Institutions and Social Mobilization: The Chinese Education Movement in Malaysia

This paper studies the persistency of minority social movement in pushing its agenda over a long period of time. Focus on institution as the main independent variable for social mobilization, this thesis argues that structural institutions such as rules and constitutions shaped the foundation framework for collaboration among the movement community, and legitimated the selection of leaders. However, the relational institutions, such as leaderships, networks, and individual social capitals that exhibited powerful and significant factors in sustaining social mobilization in a prolonged movement within a semi-democratic, non-Western society. Utilizes Malaysia’s arguably longest-running social movement, the Chinese education movement, as its empirical case study, the thesis analysis the movement trajectories, from its establishments in 1952 until today.