Large dams have proliferated in Malaysia in recent decades. Constructed mainly to meet mounting domestic demand for water and energy, they have destroyed large tracts of speciesrich tropical rain forest and displaced many already poor and marginalized indigenous groups from their homes and ancestral lands without their consent. Evicted indigenes were promised a better life in resettlement villages, but for the most part this has not occurred. Invariably traumatized by resettlement and widely forced into cash-based economies for which they were ill prepared, many resettled indigenes suffered from frayed social relationships, high rates of unemployment and enduring poverty, in large part because the authorities failed to internalize project costs. The consequences for indigenous groups of dam-induced environmental change and development-forced displacement and resettlement (DFDR) are explored through a critical reading of the literature on four large dams: Sungai Selangor, Babagon, Batang Ai and Bakun. More large dams are under construction and many others have been proposed, resulting in threats to the future well-being of many indigenous communities. Generally speaking, the experiences of Malaysia's dam-affected indigenes mirror those of other indigenous minorities in the greater Southeast Asian region.

abstract. The Malaysian government regards the country's indigenous peoples as “backward” and in need of “modernization.” It aims to assimilate them into the so‐called mainstream society and to incorporate their lands and resources into national and global markets. These policy objectives leave little scope for indigenous groups to pursue their own life projects. Indigenous communities want to share in the benefits of economic development, but they are not prepared to give up their lands, cultures, and identities to obtain them. They have attempted to ward off the negative consequences of development projects by forming advocacy nongovernmental organizations, engaging in various forms of resistance, and seeking redress of their grievances in the courts. Most of all, they want recognition of their rights to land and place. The efficacy of their agency is severely hampered by a battery of repressive laws and by their own political weakness.

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Malaysia's indigenous peoples continue to suffer numerous grievous injustices, including appropriation of their ancestral lands and socio-economic deprivation.