Abstract
Current scholarship on governance in Singapore seeking to explain the People’s Action Party (PAP)’s dominance, authoritarianism, and its bureaucratic state, has focused on post-separation Singapore, and in particular on the developmental state and performance legitimacy. It has generally used analytical frameworks and methods common to the study of governance and democratisation in other post-colonial authoritarian states. However, this chapter argues that governance in independent Singapore has fundamental continuities with colonial rule. The rhetoric and strategies used to justify PAP policies are evolutions of the rhetoric and strategies of the late-colonial government. Its mechanisms and institutions are carried over from colonial rule, or were formed in response to the challenges of the late-colonial period. The chapter thus argues that governance in Singapore needs to be understood in this context, that democratisation in Singapore should be better understood under as analogous to decolonisation, and that democratisation in Singapore needs to be pursued using the approach of anti-colonialism.
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Notes
- 1.
“The Menace of Communism in Singapore”, Annex to CM Paper (56/II)235, 10 August 1956, FCO 141/14772.
- 2.
Memorandum from Johnston to Black, 7 February 1957, CO 1030/651; Pearson to Rushford, 21.2.1957, CO 1030/651, National Archives of the UK [Henceforth NAUK]
- 3.
Singapore Parliamentary Debates, 11 January 1988, vol. 50, col. 180.
- 4.
Singapore Parliamentary Debates, 31 August 1987, col. 1591–95.
- 5.
Singapore Parliamentary Debates, 31 July 1986, col. 369.
- 6.
Supplement 4 to Singapore Police Intelligence Journal 1954, August 1954, FCO 141/15951; Supplement to Police Intelligence Journal 5/55, May 1955, FCO 141/15951; Singapore Intelligence Committee Report, 27 July to 9 August 1956, FCO 141/7373; “Communist Front Organisations”, March 1956, FCO 141/14772.
- 7.
Secret 116, Singapore to CO, 27 December 1957, FCO 141/14783, NAUK; Nanyang Siang Pao [Henceforth NYSP] and Sin Chew Jit Poh [Henceforth SCJP] 26–31 July 1957; “First impressions of the Draft Reports of the All Party Committee on Chinese Education”, 30 November 1955, FCO 141/15302.
- 8.
The Straits Times, 9 April 1960.
- 9.
Singapore, “Report of the Committee on Minimum Standards of Livelihood,” (Singapore Legislative Assembly sessional paper, Cmd. 5 of 1957), 13−26.
- 10.
See Sir Gerald Templar’s remarks as reported in Sin Chew Jit Poh 24 July 1953; Nanyang Siang Pao 25 July 1953, Nanfang Evening Post 25 July 1953.
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Thum, P.T. (2019). Independence: The Further Stage of Colonialism in Singapore. In: Rahim, L.Z., Barr, M.D. (eds) The Limits of Authoritarian Governance in Singapore’s Developmental State. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-1556-5_3
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