When a member of one of Thailand's most prominent business families went on a diving trip to one of Malaysia's island paradises he found himself in the exclusive company of Malaysians as well as Singaporeans. Like himself all ethnic-Chinese.
During the drinks and dinner following the diving conversations centered around the topic of their positions in Southeast Asia. What surprised him was how strongly the Malays and Singaporeans stressed their Chinese ethnicity and how important it was for them to see themselves as part of the larger ethnic-Chinese community rather than as citizens of the country they lived in.
Coming from Thailand he had never really given his ethnicity much thought and saw himself as a citizen of Thailand rather than a Chinese living outside China. Later he stated to European friends how shocked he had actually been when learning from his diving buddies the disregard they felt for their fellow citizens in Malaysia or other ethnicities of the countries of Southeast Asia. There was a deep mistrust felt especially towards the ethnic Malays and Indonesians.
In Thailand, he said, the ethnic factor was considered a non-issue and was never discussed among friends most of whom would be ignorant about the ethnic background of the others and never give it a second thought.
His feelings reflect how ethnic Chinese and ethnic Thais have integrated better into one single society in which differences are not suspect and no-one should feel restricted or separate from main-stream society only because of ethnicity. This is also easier in Thailand as most ethnic Chinese and ethnic Thai share the same religion - Buddhism- and perform ancestor worship in one form or other. Also ethnic Thai have their roots in southern China and form part of the wider Tai ethnic community.
Malays and Indonesians are ethnic Malay and predominantly Muslim, a religion strongly opposed to "idol worshipping". This makes for more prominent differences than between Chinese and Thai. Another element causing tension is the fact that Islam forbids money lending against interest. And even though this is changing and many Islamic financial products have been introduced, traditionally the money lending business was in the hands of the ethnic Chinese who therefore controlled the purse strings of the ethnic and Muslim Malays and Indonesians, same as the Jews handled the money lending business in medieval Europe when the Roman Catholic Church forbade Christians to engage in such activities.
This created resentment among the ethnic Malays and Indonesians towards their ethnic Chinese co-citizens who in turn felt threatened and insecure in their adopted home countries leading to suspisions towards the ethnic majorities. This traditional divide is still felt today.
The Singaporeans in the diving party saw their country mostly as a small island of economic success based on their hard work (which was attributed to their Chinese ethnicity) surrounded by hostile (ethnic Malay, Muslim) predators who would take away their hard earned wealth by force if they could and who should therefore be kept at bay and in a subservient position as much as possible.
Although the Thai diver saw no reason whatsoever to emphasize his Chinese ethnicity and no tension exists between ethnic Thais and ethnic Chinese, reality is that also in Thailand all commercial activities, from the country's large international conglomerates to the humble one-man convenience store, garage or market stall, are dominated by ethnic Chinese with ethnic Thais making up any work force they may have. The ethnic Thais just feel not threatened by the economic control their ethnic Chinese fellow citizens have over the country and see no reason to change this, neither by force nor peacefully.
This article appeared earlier on www.businesstrendsasia.com
