THREE TEXTS, ONE POLICY SCRIPT: ASEAN CENTRALITY AND RULE-BOUND RE-ENGAGEMENT IN MALAYSIA’S CHINA POLICY, 2018-2019

Abstract

This article explains why Malaysia’s China policy under Mahathir Mohamad’s second premiership followed a distinctive sequence in 2018–2019: project review, renegotiation, and rule-bound re-engagement, rather than strategic decoupling. Existing accounts emphasise hedging, domestic political change, and the political economy of Belt and Road Initiative projects, but they do not fully account for the procedural ordering or Malaysia’s persistent reliance on legal and multilateral framing. Using a policy text analysis approach, the study examines two Malaysian policy documents together with one relevant ASEAN regional reference text: Malaysia’s Foreign Policy Framework of the New Malaysia, ASEAN’s Outlook on the Indo-Pacific, and Malaysia’s Defence White Paper. Read together, these texts articulate a rules-first, ASEAN-centred policy vocabulary emphasising dialogue, international law, and non-militarisation. Using interpretive process tracing, the article derives observable implications from the script and aligns them with the 2018–2019 policy timeline. It shows how review could be justified as governance correction, renegotiation as contractual repair, and resumed cooperation as ASEAN-compatible, rules-based engagement, while sensitive security issues were channelled through ASEAN-led venues. The article concludes by highlighting how authoritative texts can tether short-term volatility and enhance small-state predictability under rivalry.