The Sea and Its Unlimited Resources

The politico-geographical distribution of land seemed to have been resolved and consolidated on a long-term basis after the colonial era. Except in a few cases (for example, Israel/Jordan) state borders have not been altered. Changes amounted to incorporation of the entire country with its former borders, or a change in the political system. Expansion beyond a border would only be possible by means of war because nowhere on earth is there a totally uninhabited region that does not belong to anyone, and at the coast living space comes to an end.

In the past, the sea was used as a waterway or for fishing, and it seemed endless and inexhaustible; everyone had sufficient space and fish (Fulton 1911). Hugo Grotius 1 defined the principle of the mare liberum in 1609. A territorial sea with a width of three nautical miles under the jurisdiction of a coastal state was only established under the growing influence of Great Britain, the Netherlands and other European sea-powers. Beyond three nautical miles nobody could claim national rights. At that time large areas of the sea were not of value except for strategically important straits. Unlike on dry land, it was possible to use its resources without marking out claims. In 1702, Bynkershoek added an auxiliary quality to the principle of the three-nautical-mile territorial sea as a juridical support: the distance a cannon can fire, because the sea cannot be fully occupied and therefore it cannot be part of a country (Kent H.S.K. 1954). Of course, there have always been attempts to mark off territorial seas, particularly if these seas are surrounded by land on a few sides. The reasons given were either on security or on economic grounds (for example, Denmark, Norway, and Iceland were a union since 1381, but when Greenland was rediscovered in 1585 Denmark claimed exclusive fishing rights in the northern North Atlantic, as they now ruled over the opposite coast).

It was intimated earlier that the course of future population trends is such that the question of an adequate supply of labour in the country will be of great concern in the future. The size of the labour force will depend primarily on changes in the size and age composition of the total population in the future. To some extent, changes in the age-specific labour force participation rates may affect the size of the population, but such changes in the future are extremely difficult to predict. Partly because of this, it is assumed that the participation rates will remain constant during the whole period of projection. What this implies is that the changes in the future labour force, to be discussed in this chapter, would be solely a reflection of the fertility trends assumed in our computation. This fits our objective well since our prime purpose is to demonstrate the impact of the different paths of fertility trends on the growth and structure of the labour force.

The total labour force at every five-year time-interval and the increase for every five-year period from 1985 onwards according to Projection A are presented in Table 6. The labour force is estimated to rise from 1,219,889 in 1985 to 1,300,200 in 1990, an increase of 80,311 or 6.6 per cent. In the next five year period 1990-95, the labour force is expected to increase by a small number of 54,500 or 4.2 per cent. The increase will continue to slacken until it amounts to only 6,400 or 0.4 per cent during 2010–15. By 2015 the labour force would have attained its peak level of 1,441,900, and thereafter it is expected to fluctuate slightly around the 1.4 million level with small negative growth rates at certain periods and small positive growth rates at others.

The figures for Projection B reveal that the labour force will follow a somewhat different but more clear-cut path in the future.

Maritime law regionalization in the western part of the Pacific Ocean is characterized by difficulties of varying degrees. Both Australia and New Zealand as well as the South Pacific island states and territories have proved that the demarcation of maritime law borders can be facilitated if the general political situation is positive and if the distances between neighbouring states are large. The sea-bed in these areas can be unequivocally assigned to the respective coastal states. In addition, based on present knowledge, the sea-bed contains no exceptional deposits. A number of relatively valuable fish live in the column of water of the fishery and economic zones, but the coastal states are at present not, or only partly, able to utilize these resources completely. This means that the distant fishing nations do not have to give up fishing in these large areas but are able to continue working there as a result of numerous contracts, although they do have to pay licence fees. Potential disputes between distant fishing nations and states in the Australia-New Zealand-South Pacific region are made less likely by the fact that the world market demand for fish is growing, and the resulting competition forces the long-distance fishery nations to compromise.

More complicated problems concerning the association and utilization of sea zones have been experienced in East and Southeast Asia. Here, one finds sea areas which are surrounded by a number of coastal states, whose political conflicts with foreign countries are naturally transferred to maritime law regionalization. These sea areas are also not large enough to permit each country to expand its sea zone as far as it would wish (cf. Alexander 1974).

These partly enclosed seas present a rather difficult starting point, and this is even more the case if they contain a large number of islands: according to the new Convention on the Law of the Sea, islands have a great effect on the size of maritime law zones. These islands, even if they are small, uninhabited, lacking in natural resources and mainly forgotten, thus gain unusual importance, and the question of possession can even result in military confrontations.

The 1960s signalled the beginning of a totally new phase in the history of the country. Malaya gained its independence on 31 August 1957, and as a result the 1960s were characterized by a complex interplay of the political, social and economic forces brought into being by the circumstances of an immediate post-independence era. Inevitably, the complexity of events during these years made themselves felt in certain significant ways in the literary development of the period.

