THE MIDDLE CLASS AS A FIELD OF ETHNOLOGICAL STUDY

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THE MIDDLE CLASS AS A FIELD OF ETHNOLOGICAL STUDY

Joel S. Kahn*

Joel S. Kahn is Professor of Anthropology at the School of Sociology and Anthropology, La Trobe University, Bundoora Campus, Victoria, Australia. He has authored several books, including Constituting the Minangkabau: Peasants, Culture and Modernity in Colonial Indonesia, Minangkabau Social Formations: Indonesian Peasants in the World Economy, and edited, with Francis Loh Kok Wah, Fragmented Vision: Culture and Politics in Contemporary Malaysia

For some time we have lagged behind Indonesian stratificatory realities under the impression, once quite true, that the middle classes (or whatever we choose for the moment to call them) were too minute to make a difference. Now, suddenly, when they appear to be making some difference, or anyway are substantial enough to compel notice, we are at a loss to figure out who exactly they are, why they are important, and what difference they actually make.

(Lev,1990:25)

Daniel Lev's remarks about Indonesia are doubly true in the Malay-sian context, for in spite of the well-documented growth of, if anything, a relatively larger middle class, as yet there has been remarkably little interest among social scientists in the phenomenon. With a handful of exceptions, very few Malaysianists in Malaysia or overseas — have done more than mention the middle class in passing; and there have been even fewer attempts to clarify the use of the concept in Malaysian conditions, or to assess its impact on the taken-for-granted contours of Malaysian society.

In the scholarly literature on the Malays, with which I am most familiar and which for better or worse tends to predominate, we

  • This paper is based on research carried out on the emergence of an indigenous middle class. I am grateful to the Australian Research Council which has provided funds for my ongoing research in Malaysia for the last several years. I would also like to acknowledge my debt to Maila Stivens, my co-worker in this study with whom I have discussed many of the ideas in this paper, and who has given me many suggestions based on her research. I would also like to thank Pat Young and Lucy Healey for their bibilographical work which proved very useful in putting this article together, and Gaynor Thornell for help with the typing.
  • instead continue to witness an outpouring of studies of peasants, factory girls, ethnicity, and Islam — not unimportant in themselves, but in their distribution far from fully representative of current trends in the Malay community. As for studies of Malaysia's other main ethnic groups, lamentably fewer in number, the growth of the middle class is similarly largely ignored.

But consider the following. According to one observer:

In Malaysia, where the non-Malay component of the middle class had continued to grow as a result of economic development since independence, in the 1970s Malay representation in the middle class rose sharply following the introduction of the New Economic Policy....

(Crouch, 1985: 31)

And depending on the interpretation of census data, the size of that "substantial and prosperous" middle class was as high as 24 per cent of the work force in 1980 (ibid, 31-32).

The class grew in significance in the 1980s, so that, using the same calculation, Saravanamuttu estimates that by 1986, 37.2 per cent of workers were in middle class occupations. And doubtless the 1990 census will show continued growth in both the absolute and relative size of the Malaysian middle class.

The Significance of the Middle Class

The fact that a loosely defined middle class has grown quite rapidly in the last fifteen to twenty years is reason enough to focus more attention on it. But more importantly it is the implication of this trend which makes it a significant topic for research. In the absence of such research it is, of course, difficult to say what those implications might be. But one area in which the new middle class has made a significant impact is in the market for consumer goods. Not surprisingly the advertising industry has discovered the middle class before the academics. In this regard a report of the findings of market researchers commissioned by The New Straits Times is illuminating. The firm in question. Survey Research Malaysia, employed an apparently novel approach to research based on identifying what they call "psycho-graphic segmentation" in the consumer market, to divide the population according to what might be called different consumer cultures or subcultures.1 Surprisingly, the major subdivisions identified by this research were not ethnically-determined, but bear a greater resemblance to classes. And among these/ a very significant "class"

is composed of the NQTs or "Not Quite There's". To quote selectively from the article:

NQTs appear to be halfway up the ladder of success but, as the name suggests, they are not quite there.... This group is particularly introverted, spending-oriented, neurotic, unadventurous, traditional and lacking in confidence. They are also ambitious, family-oriented, religious and nationalistic....

And, after discussing the consumer preferences of the NQTs, the article goes on to say:

The NQTs have a lower average income than the Upper Echelons. While the proportion of White Collar Workers is high, they tend to be in the middle and lower levels of the group....

The impact of the emergence of the NQTs on Malaysia's consumer culture is there for all to see — in the proliferation of shopping malls, western-owned or western-style fast food outlets and, increasingly, middle range restaurants; and in the expanding demand for a wide range of consumer goods ranging from clothing, electrical and electronic goods, and cars, to tourist locales, and theme parks — all of which cater to the demand for fashions of distinction which will serve to distinguish the middle classes from the other urban (and rural) classes.

