Minority Empowerment & Minority Representation: What You Need to Know

What is Minority Empowerment?
Minority empowerment is the existence of several minority communities that are compelled to live under discriminatory regimes, leaving them underrepresented politically, economically, and culturally which is neither a secret nor a novel phenomenon. They are frequently marginalized, disempowered, and underrepresented, with little or no access to public services and political participation. These are frequently minority groups that have faced persecution and/or systematic discrimination in their home countries, leaving them unrepresented and unprotected, effectively unable to make practical use of their nationality and enjoy their human rights. Statelessness can be combated by empowering minorities. Protecting minorities' human rights is a strategy that strengthens the agency and dignity of the people it focuses on.
 
Why is minority representation not enough?
Minority representation is unquestionably an integral part of democracy and has a big influence on how a nation is governed and run. In order to close the gap between the dominant groups and the minority groups, however, representation alone is insufficient, whether it be in the realms of politics, socioeconomics, or education.
 
For instance, despite the fact that Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Tribes were granted special reservation in services under Chapter XI of the Indian Constitution, Hindus from upper castes still engage in social discrimination, which is still a serious problem in India.[1]
 
Because of his Dalit heritage, former Indian President Ram Nath Kovind encountered intolerance in an Odisha temple. Unbelievably, Dalits (commonly known as the untouchables or the lowest caste) are discriminated against in the distribution of land and housing, excluded from village wells, temples, and tea shops, forced to be subordinate to upper caste neighbors, and prohibited from participating in local government institutions in rural India, where the majority of India's population still resides.[2]
 
However, better days are coming for the Dalits. The 103rd constitutional amendment, which provided legal sanction to carve out 10% reservation for the economically weaker sections from unreserved classes for admission to educational institutions and government jobs, was upheld by the Supreme Court of India on November 7, 2022. The court also held that the 50% cap on quota is not inviolable and that affirmative action on the basis of economic status may go a long way toward ending caste-based discrimination. Due to this constitutional amendment, there are now 59.50% overall reservations in government institutions.
 
Affirmative Action
Hence, minority empowerment and affirmative action go hand in hand in promoting social mobility and closing the gap between the minority group and the minority group.  Why? In the context of an organization or government, affirmative action or positive discrimination refers to a set of policies and practices that aims to include particular communities based on their gender, race, sexual orientation, religion, or nationality in fields where they are underrepresented, particularly in employment and education. As the main goal of affirmative action is to bridge inequalities, affirmative action in the field of education aims to increase access to education, promoting diversity and redressing apparent past wrongs, harms, or hindrances.
 
The state of Rio de Janeiro created history by enacting Brazil's first affirmative action regulations governing university admissions, demonstrating the power of such a policy. A pair of rules passed between 2000 and 2001 mandated that the two state-run universities reserve 40% of their seats for Afro-Brazilians and 50% of their spaces for graduates of public high schools, two historically underrepresented groups in Brazilian higher education. As a result, since 2003, hundreds of public and private universities have followed Rio's suit, unleashing momentum that culminated with the passage of the federal Quota Law in 2012. The law requires the country’s 63 federal universities to reserve 50% of seats for Afro-Brazilians and graduates of public high schools by 2016. Together, the measures constitute the most sweeping affirmative action policies in higher education in the Western Hemisphere.[3]
 
The Regulation on the Preferential Treatment of Upland Students Admission into Higher Education, which was passed in Taiwan in 1987 and later renamed the Regulation on Affirmative Quota for Indigenous Students Admission into Higher Education and Government Scholarship for Overseas Study in 2001, was the country's first indigenous-focused law. Surprisingly, according to 2018 figures, the percentage of indigenous students enrolling in tertiary education hit a record high of 53.9%.[4]
 
Situation in Malaysia
In Malaysia, the New Economic Policy (NEP) was established in response to racial unrest that was blamed at the time on the wealth disparity between native Malays (bumiputra) and non-Malays. Its goals included eradicating poverty for all people, regardless of race, and reconstructing society to do away with the association of race with economic function.[5] To put things in perspective, in 1970, Malays made up almost 50% of the population yet owned less than 3% of the nation's wealth. Due to this injustice, Malaysia's society was innately unstable, with its main ethnic group controlling a negligible portion of the country's GDP.
 