The 1960s were generally referred to as zaman mengisi kemerdekaan or an era in which to give substance to (the meaning of) independence. In line with this aspiration, the administrative sector undertook to accelerate what was known as the process of Malayanization. Prior to independence in 1955, a committee was set up to look into this process, and it recommended that for every five officers recruited into the Malayan Civil Service (MCS), four should be Malays. Between 1957 and 1962, the number of British officers in the MCS decreased from 220 to 26, while that of Malays increased from 128 to 219. By 1968, the number of these Malay officers had reached 709. The 1960s were thus to witness the emergence of these MCS officers as a distinct Malay group. Alongside the MCS officers, there also grew a group which came about as a result of the adoption of parliamentary democracy, namely the parliamentarians and councillors (Wakil Rakyat). Together with the MCS officers, they drew attention to the phenomenon of Malay leadership as a whole. To be sure, this question was evident in earlier years, but it became more pertinent in the context of independent Malaya where the leadership of the country was now solely in the hands of the indigenous population. Within Malay society in particular, the Wakil Rakyat and the MCS officers, especially the latter with their pervasive presence in all ministries and the various statutory bodies, were seen as the body with the authority and power to shape the fortunes of the Malays.

Ever since the end of the economic reconstruction of post-war Japan in 1952 or so, there has been a steady process of unidirectional industrial restructuring, moving from a composite of the labour-intensive light industries to what the Japanese nowadays call the heavy, thick, long, and large (HETHILL) industries and on to the so-called light, thin, short, and small (LITHISS) industries. The prima donnas in the leading industries have shifted from textiles, low-cost apparel, toys, and plywood manufacturing industries through petro-chemicals, iron and steel, nonferrous metals, and heavy general and electrical machinery, and shipbuilding to consumer and industrial electronics including VTRs and semiconductors, precision equipment, biotechnology, and new materials such as optical fibres and new ceramics.

The process of Japan's industrial restructuring had proceeded very smoothly during the first phase in the 1950s and 1960s from the labour-intensive light industries lo the heavy and chemical industries. It coincided with the period when the Japanese economy, assisted by the ongoing international economic environment toward trade liberalization and the expanding world economy, fully took advantage of the well-educated and hard-working labour force, the high rate of domestic savings, the active entrepreneurial spirit precipitated by the structural reforms installed by the Allied Occupation Forces and the government's high-growth policies, and was growing at the annual average rate of over 10 per cent.

While there were some declining industries such as coal-mining appearing on the industrial scene even during the first phase, it was relatively easy for the Japanese economy to absorb the adverse impact on capital and human resources, since there were so many rapidly expanding industries creating new jobs and growth opportunities for all the enterprising private sector industrialists. All that the Japanese Government had to do was “not to stand in their way” and assist the private sector entrepreneurs to obtain the required technologies and markets overseas.

NOTES ON RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The tables presented in the text are based on data derived from questionnaires related to daily income and expenditure administered to 16 households in the village (the questionnaire is to be found in Appendix II). Each questionnaire was designed for three days, and every three days the questionnaires were collected. If the questionnaires had not been filled in, as was often the case, a return visit was made later in the day, or three days later, when the next questionnaire was finished. A three-day interval was designed so that a control could be kept over the regular recording of accounts, before too much was forgotten.

The sixteen households were chosen according to three principles: that of stratification, that is, five of each category of rich, middle and poor households as identified by a village informant (for a discussion on these categories, see the chapter on “The Village as a Unit of Analysis”); that of variability, that is, where possible, different family structures; and thirdly, the limits of the possible were set by personal access and the availability of a family member willing and able to fill in the questionnaire everyday. Naturally, the quality of the data varied from household to household and improved by the second month, when everyone was sure of how the questionnaire worked. On the whole, the information given is as accurate as any other methodology would have been able to ensure.

These sample households were not chosen by the author but by the author's adoptive father (according to the parameters set above). As such, they reflect very much his personal friendships in the village, but seem to be fairly representative and, significantly, included households from both the major political factions in the village.

THE QUALITY OF THE DATA

The first major problem is the lack of data on labour utilization, especially for household production.

One of the central objectives of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), as embodied in the Bangkok Declaration under which ASEAN was founded, is the promotion of Southeast Asian Studies. In this context, ASEAN warmly welcomed the offer of Mr Zenko Suzuki, Prime Minister of Japan, in early 1981 to support the launching of an ASEAN Regional Studies Promotion Programme (ARSPP).

