Malaysia's ruling coalition was stunned in elections last weekend. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi and his National Front (Barisan Nasional) lost the two-thirds majority in Parliament that they have held for nearly four decades. As the government tries to regroup, Malaysia appears headed toward increasingly pluralist politics as well as rising tensions in its multiethnic society.

The National Front, which has governed Malaysia since it gained independence in 1957, is a coalition of three big parties and 11 small ones that encompass Malaysia's main ethnic groups: Muslim Malays who make up 60 percent of the population, Chinese who comprise 25 percent and Indians who represent 8 percent. Impressive economic development, coupled with a Bumiputra policy that favors ethnic Malays in all realms of Malaysian life, facilitated National Front rule.

Mr. Abdullah, who took over as prime minister in 2003, had solidified the coalition position, winning a landslide election in 2004 shortly after taking office. Yet disaffection with his government has grown. The public is angry at unfulfilled promises from that campaign, a widening income gap and rising costs of living. Mr. Abdullah, whose rule has been less harsh than that of his predecessor, Mr. Mahathir Mohamad, has been criticized for being out of touch and unresponsive in crises; he has even been chastised for remarrying less than two years after his wife died.