Date： June 15, 2011 16:00-18:00
Venue： Room No.331, Inamori Foundation Memorial Building, Kyoto University
Speaker： Shamsul A. B.
Distinguished Professor of Social Anthropology, Director, Institute of Ethnic Studies (KITA), National University of Malaysia (Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia)
Title： "From Conflict to Cohesion: The analytical challenge in Southeast Asian Studies”
Organizer：Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (S)"Planted Forests in Equatorial Southeast Asia: Human-nature Interactions in High Biomass Society"
Abstract：
Southeast Asia as a form of knowledge, as being presented in the field of Southeast Asian studies, popularized and expanded during the Cold War has privileged what could be called as a ‘conflict approach’ in which the workings of centrifugal forces as the ruling societal pattern informed analyses regarding the region and its component countries. Underpinning this conflict approach was the well-known ‘domino theory.’ Therefore, each component country was perceived as a domino that would fall one after another as communism expanded its influence in the region, namely, from Mainland Southeast Asia (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Burma) to the Maritime part of the region (Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei and the Philippines). Social scientists, working independently or for the noncommunist countries (USA, UK, France, Germany), held the viewpoint that the internal conflict and struggle within the region made it fragile and vulnerable to communist takeover. Saving the region from communist takeover became almost a ‘political salvation’ for both the noncommunist bloc and the majority of their social scientists. Although the Cold War was over in 1989, the conflict-based analytical paradigm persists until today. The countries of the region continued to be seen as fragile and vulnerable exposed to new transnational forces, such as global fundamental Islamic activism, that would find roots locally rather easily. Political analysts often playing the ‘prophet of doom’ role frequently offer negative predictions about the future of these societies. It was predicted once that the fall of Suharto would lead to the breaking down of Indonesian unity as a nation-state. Malaysia was predicted to suffer from serious bloody ethnic conflicts every time an economic crisis occurred in Asia. But none of these has actually taken place. Why it didn’t happen has also to be explained. Perhaps, as this presentation shall argue, that it is useful to approach this issue sociologically from a ‘cohesion approach’ with the assumption that the plural societies in Southeast Asia are generally in a state of ‘stable tension’ meaning they have been surviving in a situation dominated by major societal contradictions but nonetheless, longitudinally, remains generally cohesive. In other words, there is social cohesion within these societies, but the journey has not been plain sailing. Empirical evidence from Malaysia shall be presented as a case study.
Shamsul A.B. is Distinguished Professor of Social Anthropology and, currently, Founding Director, Institute of Ethnic Studies (KITA), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia. He has researched, written and lectured extensively, in the last 25 years, on the theme “politics, culture and economic development,” with an empirical focus on Malaysia and Southeast Asia. His award-winning monograph From British to Bumiputera Rule (1986, reprinted 1990, 2nd edition 2004) is a study on the phenomenology of class and ethnic relations in a Malaysian rural community. His academic activism takes many forms: conferences and lecture tours in Asia, Europe, North & South America & the Oceania; public policy formulation in Malaysian higher education; museum re-conceptualization projects; and as a political analyst on Malaysia current affairs in local and international media (Channel News Asia, Al-Jazeera, National Geographic, Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the BBC). Recently, he was awarded the prestigious ACADEMIC PRIZE 2008, of the Fukuoka Prize, Japan.