Given due credit, the government's involvement in education has definitely sped up the development of a rich Malay professional middle class, as shown by the high proportion of bumiputra professionals working in industries like accountancy, law, and engineering. As proof, the NEP affirmative action measures produced a significant number of Malay professionals, and the modern Malay population is well-represented across all professions, which is a complete contrast to the pre-NEP period. For instance, compared to fewer than 10% before the NEP, roughly 50% of doctors and 40% of attorneys, respectively, are ethnic Malay.
 
This phenomenon is attributed to the strict quota system imposed on all public tertiary institutions and scholarships. Public universities in Malaysia, for example, generally reserved a minimum of 55% of their intake for bumiputra students. Only that, special bumiputra-only tertiary institutions were created to dramatically increase the number of places for bumiputra students. Government-funded scholarships were also another means of greatly increasing the number of Malay graduates. More than 80% of all government scholarships for studies outside Malaysia were awarded to Malay students. An ethnic-based admission policy that also made it mandatory for all local public universities to reserve 55% of their places for Malay students was implemented in 1971.
 
Is there any need for minority empowerment and representation nowadays?
Notwithstanding the amazing success of the NEP and other affirmative initiatives, academics and policymakers continue to emphasize the need for justice and equality. This is largely due to the fact that many communities continue to be marginalized by state measures that only act as racial affirmative action rather than class-based affirmative action. Such a phenomenon is noticed by the current Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim who only pointed out the glaring wealth gap between the poor Indians and the rich Indians, but also among the working-class Malays and its rich political leaders.
 
Similar to that, Malaysia's representation of minorities is far from favorable. Statistics from the All-Action Women's Society (AWAM) and PantauPRU15 showed that just 251 out of 2,333 candidates in the most recent general election were women, despite the fact that 7.3 million women, or 50.4% of registered voters, were female. Even worse, there were just 10.76% women in cabinet roles.[6] On the global scale, the World Economic Forum's Global Gender Gap Index 2022 ranked Malaysia 103rd out of 146 countries - a far cry from the neighboring Singapore ranked 49th, Thailand 79th and Indonesia 92nd.
 
Malaysians can anticipate better times, nevertheless. Women are still underrepresented in the current 28-member Cabinet, which only has 5 female ministers; nonetheless, this marks a new beginning for minority representation in Malaysia as historically, the Cabinet has never had more than five women sitting in it at any given time. It is worth noting that with only 31 women elected, making up 13.9% of parliament, GE15 did not witness a gain in the number of female lawmakers, but rather a fall from the 33 women who were elected in 2018. (GE14). In the 2015 general election, 127 women out of 945 candidates ran for parliamentary seats. 
 
Minority rights and empowerment are therefore more important in Malaysia, although recipients of affirmative action should not be limited to a single ethnic group. Women, individuals with disabilities, Orang Asli, Orang Asal, and B40 Indians should all be included.


Disclaimer: The article is merely an academic discussion to express the point of view towards the said issue.
 
Written by Secretariat of Current Affairs 2022/23 👉
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References: 
[1] The Indian Constitution 243D: Reservation of Seats

[2] (The Jagannath Temple Incident Shows That the Socially Ruling Class Can Nudge Even the President, 2018) https://www.news18.com/news/opinion/opinion-the-jagannath-temple-incident-shows-that-the-socially-ruling-class-can-nudge-even-the-president-1795125.html

[3] Lloyd, M. (2015), "A Decade of Affirmative Action in Brazil: Lessons for the Global Debate"
 
[4] Muni Druluan (2019), “Does the Affirmative Policy for Higher Education Admission Turn Indigenous Students Further Away?” https://insight.ipcf.org.tw/en-US/article/165

[5] P.Ramasamy (2022), Focus Malaysia article on “Malays are poor, Indians are dirt poor but MIC leaders are super rich” https://focusmalaysia.my/malays-are-poor-indians-are-dirt-poor-but-mic-leaders-are-super-rich/

[6] The News Straits Times article on Malaysia still far behind in women's political participation https://www.nst.com.my/opinion/columnists/2022/11/845919/malaysia-still-far-behind-womens-political-participation