The Rise, Resilience and Demise of Malaysia’s Dominant Coalition

In May 2018, Malaysia’s Barisan Nasional (BN) lost power for the first time since the country’s independence. Although the opposition finally succeeded in assuming the reins of government after three failed attempts since 1990, the aspired for ‘two-coalition system’ did not emerge. Like previous opposition coalitions that disintegrated after electoral defeat, BN is fast melting down and is now reduced to a rump of its Malay nationalist core, the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO). Officially born in 1974, BN was expanded from its centrist forerunner Alliance, which suffered an electoral setback in 1969 under centrifugal competition. As a permanent grand coalition designed to contain opposition, BN had resiliently survived on a crafty manipulation of communal anxieties of ethnic Malays and Chinese. As unintended consequences, BN had, however, radicalised opposition in first-past-the-post elections and become vulnerable to implosion after electoral landslides. Pakatan Harapan now seemingly emerges as the new dominant coalition, with centrifugal competition from ethno-religious and regional-nationalists.