Indeed, while the two are by no means separable, the developing urban lifestyle in Kuala Lumpur, Penang and other cities is also strongly shaped by the consumer preferences and aspirations of the "new middle classes". Cultural commentators have been quicker to spot this trend than academics. Bunn's "portrait of the natives" of Kuala Lumpur is a case in point. Bunn's KL is peopled by the likes of Alee the exec. The Volvo Man, Dyn the fashion designer, Hamil the civil servant, Ragu the "dental surgeon" and his girlfriend Mary the lawyer, Aziina and Deflora — independent and fashion conscious professional women, Peter the Lothario and Porsche-owner, and more. These characters share the stage with other modern KL-ites — the Kutus, the car park attendants, the builders and the labourers, the Jinjang Joes and Jos. The interaction, even conflict, between those members of Malaysia's "new middle class" and its equally new under classes produce the culture of modern Kuala Lumpur (Bunn, 1990).

The growing size of the class of what The New Straits Times calls the Not Quite Theres is significant for developments in areas with which social scientists have more traditionally been concerned. One such area is religion.

A recurring theme in the writings on Malaysia by historians and social scientists is of religious revival. The development and spread of Islam in particular is portrayed in terms of waves of consolidation and revival, the crest of the waves representing the successive fundamentalist movements which seem regularly to sweep over the Malay community. Sociologists with an eye to the social context of these movements have been concerned to link religious with social transformation. Hence Kessler, for example, has argued that religious revival in Kelantan has been associated both with political rivalry (between UMNO and what was the PMIP) and the economic hardships of the peasantry (see Kessler, 1978).

But the more recent Islamic resurgence, which dates from the early to middle 70s, can quite clearly not be understood without referring to the middle class. Chandra Muzaffar, for example, argues that the cultural dimensions of modern Islamic resurgence, the attitudes towards dress, food taboos and regulatory interaction between the sexes — as well as the renewed commitment to a "puristic, doctrinaire type of Islamic economy" and an "unalloyed, unadulterated" Islamic political and educational order is strongest amongst "the younger, urban, middle-class generation". In this he echoes to some extent Nagata's conclusion that the key players in the so-called dakwah movements have been the urban, tertiary-educated young (Muzaffar, 1987; 7-10; Nagata, 1984).

The nexus between religious transformation and the development of the middle class is no less marked for other religions. Consider, for example, the following comments on the recent spread of charismatic Christianity in Malaysia:

Charismatic Christian identity entails not only the attenuation of denominational divisions but also the erosion of ethnic boundaries among non-Malays. The propagation of the movement mainly through the medium of the English language has shaped its multi-ethnic, middle class character.... Identification as a Charismatic Christian is associated with middle class orientation and de-emphasises ethnic background. In Malaysia, middle-class orientation includes a preference for the use of English rather than the national language... or other vernacular, familiarity with English language mass media, and aspiration to a Western style of life.

(Ackerman and Lee, 1988: 85)

If an investigation of the expanding Malaysian middle class is important for understanding changing consumer demands, the creation of urban cultural forms and religious revival, it is equally significant for assessing the impact of the New Economic Policy in general, and its success in promoting changes in the "ethnic division of labour" in particular. Much research has been done on the effectiveness of the NEP in transfering wealth and economic control to the Malays, one of its stated objectives.2 The policy does appear at least to have had one consequence — the creation of a considerably enlarged Malay middle class. But questions are continually asked about the nature of this middle class. Does it testify to the emergence of a true class of Malay entrepreneurs who will contribute to the commercial development of the Malay community? Or has the NEP created a group dependent on the State for its continued survival? These questions were very much on the minds of the Malaysian leadership, particularly in the run up to the review of the policy a couple of years ago, as the following extract from an interview with the Prime Minister testifies:

MB: The NEP, notwithstanding the critics, has genuinely helped a lot of Malaysians, particularly Malays. For instance, there is now a large and growing corps of middle class Bumi professionals and entrepreneurs where there had been none before. Conversely, it has also precipitated what social scientists call a crutch or subsidy mentality. A whole new generation seems to have taken it for granted that the benefits of the NEP will continue in perpetuity.... This cannot be healthy in the long run. Comment?

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MAHATHIR: To say that the NEP has succeeded is to be optimistic. You say it has succeeded in creating this middle-class of Malay professionals. It has not. What has happened is simply the Government makes it possible for them to survive. The economy is still basically the same. All these people depend on the Government — the Malay contractors, the Malay lawyers, the businessmen.

Now that the Government is not having a lot of projects, all of them are suffering. And they do not know what to do. Malay contractors can never get contracts other than from the Government. Perhaps ...

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