Communication, Globalisation and National Agenda - Policies, Parables and Paradoxes for Youth Development in Malaysia

This article gives an overview of the changing media landscape and its implication to youth development in Malaysia. In tandem with globalisation, the Malaysian government had enacted several liberalisation policies that paved the way for the commercialisation, deregulation and privatisation of broadcasting and telecommunication industries. Such initiatives resulted in media-rich environment and higher media penetration among young people in Malaysia. They are now having access to inflow of foreign programmes on local stations, many are of the opinion that there should be some kind of control and censorship over such programmes. The paradox is that the changing media landscape allows for the necessary growth of human capitals pertinent to nation building, but at the same time it is also blamed for most of the on-going social maladies among the young.