At the time of writing, I fervently hope the mist of current political situation drifting over our homeland will soon clear up. The saga has added salt to the wound. Like many other upper middle-income countries, our country is still facing a spectrum of problems in social economic sphere.
The uncertainty in the political terrain is preventing public, private, and broadly defined not-for-profit community-based organizations from keeping up economic resilience for sustaining continuous income growth, which is extremely crucial for every citizen.
Unanimous agreement in an election is extremely difficult. It is impossible to do so in a dictatorial regime where there is no democracy. Therefore, the constructive partnership between elected representatives and citizens or voters become the necessary and sufficient conditions for transforming desirability to the accomplishment of the largest scale of common good in our society.
Every rakyat with moral high ground is desperate to attain the common good, and he or she is steadfastly defending the righteousness of 'freedom from want' and 'freedom from fear”. These are expounded by United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in 1994 — in measuring the level of human development — based on the concept of capability approach conceived by Amartya Sen in 1980s.
In a democratic country like Malaysia, citizens, or more specifically voters choose the best representative in their constituent who can maximize their utility in terms of the possibility in attaining the largest common good. Their choice is reciprocated by the desire of each candidate to receive majority votes.
Hence a candidate will undoubtedly position him or her in a situation where the majority votes are concentrated in the middle distribution of preferences so that it is also a situation where at the same time the best preference of voters could be satisfied.
Therefore the constructive partnership between elected representatives and citizens or voters become the necessary and sufficient conditions for transforming desirability to the accomplishment of the largest scale of common good in our society.
Then the actual constructive coordination or partnership between elected legislators and citizens determine the intersection of the demand curve of citizens with that of elected representatives. That point of equilibrium is the largest share of common good, which is mutually benefit to both partners.
Every citizen who is of moral high ground does not debate advantages and disadvantages of the common good. A training program in University of Colorado defines moral high ground as 'Parties seeking the moral high ground simply refuse to act in ways which are not viewed as legitimate and morally defensible.'
Just as important, every citizen and every elected representative is in search of answer to the following question: “How to derive the state of common good for a pluralistic society that symbolizes the right of Rakyat in Federation Malaysia under the Federal Constitution, viz., government of, government by and government for the people”.
These are the Three Principles of the People. The constitutional right is unshakable and they ought to become the most important foundation of our homeland. Hence, while re-setting the sail from coastal waters where the mist of uncertainty is still drifting may in reality causes higher probability of human errors that may be too late to turn back.
Our journey to the land where it is filled with the largest common good is still a long and winding one. Although there were road bumps in the past two weeks, I believe this is a temporary set back.
We can certainly reboot the navigator with moral high ground as our compass in arriving to the land fills with the largest common good and shared prosperity. This is the idea of Malaysia.
Fukuzawa Yukichi said in 1875: “In its broad sense, civilization means not only comfort in daily necessities but also the refining of knowledge and the cultivation of virtue so as to elevate human life to a higher plane...”
The writer is a professor at Reitaku University, Tokyo, and has been teaching Southeast Asia studies, international economics, integration, development economics and Asian economy since 1983
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect those of the New Straits Times
