Malaysia's Development Challenges: Graduating from the Middle

Malaysia is one of the developing world's greatest success stories. The book argues that as one of the developing world's most open economies, with a reputation for prudent macroeconomic management, Malaysia has achieved consistent growth since independence. It has moved from a largely resource-based economy to a multinational-led, export-oriented, industrial economy. Despite this success, Malaysia, like other developing countries, is currently at a crossroads in its development strategy; it is in danger of being unable to graduate to the level of more advanced economies - such as Korea, Taiwan and Singapore - but with the basis of its success at risk from competition from efficient, lower-wage countries - such as China, India and Vietnam. Moreover, there are new threats to the political stability and affirmative action programmes which have successfully held together a very racially diverse population.