After extensive consultations among ASEAN member countries and between ASEAN and Japan, it was agreed that the ASEAN Regional Studies Promotion Programme, initially to extend over a period of five years (FY 1982–86), should focus on policy-oriented socio-economic research. Thus far, the co-operative effort has resulted in the publication of two joint ASEAN-Japan overview papers: ASEAN-Japan Industrial Co-operation: An Overview published in September 1984 resulting from the first phase; and Effective Mechanisms for the Enhancement of Technology and Skills in ASEAN: An Overview published in March 1986, from the second phase. This volume is the product of the third phase of the programme on “Industrial Restructuring and Adjustment for Japan-ASEAN Investment and Trade Expansion”. Like the two previous volumes, it is based on the results of studies conducted by the Japanese research team and the ASEAN country research teams.

The recent history of ASEAN-Japan relations has been marked by a degree of ambivalence. As the first Asian nation to industrialize successfully and to have risen as a phoenix from the ashes of war-time destruction to the leading heights of industrial and technological power, Japan has always been regarded with a degree of awe and admiration by its southern neighbours. Such awe and admiration have, however, been tinged with a certain amount oi anxiety, especially as the impact of Japan's post-war economic expansion becomes increasingly felt in the ASEAN region.

On the Japanese side, historical circumstances and the need for economic reconstruction in the early post-war years made it unavoidable that its external relations were initially to a large extent oriented towards the West, especially the United States.

A study of modern Malay literature of the immediate post-war years inevitably points to the role of Singapore as the centre of literary activity. After the war, Singapore ranked as the most important port in the region, attracting trade and business from all over the world. As a cosmopolitan city, it was a focus for foreign tourists, artists and scholars and held the promise of a lively cultural life. Its many libraries, the University of Malaya (1949) and Nanyang University (1955) combined to make it an ideal centre for literary activity. However, Singapore's importance, especially in the context of the development of Malay literature of the period, lies not only in its strategic location as an international sea-port. It is also tied up with the larger and more important overall climate of the day. In Singapore, political, social and economic forces combined to create an environment which brought into being a style of literary activity which was to leave a distinct mark in the history of modern Malay literature.

The 1940s were significant in the Asian region as a period of intense struggle for independence from colonial rule, with Indonesia gaining its independence in 1945, India in 1947, and Burma in 1948. Under the influence especially of the political struggles in Indonesia, the 1930s saw the growth in Malaya of a number of political organizations in Pahang, Negri Sembilan and Perak. In May 1937, Ibrahim Yaakub and a few others including Ishak Hj. Mohammad founded the Kesatuan Melayu Muda (KMM – Young Malays Association). Openly anti-British and radical in outlook, the organization advocated fighting for independence by aligning itself with Indonesia. During the Japanese occupation, progressive political movements were encouraged and Pembela Tanah Air (PETA – Defenders of the Motherland) was formed. This was a paramilitary group supported by the Japanese. After the Japanese surrendered and British took over control of the country, the Partai Kebangsaan Melayu Sa-Malaya (PKM - Malay Nationalist Party) was founded.

It is possible to distinguish four types of tropical forests: wet evergreen or rainforest, moist deciduous forest, dry deciduous forest, and open woodland. Rainforests and wet deciduous forests may be grouped together as tropical moist forests (TMF). About two-thirds of the world's TMF consists of rainforests that develop in areas receiving between 4,000 to 10,000 mm. of rainfall per annum. They are evergreen and are genetically and ecologically very rich. Hoist deciduous forests develop in areas of lesser rainfall (1,000-4,000 mm. annually).

One of the results of the U.N. World Conference on the Human Environment held in Stockholm in 1972 was an increased international awareness of the seriousness of the current trends in the loss of forest cover and growing stock in the developing countries of the tropical world. Among the recommendations of the Conference pertaining explicitly to this issue was one which called for the continuous monitoring of the world's forests in collaboration with the FAO, UNEP, and UNESCO.

In the decade after the Stockholm Conference a number of studies of the world's TMF were published. These were 1argely attempts to evaluate and synthesize heterogenous data of varying quality and reliability. Although the final figures and conclusions arrived at by the authors varied in detail, all were unanimous in their views that the world's TMF were being depleted rapidly, in many cases beyond critical thresholds (see Persson 1974; Sommer 1976; Myers 1980; the Global 2000 Report 1981).

Estimates of the rates of deforestation varied considerably. Sommer (1976) reported that the total area of TMF in the mid-1970s was 935 million hectares. This was 40 per cent less than their previous global coverage. His computation of the annual TMF loss was 11 million hectares (1.2 per cent per annum). In a later study Lanly and Clement (1979) put the annual loss at 5.6 million hectares. This figure covered only those TMF that were permanently removed. At the other end of the scale, Myers (1980) estimated that 20 million hectares of TMF were being destroyed or seriously degraded each year.

