Traditional to Engaging Phases
Phase I: Traditional
The formation of Malaysia started in Malacca in the thirteenth-century. The image of Malacca
as one of Malaysia’s historical cities lends a substantial advantage in terms of attracting
visitors to museums. The Malacca state government has played an active role in developing
and promoting the tourism industry in the state since the 1980s, and this is due to their
disadvantage in natural resources compared to other states in Malaysia (Cartier 2002). The
state is heavily dependent on the tourism industry as their primary income, and the cultural
tourism sector has been their major attraction for local and international tourists. Since being
named a “UNESCO World Heritage City”, Malacca has become more popular with local and
international tourists. Further, the location of the museums, attractive museum architecture,
and a constant stream of imaginative programs, are among the strategies implemented by the
corporation to increase attendance. Occasionally, PERZIM introduces special events and
themes to their museums to make raise public awareness of their existence, and to give the
best engaging experience for their visitors. At the same time, original artefacts, collections and
culture are still their main focus. PERZIM is also actively involved in the local community via
their programs and activities, and encourages the locals to become involved with the tourism
industry.
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Museums in Malacca have a significant, close relationship to the tourism industry. This study
found that other museums in Malaysia are also associating their products and services closely
to tourism. In addition, the Malaysia Department of Museums formerly operated under the
Ministry of Tourism (then Ministry of Culture, Arts and Tourism) (Department of Museum
2010). Since the Malacca state government is heavily dependent on the tourism industry, the
museums in the state have to raise new and innovative ideas for their products and services
to become competitive. To date, Malacca is the state in Malaysia that has the highest number
of museums (sixteen public museums) with more being planned. Each museum in Malacca
offers different products and services compared to other museums in the country and some
museums in the region. Thus, as the market leader of the museum sector in Malaysia,
PERZIM has to be aware of the latest developments taking place in the museum sector and
experience industry. PERZIM is cautiously working in the same direction as the rest of the
world’s rapidly evolving museum sector.
Phase II: Engaging
The experience industries involving museums in Malaysia once involved only static displays
and no visitor interaction. With the new role of museums globally, however, the broader role of
museums as educational institutions and to some extent entertainment venues benefiting the
wider public (Stephen 2001), has prompted museums under PERZIM in Malacca to adopt new
approaches. These are among the first few museums in the country and the wider Asian
region to implement these new strategies. Importantly, the development of PERZIM uses the
ICOM mission and objectives to inform their organisation’s guidelines. ICOM (2010) mission
and objectives ask for a commitment to the conservation, continuation and communication to
society of the world’s natural and cultural heritage, present and future, tangible and intangible.
During the interviews, PERZIM staff affirmed that their organisation mission and vision is not
only to make museums a place to display artefacts relating to history, but also to offer
education, R&D activities, cultural centres, and to some extent to provide entertainment. This
offers visitors unique experiences and redefines the institution’s role as traditional museums.
PERZIM also recognise that they have to follow world trends, which dictate that new
components of interactivity have to be applied to their products in order for them to attract
more visitors, particularly younger generations. Thus, PERZIM’s programs and activities are
designed for all demographics of visitors, in particular with families.
PERZIM’s Sleepover @ Museum program offers the experience of education and as well as
entertainment to their visitors. This program had managed to attract domestic and
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international tourists. However, the development of the experience industry in Malaysia—
particularly the museum sector—is in a slow phase compared to other new sectors like
animation and advertising. For instance, the development of animation sector in Malaysia
began in the late-1990s, but its progress has been more rapid than the museum sector, which
has existed in Malaysia for much longer. This slow progress could be due to most of the
formation of public museums in Malaysia being administered by the state and federal
government. The bureaucratic implications of top-down management here sometimes causes
slow decision-making (for further reading read Siddiquee 2006), especially in cases involving
more than one stakeholder in the decision-making process. Consequently, new changes may
take longer time to be implemented.
PERZIM’s official website shows that from 2000 until 2009, the Malacca Maritime museum
managed to maintain the first rank of attendance among all of the PERZIM museums. This
could be due to the new features applied by these museums to make their products and
services more competitive compared to other museums in other states in Malaysia. With
different activities and programs being introduced constantly to their visitors, these museums
have managed to attract a significant number of visitors. Some states in Malaysia may have
better and more valuable collections (see the Perak Museum, and the Cultural Museum in
Negeri Sembilan Shukry 2010) but attendance at these museums is lower than at Malacca
museums. However, perhaps because of Malacca’s UNESCO status caused them to receive
top priority from the federal government, particularly in terms of funding and promotion, since
this title helped to introduce Malacca to the world.
