ASSESSING THE LEVEL OF UNiTY AND INTEGRATION IN MALAYSIA USING THE SYSTEM DYNAMICS SIMULATION MODEL

Social capital plays an important role in enhancing the efficiency of political institutions, and the economic performance of nations. Malaysia is a multiracial country with a population of 22,2 millions. The four main ethnic communities are the Malay, Chinese, Indian and the indigenous people of Sabah and Sarawak. The indigenous people account for only about 12 per cent of the population but they comprise of nearly 37 ethnic groups and sub-ethnic groups. As such the importance of maintaining close social bond which encompasses national unity and integration is an important social agenda needed for a successful transformation of the Malaysian society both economically and politically. This study attempts to assess the level of unity and integration among the diverse ethnic communities of Malaysia on the basis of the hard economic variables extracted from the 1991 and 2000 Population and Housing Census Reports of Malaysia and a sample survey on the social capital of the ethnic communities. A System Dynamic which integrates both the hard economic variables and the perceived social capital of the ethnic communities is constructed to simulate the scenarios based on different policy options on the government in terms of affirmative action plan. The hard economic variables comprise of highest educational attainment, occupational hierarchy and participation in the industrial sectors, while the soft variable or the social capital component that include seven dimensions trust, reciprocity, community efficacy community integration, sociability and quality of life. The former is based on secondary data analysis while the latter is captured through the field survey via structured questionnaires. The weighted aggregated selectivity ratios are computed for both the hard variables and the soft variables. These two ratios are aggregated to obtain the composite weighted aggregated selectivity ratios (CWAS) for each ethnic community. From the results obtained, strategies are suggested to address issues relating to unity and integration in Malaysia