Sources

The sources on boria are fairly limited, consisting of short articles, passing comments in wider studies of theatre, and scattered notes. Boria was first mentioned by H.T. Haughton (1897, pp. 312-13). According to him it was first brought to Penang in 1845 by the 21st Regiment of Madras which had been transferred there to garrison the fort. A song and dance form, it was played by the Indian Muslims of the regiment for ten days in the month of Muharram when they had holiday leave to celebrate the annual Shi'ite festival of mourning for Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammed. Under the designation of the Muharram festival therefore, sources on boria date back to 1845 according to Haughton. In 1558 J.D. Vaughan (1970, pp. 116-75) mentioned it as an activity of the Jawi-Pekan of Penang. Another significant early source is the Penang Riot Commission Report of 1868 (hereafter referred to as the 1867 Riot Report). In this repct investigation into the cause and effects of the Penang riots 1867 revealed that two rival Malay associations, the Red Fia and White Flag societies, formed a few years earlier to perform in the Muharram festival were allied to Chinese secret societies and were involved with them in the riots. The committee's proposals in the report led to the future confinement of activities to religious festivities in their own village areas. Though there is no information in the report on boria as a drama form, it does provide us with a contemporary source on the locations and political activities of some of its actors and performers.

R.J. Wilkinson (1910), a Straits Civil Service Officer and noted Malay scholar, discussed boria as a form of Malay amusement. He compared the boria of Madras to that of Penang and established that the resemblance was only in name, for the show as then known in Penang had a totally different form.

In 1985, further research was carried out to focus on two areas: 1. the relocation of certain industries from other countries, in particular from Japan, to the ASEAN countries; and 2. the environment necessary to speed up the process of transfer. The research studies attempted to identify constraints perceived to be responsible for the slow pace of redeployment and to formulate measures at national, bilateral, and multilateral levels to enhance the process of industrial development in ASEAN.

In this research, industrial restructuring is defined as the process of bringing a country's industrial activities in line with its existing or emerging comparative advantage in order to make more efficient use of its resource and skill endowments. It also involves the manipulation and adjustment of economic parameters such as investment incentives, prices, wage levels, exchange rates, and tariff and non-tariff barriers to trade. Consequently, the country research studies aimed at generating information and recommendations, based on the experiences of various firms, for industrial development in the ASEAN region. A key indicator of successful redeployment of industries to the ASEAN countries based on comparative advantage is the ability of the recipient country to compete in the world market for these types of manufactures, evidenced by a rising share of manufactures in the country's export total.

Background on Selected Industries

The common industry chosen by the research teams from the ASEAN countries for their case studies is the electronics/electrical industry. This industry is chosen because of its significance in the industrial development strategies of the ASEAN nations. It not only accounts for a large segment of industrial investment and employment, but also reflects very significantly the dependence of the ASEAN countries on such investments from Japan and other developed countries. Furthermore, it has been perceived that there are within this industry economic activities in which ASEAN countries have or are gaining comparative advantages. This in turn implies potential opportunities for economic co-operation between ASEAN and Japan.

Market-places are for circulating goods outside the traditional system of reciprocity and redistribution. At the early stages, trading that was conducted outside the village or town was made with foreigners to whom there were no social obligations, as depicted by Polanyi in the case of ancient Greece (Polanyi 1971, p. 104). The spatial separation of trade and other modes of circulating goods indeed mirrored the historic incompatibility of two different normative conceptions which constituted the basis for the exchange of goods. It was felt that the gift, to members of the same community, contained a social content inasmuch as the transfer of the gift confirmed the social bonds with kin, neighbours, and fellow villagers, thus contributing to the social cohesion and economic self-sufficiency of even smaller communities. Trading for money has always conveyed the notion of making profit at the expense of others; among friends and neighbours, it would have discredited the social content of the good (Malinowski 1922; Mauss 1966; Polanyi 1971, pp. 78-115). This notion did not apply, however, in transactions with foreigners, who were regarded as having a different set of values.

When the market principle penetrates and gradually dominates various aspects of community life, the market-place comes to be a central village institution which now not only serves the trading function but also has social and cultural purposes. In Minahasa, after the abolishment of the mapalus — the mutual aid groups involved in agricultural production which also provided the arena at festivities for confirming social and cultural relations — the marketplace, in addition to other new institutions such as local associations, took on some non-economic functions. For despite economic integration and social transformation, the villagers continued to feel the need for an informal public place in which to exchange all kinds of local news, including private and political gossip and slander (Frohlich 1940; Bohannan and Dalton 1968; Skinner 1968).

As the market-place mirrors various aspects of village life, the pasar as a research subject provides valuable access to a number of issues in the social sciences which relate to the village.