As the museum sector is part of the experience industry, it has to become more imaginative
with their products and services in order to offer the best experience to their visitors
particularly the younger generation. PERZIM is seen as being aggressive in promoting and
developing their museums and brand image throughout the country and the region, while the
other museums in Malaysia are more passive. The only other state recognised for being
aggressive in developing their museums’ brand image in Malaysia is Sarawak through the
Sarawak Museum Department, which is not only offering visitors high quality cultural
collections, but also produces annually an academic journal titled The Sarawak Museum
Journal (Sarawak Museum 2010). Nevertheless, compared to other museums in developed
countries, the museums in Malaysia are far behind with their engaging phase, although there
are some positive changes towards it. Some Malaysian museums—for example, the Kedah
Archaeology Museum (Utusan Malaysia 2009)—are not given proper attention by the state
and federal government, and as a result incur significant wastage of resources.
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Interview respondents revealed that the engaging phase at PERZIM museums has been
taking place rapidly over the past five years while they were prepared the city to become
UNESCO World Heritage City. Once the title was obtained in 2008, PERZIM became more
active in offering new features to their visitors, and has subsequently opened more museums
in the state. While their new features combine culture and imaginative components the strict
rules and regulations from the federal, state government and UNESCO, mean some of the
changes may not be too imaginative in fact.
6.5 RQ3: How do Malaysian creative economy enterprises utilise
traditional Malaysian cultural assets?
All respondents categorise PERZIM products and services as belonging to the cultural tourism
sector, and realise the importance of tourism as the major income for the state. Thus tourism
and culture are the two terms used by staff most frequently when describing their industry and
the products and services they offer. With the announcement of Malacca as “World Heritage
City” in 2008, cultural tourism remains a significant tourist attraction. Although the new
creative economy concept has been introduced by policymakers in Malaysia, cultural tourism
is the more acceptable term used by this corporation to describe their products and services.
Since Malacca is lacking natural resources in comparison to other states in the country, the
cultural tourism sector is identified as one of the sectors that can generate significant income
to the state. Thus, all the museum activities under the management of PERZIM mainly aim to
attract more numbers of visitors and tourists to visit the museums and the state.
The state government established PERZIM to manage the operation of the museums all over
the state, and to preserve their local culture. At the time of the interviews, PERZIM was
operating sixteen state museums and planning five museums around Malacca. Recently,
PERZIM also expanded their role by making their museums education institutions for the
public. Hence, their program is normally a mixture of all these elements, and these products
are somewhat different from most of the other museums in Malaysia. This gives an experience
to their visitors that other museums in the country do not provide, and attracts visitors from
different types of market to their museums. PERZIM also assists locals interested in becoming
involved with cultural tourism products and services by organising training and seminars open
to the public. Through this exposure, the organisation hopes locals will learn to operate their
own businesses. This is in line with the state government mission to achieve zero
unemployment rates. Since the 1980s, the state government has recognised that the tourism
industry could generate more job opportunities for the local people and give significant support
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to the development of this industry. Malacca is called the “Historical state of Malaysia” and its
government plays an active role in developing the tourism industry in Malacca, particularly by
promoting their strengths, two of which are history and culture. To support the creative
economy concept, the corporation is using culture, new ideas and technology.
Like other countries in the region, Malaysia promotes her unique culture to attract tourists to
their country. This can be seen in all promotions for Malaysia, whether they are designed to
attract investors, international students or tourism (particularly). The culture of Malaysia has
always been the primary feature. Each state in the country has a different culture to offer to
their visitors, and since the 1970s, culture has been an important component in attracting local
and international tourists to the country (Musa 2004, 147).
Sometimes tourism campaigns based on Malaysian culture create heated debate with
Malaysia’s neighbours, particularly Indonesia and Singapore. Recently, due to similarities
between Malaysian and Indonesian culture, there has been dispute among the cultural groups
in Indonesia. The issue has been prominent in the Indonesian media for more than three
months, and has sparked a series of demonstrations in front of the Malaysian Embassy in
Indonesia. At one point this created a violent situation for the Malaysians who reside in
Indonesia. Both governments met to discuss the issues and try to find ways to solve the
problem. After the issue was settled in 2009, UNESCO recognised Indonesian batik as the
Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. This made Malaysian batik producers furious.
Following these incidents, the Malaysian public urged their government to start patenting local
cultural items such as food and dances, which caused debate in Singapore. The similarities
between the cultures of Singapore and Malaysia are unpreventable, since Singapore was
once a part of Malaysia. I argue that this is an unending debate. The cultural plagiarism that
some Indonesians have accused Malaysia of should not be an issue at all. Every country or
community has copied the culture of others since humans have existed in this world. Culture is
not exclusive to one community, and Malaysia is not the only country to face this problem.
6.6 RQ4: How can Malaysia position itself in the creative economy in
the region?
