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PARADISE LOST: Mahathir & The End of Hope takes a critical look at Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s role in Malaysia’s political evolution and his ultimately destructive legacy of corruption, racism and religious extremism. He inherited a nation pregnant with promise and left it mired in division, uncertainty and instability, a grand kleptopia, a terrible kakistocracy. It also examines the role Mahathir played in Pakatan Harapan’s stunning 2018 electoral victory and his subsequent betrayal of the coalition he was entrusted to lead. The end result is a nation in deep crisis, adrift in a sea of uncertainty, unable to come to terms with its past, unwilling to make the compromises necessary for its future.

Written by a former Malaysian ambassador, Paradise Lost makes for sober reading. Intensely provocative, it challenges long-established shibboleths, spotlights the dangers now confronting the nation and argues that Malaysia’s only hope for redemption lies in embracing and harnessing its unique multicultural identity.

321 pages.

“Dennis Ignatius, who retired after an illustrious career as one of Malaysia’s top diplomats with a seat in policymaking councils, has written a deeply informative and disturbing account of how Mahathir Mohamad almost single-handedly destroyed Malaysia’s promise as a multiracial, multiethnic democracy and transformed it into a repository of racial and religious intolerance, condoning venality and corruption in his misguided drive to uplift the Malay race. For a world that has mistakenly viewed the former prime minister as one of Asia’s indispensable strongmen, this is a vital corrective. It should be on every Southeast Asian government specialist’s bookshelf.”
John Berthelsen
Editor in Chief, Asia Sentinel

“Dennis Ignatius has seen it all in his long and distinguished career within the corridors of power and out of it. In Paradise Lost he touches on almost every aspect of our federal political quagmire including Mahathirism, the entrenchment and propagation of “ketuanan Melayu” and political Islam, the miseducation of our society and the political economy. It’s a landscape of surprising breadth and depth that needs to be read. More than ever, we all need to step up to the challenge if we are to take Malaysia back to the paradise we once were.”
Siti Kasim
Human Rights Lawyer

“Ignatius’ devastating portrait of Mahathir is a must-read for every Malaysian. It is a compelling in-depth study of Malaysia’s longest serving prime minister who squandered two chances to propel the nation to greater heights. Mahathir’s narcissistic tendencies, his racist worldview, overwhelming sense of self-righteousness and deflection of blame gave rise to policies which destroyed several generations of Malaysians and crippled a once beautiful country. Paradise Lost doesn’t disappoint.”
Mariam Mokhtar
Rebuilding Malaysia