Tuesday, May 5, 2009

In your own words, explain what is meant by social contract in the Malaysian context.

Generally speaking, for me, social contract is an implied agreement (not actually an agreement but more about tolerance and compromise) by the people in the forming of a nation. For instance, citizens give up some rights to a government, which in return protects its entire people’s interest and even simple enough, but it’s the basis on which nation-states are formed. Here, the term “social contract” is often used in the context of the special position of the Malay community. In return for the right to citizenship, non-Malays in Malaya agreed to acknowledge and respect the special position of the Malays and this also includes issues of national language, religion of Islam and power of rulers, among other things. That’s why during emergency , Section 150 (6A) provide an exception in which emergency laws cannot contravene constitutional provision relating to Islam and Malay Customs, native laws and customs, religion, language and citizenship because this provision contains ‘social contract’ impliedly. Actually, unlike the Constitution, this social contract is not a document, though anybody can be argued about that, but we must bear in mind that its spirit can be found in our Constitution as I explain before as we has already provision which protect our (Malays) right. In a rare statement issued after the 215th meeting of the Conference of Rulers in Kuala Terengganu last week, the Malay rulers warned against questioning matters enshrined in the Federal Constitution as what I told earlier, as such actions had caused public unease. Not stop there, Sultan of Perak, Sultan Azlan Shah, recently proposed that the social contract be taught in schools. That's a great idea, in fact, let's educate all Malaysians on what exactly the social contract means. As we cannot predict the future, anything can happen, 5 or 10 years later, so what we need to do is taught it to the young generation in order to give some awareness to them on what is our social contract all about.


this is my answer that tackle Sir Majid heart...is that so...Sir Majid is my former dean...now further study in UK..

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