As the historical city of Malaysia, Malacca has managed to position herself comfortably among
the domestic and regional tourists, particularly from Singapore, Indonesia and Brunei. The
state is also gaining substantial attention from international tourism market, and has ranked
Malacca together with other important cities in Malaysia such as, Kuala Lumpur, and George
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Town. Now, more international tourists are travelling to Malacca; consequently, the whole
state benefits. The number of tourists to Malacca has been growing every year, and the same
scenario is evident in their museums (refer figure RQ 2.1 and RQ 2.2). More engaging and
interactive components offer visitors better experiences of PERZIM’s products and services.
With the state government target to attract eight million tourists to the state in 2010,
aggressive promotion has been planned.
PERZIM had succeeded in positioning their museums as some of the most visited museums
in Malaysia, and have become important tourist attractions in the Malacca. UNESCO’s
recognition of PERZIM sets a good example to other state agencies in the country. Other
museums in the country and regions, including Indonesia and Thailand, now seek PERZIM’s
advice on managing their museums. As a result, not only they have a better positioning in the
country but also in the region, and this will directly contribute to the position of the Malaysian
creative economy. After modifying their mission and objective to have their museums do more
than just display historical artefacts and collections, PERZIM has succeeded in adding new
changes to their products and services. The organisation wanted the state to have the highest
number of museums in the country, and at the moment they are leading other states in
Malaysia.
Tourism has been the state’s traditional primary income, and recently creative economy has
been identified by the state government as having significant potential to generate income.
The state government has given priority for the development of creative economy, particularly
in terms of supporting and promoting such development among locals. Each year through
PERZIM, the state has run many training courses, seminars, and workshops, encouraging the
public to participate, especially those who want to start their own businesses. This gives the
locals the proper exposure and preparation for them to get involved in creative economy
products and services, particularly relating to cultural tourism sector.
At the same time, the transformation of the creative economy is also affecting the whole
country. From other data resources, this study found that Malaysia is trying to position herself
as one of the most important countries with a creative economy in the region. In addition,
several significant transformations have been achieved in Malaysia over the past ten years, in
line with the government mission and policy to raise the status of Malaysia to that of a
developed country by the year 2020. For the past five years, more positive development to
promote the creative economy has been taken place across the nation, particularly around
Klang Valley area and in Malaysia cities. Also, more private organisations are playing their
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active role in helping the government to more effectively position the Malaysian creative
economy sector. These government and private organisations are outlined below.
Kuala Lumpur City Hall (KLCH)
Malaysia’s capital city of Kuala Lumpur receives constant support and development from the
federal government and major private sectors, particularly in the tourism sector. Although most
of the administration’s government offices have moved to the new administration city of
Putrajaya, KL maintains its major role as the nation’s number one Central Business District
(CBD). In the KLSP20, the city identified the importance of culture and creative industries in
developing and promoting their tourism sector. Today, KL has many world class creative
economy facilities, and among the popular facilities are:
• Istana Budaya (Cultural Palace)
• Pusat Konvensyen KL (KL Convention Centre – KLCC)
• Dewan Filharmonik Petronas (Petronas Philharmonic Hall)
• Panggung Bandaraya DBKL (KLCH Theatre)
• Pasar Seni KL (KL Central Market – KLCM)
National Arts, Culture and Heritage Academy (ASWARA)
ASWARA opened in 1994 and now has five departments: dance; music; film and video;
writing; and theatre. Currently, they plan to open up a new department of heritage. This
academy offers short courses and certificate and diploma level programs for part-time and fulltime
students. This focus on education in the arts, culture and heritage contributes to the
government's Vision 2020 agenda to become a developed nation. Malaysia aims to follow
these characteristics of developed countries. ASWARA works closely with other government
and private organisations in developing, promoting, and preserving Malaysian culture, and is
well known for preserving and popularising Malaysian traditional dance, music and theatre,
which is on the verge of extinction, particularly in KL. In doing so, this institution often
experiments with new ideas that are a combination of technology, innovation and creativity in
attracting the public particularly the younger generation and international tourists. However, in
comparison to other traditional institutions in KL and Malaysia, ASWARA’s impact as a higher
institution can be considered small, particularly in terms of R&D and producing IP. Until today,
none of their graduates have contributed a significant impact in the development of creative
industries in Malaysia compared to other university graduates.
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University of Malaya (UM)
UM is the oldest university in Malaysia, and has a global reputation as one of the top Asian
universities. Their Cultural Centre was established in 1974, and in 1997 began to offer a
degree with honours program. In 2001, the centre launched their postgraduate program.
