Editorial - Penang Monthly (Page 9)

The sustaining of social disharmony must end

2 min read

We have just entered a new year, so allow me to kick off this magazine’s fifth year in its present form with some observations about the central importa...

India In Our Minds

2 min read

Today, when we talk about the rise of China and India, we lazily think of them as similar items – ancient and rich civilisations coming into their own i...

All the World’s a Stage, and Who Else but We are Responsible for the Upkeep of the Theatre

3 min read

All things change. We can all agree on that. But what the density and swiftness of change in modern living have taught us is that there are harsh limits.We ar...

We all need Over Exposure

2 min read

Since our cover story for the month is about the future of education in Malaysia, I would like to take up the issue of exposure as a necessary element in the...

Now that Cavemen Have Conquered the Earth…

3 min read

When we were cavemen, we lived in caves.And in the thousands of years since then, we have lived in everything else – from lean-tos to tents to log cab...

Governments and citizens who should be grateful to them?

2 min read

An important issue that should surface during coming debates about the impending Goods and Services Tax (GST) is how it affects the basic relation between the...

Reading and Writing Yourself Free

3 min read

The basis for human liberty as we understand it today was laid with the advent of universal literacy. When reading and writing stopped being the sole right...

Representativeness is the basis of social harmony

2 min read

I remember spending a lot of time in my teenage years wondering how societies are possible. Noticing how difficult it is for people to get along, I wondered w...

Can Our Cuisine Remain the Same While We Change?

3 min read

Mr Ong Jin Teong, in his admirable book Penang Heritage Book: Yesterday’s Recipes for Today’s Cook (Singapore: Landmark Books, 2010), noted forlor...

Toward a political culture that suits a two-party system

2 min read

Following the General Election in 2008, BN had the strange situation of being in the opposition in five states. Before March 8 that year, it only had that rol...

Let's Perfect The Two-Party System

2 min read

The pattern of change in Malaysia became ever more discernible after the 13th General Election. While the ruling BN understandably wishes to describe its vict...

Let’s not go back to the late Abdullah era

2 min read

One important effect of the March 8, 2008 elections was that it forced the BN government in Putrajaya into crisis management. That became the responsibility o...