In January of 1930, the Chinese Affairs Department in British Malaya started releasing monthly reviews which intended to document every issue on the Chinese community.

A major reason for this was that the Chinese were marginally more independent than other ‘races’. Many of the perceived threats to British hegemony came from predominantly Chinese organisations such as the MCP and the KMT.

The Far Eastern Survey had problematised the fact that a majority of labour in Malaya as an ‘alien labour force’ and suggested their status as ‘aliens’ plays a large part in the labour unrest since their ‘loyalties laid elsewhere’.

A key justification for this was the idea that ‘the Chinese’ were more susceptible to being ‘politically minded’ an idea stemming from the 1911 Revolution.

Malays, especially from the anti-imperialist left-wing, were seen as being influenced by the ‘politically minded’ Chinese. Indians as well were seen as passive because of ‘better living conditions’ of Malaya.

Chinese political activity revolved around labour militancy which severely disrupted British colonial economy. Chinese workers were organised and capable of collective bargaining and all of this culminated in 1936 with strikes from miners, municipal labourers and so on.

The image of the Chinese as a hard-working race had until this point been useful to the colonial state as it could be used as a foil to the ‘lazy’ Malay race that would in turn need the protection of the White Europeans but now they were seen as a social menace.

The reasons for this is that as generations of Chinese coolies were born in Malaysia, they were suddenly able reposition themselves to avoid exploitation as cheap labour by the colonial state.

Governor Cecil Clementi even takes this chance to blame the ills of colonial British Malaya on the Chinese as they had transgressed the predetermined roles set for them by the British in his article ‘Chinese Topics in Malaya’, in the Straits Times in 1932

Though, the discursive construction of the Chinese during this decade were negative, they would pale in comparison to how the Chinese were constructed in the next few decades.