Abstract

The Malaysian government and public consider the task of establishing world-class universities to be of primary importance; however their achievement in this field remains quite modest. This article examines the history of establishing world-class universities in Malaysia and tries to determine the reasons of falling short of the goal. According to the authors, two main reasons leading to the inadequacy of Malaysian universities are: 1/ The government is too deeply involved in schools' operation; schools are not sufficiently decentralized 2/ The Chinese culture and especially Muslim culture of Malaysia do not encourage students to be creative or to challenge. Malaysia requires policies that facilitate human resources in order to achieve desired results in the field of higher education.