Today, UM offers three undergraduate (music, drama and dance) and postgraduate
(performing art, visual art and PhD) programs for students. The centre is also active in
research and organising dialogues, seminars, exhibitions and conferences about creative
industries. Since UM is the first university in the country, the institution has managed to
maintain their R&D and facilities at an international standard. For instance, the centre
organised an International Conference on Performing Arts as Creative Industries in Asia in
2008 (UM Cultural Centre 2009)—a joint effort with the then Ministry of Culture, Arts and
Heritage which received catered to participants from all over the globe. The Cultural Centre is
not only active in organising Malaysian traditional shows, but also modern and foreign
performances such as orchestra, ballet and English theatre. Also, hospitality and tourism
subjects have been introduced at the higher degree level at the Faculty of Business and
Accounts since 2002. As the oldest university in Malaysia, UM offers vast national and
international networking privileges. Unfortunately, the social science subjects are not as highly
regarded by university management as the pure science subjects, and often receive second
class treatment.
New Media Trend (Blogging/Online Social Network)
Blogging has become the latest global trend, and Malaysia is no exception. Apart from the
online media websites, blogging has become the other means of positioning Malaysia
museums in the region. Thus, both case studies in this research have their own official
website, blogs, and fan pages on Facebook and twitter, which attract substantial fan numbers.
In the time of writing up this chapter in October 2010, LCP attracted over one million fans on
their Upin & Ipin Facebook page, while PERZIM has more than 800 fans, and their number
increase every day. Both organisations actively update their account with photos from
previous and current programs, and organise activities for their fans. Sometimes, these fan
pages inadvertently prompt their fans to fight over certain issues—in one instance, a small
group of Indonesians posted hate messages to Malaysians. Hence, the moderators need to
handle the situation with care.
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Conferences/Meeting/Dialogue
Today, the Malaysian government and private agencies actively collaborate to raise public
awareness about the significant potential of creative economy for the country. Increasing
numbers of domestic and international conferences, meetings, dialogues and workshops
related to this sector have been organised over the past three years. The latest event
attracted significant names from the creative industries sector, and was held in Kuala Lumpur
in December 2009. The Digital Content Conference managed to attract more than twenty
international renowned creative industries figures and local key players to give their speeches.
In 2009, MDeC for the first time sent the biggest group from Malaysia to attend the Cannes
Film Festival to showcase Malaysian 3D-animated products. The Prime Minister attended this
international event to show his support for this sector, and to show Malaysian government’s
commitment to develop this field. All of these activities were organised to develop the creative
economy, and to position Malaysia as the important country in this sector in the world.
Malaysia claimed to be ambitious with their Vision 2020 mission and the mega projects they
launched, such as the MSC development (Bhuiyan 1997). For the past ten years, the
Malaysian government has continuously offered significant support and incentives to local and
international investors, particularly to open their ICT business in Malaysia. The creative
economy development has been the Malaysian government’s top priority for the past three
years, and many plans under the Malaysian Plan 10 have been established by the
government for its benefit and progress. With Vision 2020 less than 10 years away, the
government and private sector need to speed up with their work. Since becoming the sixth
Prime Minister, Najib has demonstrated his commitment for the development of a creative
economy, and positive progress can been seen all around Malaysia. With strong neighbours
such as China, India and Singapore, this vision is seen by some as impossible. However,
Malaysia has encouraged major international companies including Intel, Harrods, Hewlett-
Packard (HP), Microsoft, and Rhythm and Hues to invest in the country in all aspects of ICT.
This is a positive sign that international companies recognise the potential for Malaysia with
her rich resources (like human resource and culture) to succeed in this sector.
Nevertheless, there are many aspects that still need major attention from the government. For
instance, the level of awareness from the public about creative economy is significantly low.
Hence, the government should educate the public first before they develop this sector further.
The top-down approach by Malaysian government may reach and benefit only some people,
but not the entire public. If the public understand the government’s vision, it will be easier to
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get their support in implementing the vision. Also, until today there is no clear definition or
policy about creative economy or its sectors. A clearer policy on creative economy will give
proper guidance for the market players in developing their products.
6.7 Conclusion
After comparing PERZIM and MoV, this chapter presented the data gathered from PERZIM as
a state government corporation managing more than 16 museums and heritage building in
Malaysia. This highlighted the differences and similarities of museum management in
developing and developed countries. Then, PERZIM’s experience as a traditional cultural
tourism producer adapting to new changes and ideas with new role was categorised in seven
themes, which answered RQ1 of this study. In answering RQ2, a discussion followed about
how PERZIM developed their cultural products and services to remain competitive in the
market. Finally, RQ3 was addressed by highlighting the close relationship between the cultural
tourism and imaginative ideas used by PERZIM in their products and services. The
corporation also used ICT facilities to gain a better position in the market. However, special
consideration is needed with these modern applications. With their elite status within a
“UNESCO World Heritage City”, the corporation has to ensure their changes continue to
maintain the traditional elements in their museums and heritage buildings. RQ4 discusses
government strategies to assist in positioning Malaysia’s cultural organisations in the region.