Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

submittedVersion

Publication Date

9-2023

Abstract

Malaysia’s fifteenth general election (GE15) was a milestone in the country’s democratization process, with new parties and political movements competing with established political coalitions. In this paper, we investigate how Malaysia’s cleavage structure—a central feature of Malaysia’s prior authoritarian regime—shapes electoral competition in a newly competitive political environment. We find that the “race paradigm” (Milner, Embong, and Tham 2014) remains central to explaining party strategy and coalition behavior in GE15, but that more democratic competition has increased the salience of regional differences—both between peninsular Malaysia and East Malaysia, and within peninsular Malaysia itself. Our analysis reveals the structural foundations of political competition in democratizing countries and contributes to the emerging literature on authoritarian legacies in such contexts.

Keywords

Ethnicity, Elections, Urbanization, Democratization, Authoritarian legacies, Malaysia

Discipline

Asian Studies | Political Science

Research Areas

Political Science

Publication

Democratization

ISSN

1351-0347

Identifier

10.1080/13510347.2023.2254707

Publisher

Taylor & Francis (Routledge): SSH Titles

Copyright Owner and License

Authors

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