%0 Journal Article
%T ˇ°Saviourˇ± Politics and Malaysia's 2018 Electoral Democratic Breakthrough: Rethinking Explanatory Narratives and Implications
%A Bridget Welsh
%J Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs
%@ 1868-4882
%D 2018
%R 10.1177/186810341803700305
%X In understanding Malaysia's surprise 14th General Election, this article argues for the need to rethink how we understand elections. We need to bring together macro socio-political forces with more micro-level evolving phenomena in the campaign, within political institutions, and in voting behaviour. Rather than buck international trends, Malaysia's sociopolitical conditions before the election ¨C political polarisation, a rise of anger, increasing economic vulnerabilities, as well as increased nationalist and populist sentiments ¨C echoed global trends and served as fertile ground for political change. It was however three sufficient conditions that brought about the political breakthrough: the impact of emotional campaigning through social media, the deinstitutionalisation of the dominant Malay party, United Malays National Organisation, and the failure to win over young voters ¨C all factors that tie closely with the macro forces shaping the country. Given the factors that shaped the electoral outcome and Malaysia's ˇ°saviour politics,ˇ± it is suggested that the government turnover was more about breaking with the past than embracing democracy. As such, there will be constraints placed on expanding democracy going forward
%K Malaysia
%K GE14
%K Mahathir Mohamad
%K saviour
%K emotions
%K UMNO
%K youth
%K deinstitutionalisation
%K populism
%K nationalism
%K political polarisation
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/186810341803700305