About | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline Law Journal Library | HeinOnline
LOG IN
LOG IN

1 1 (January 28, 2025)

handle is hein.crs/govesgs0001 and id is 1 raw text is: Congressional Research Service nformin g th leg slatve debate sn nee 1914 Malaysia Updated January 28, 2025 Overview The Federation of Malaysia is a majority Muslim parliamentary democracy in Southeast Asia. It has an ethnically and religiously diverse population of 32.7 million, with a Malay majority and large ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities. Malaysia plays an active role in regional diplomacy and is a partner in numerous U.S. initiatives in Asia, including trade and security programs as well as efforts to combat terrorism and religious extremism. Malaysia is a founding member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and serves as ASEAN's chair in 2025. It sees itself as both a regional leader and a moderate voice within the Islamic world. Despite generally cooperative bilateral relations with the United States, some issues constrain closer ties, including Malaysian opposition to much of U.S. policy in the Middle East, ongoing outreach to Hamas by Malaysian leaders including Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, and U.S. concerns over some Malaysian economic and human-rights policies. Congress has overseen Malaysia policy, including trade negotiations in the 2000s and 2010s, as well as U.S.- Malaysia cooperation on security and counterterrorism issues. Some Members of Congress have expressed concerns about human rights issues in the country including Malaysia's record in combatting human trafficking (Malaysia was listed on the Tier 2 Watchlist in the State Department's 2023 Trafficking in Persons report) and Malaysia's treatment of refugees from Burma. Democracy and Poitics in Malaysa Malaysia was led by a single governing coalition from its independence from the United Kingdom in 1957 until 2018. That coalition, known as the Barisan Nasional (BN), was led from 1973 by UMNO, a Malay-nationalist party. During its lengthy period in power, UMNO enacted a series of economic and social preferences for the majority bumiputera (ethnic Malays and indigenous peoples), and it derived much of its appeal from issues of ethnic identity. Prime Minister Anwar was UMNO's deputy chairman until 1998, when he broke with longtime UMNO leader Mahathir Mohamad and was later convicted and imprisoned on charges many considered politically motivated. Malaysia has undergone significant political upheaval since 2018, as national elections in 2018 and 2022 resulted in weak coalition governments marked by internal rivalries that have struggled to govern effectively. The current government is headed by Anwar, a former deputy prime minister who was imprisoned for five years in the 1990s and 2000s and became an opposition leader upon his release. After another three years in prison in the 2010s, Anwar came to power in November 2022 following elections in which no party gained a clear majority of parliamentary seats. His political coalition, Pakatan Harapan (PH), joined its longtime rival, the United Malays Nasional Organization (UNMO) to form a government, but the two groups remain deeply divided on many issues. Figure I. Malaysia conomic Lflallenges In the decades following independence, Malaysia underwent a profound economic transformation, adopting an export-led growth model that propelled the country from a commodity-based economy to an upper-middle-income country and a leading export of electronics and other manufactured goods. Over the past decade, GDP, wage, and productivity growth has slowed and inequality has risen, contributing to concerns that the government is not providing adequate opportunities for new entrants to the labor force or support for its aging population. Malaysia's government has pursued a variety of trade agreements. Malaysia was a member of the proposed Trans- Pacific Partnership (TPP), from which the United States withdrew in 2017, and is one of 11 members of the renamed Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans- Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which it ratified in 2022. Malaysia also ratified the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) in 2022. Malaysia fully participates in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) initiative, including the trade, supply chains, clean energy, and anti-corruption pillars. Patronage and corruption are a major part of Malaysian politics and economic policy. (In November 2024, for example, Malaysian businessman Leonard Fat Leonard Francis was sentenced to 15 years in jail for his role in the largest corruption scandal in the U.S. Navy's history.) Some observers heralded Malaysia's peaceful changes of government that resulted from the 2018 and 2022 elections, raising the prospects for political and economic reforms. However, the weakness of the resulting coalitions limited

What Is HeinOnline?

HeinOnline is a subscription-based resource containing thousands of academic and legal journals from inception; complete coverage of government documents such as U.S. Statutes at Large, U.S. Code, Federal Register, Code of Federal Regulations, U.S. Reports, and much more. Documents are image-based, fully searchable PDFs with the authority of print combined with the accessibility of a user-friendly and powerful database. For more information, request a quote or trial for your organization below.



Short-term subscription options include 24 hours, 48 hours, or 1 week to HeinOnline.

Purchase Access

Already a HeinOnline Subscriber?

Log In

profiles profiles most