborates on the ‘hot’ Cold War in the region, providing the political-economic and geostrategic contexts for this discursive difference about conflict (as compared to West Asia). The third part discusses briefly how, in the post–Cold War era, George Town and other parts of the region experienced rapid economic development, consolidation of the middle classes, emergence of a political culture of ‘developmentalism’ and the installation of illiberal democracies dominated by strong developmental states. As these countries developed and the people prospered, inter-ethnic conflict was also held in abeyance. This chapter argues that ethnic or ethno-religious difference does not necessarily result in conflict; when it does, it must be explained.
