ABSTRACT
Writers and activists dealing with gender issues in Malaysia regard ‘development’ as producing a very mixed result for women in the country. Malaysia has seen massive social change since independence in 1957. Contemporary Malaysian modernity can be seen as a highly specific form of being modern. It has not simply followed the western liberal capitalist path to development but rather one common to many countries in the Asian region, in which the state acts as a ‘midwife’ to capitalism. Discussions of the dramatic effects of ‘development’ on Malaysian women’s lives have appeared in a number of different contexts, including academic writing, Malaysian popular culture, local activism and western representations of the country. The British colonial regime left a legacy of large business and plantation interests in ascendancy in the Malaysian economy. Few accounts of class in Malaysia discuss women, apart from young women factory workers.
