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Published by
Imperial College Press
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Covent Garden
London WC2H 9HE
Distributed by
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ISBN 978-1-78326-953-2
Printed in Singapore
PREFACE
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This edited volume was conceived back in 2011 when four of us, who
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
were then part of the Society and Identity cluster at the Institute of Policy
Studies (IPS), met to discuss future projects. Because we came from a
range of disciplines — Chiang Wai Fong, an anthropologist, Faizal Yahya,
a political economist, Quek Guan Cheng, an educationist and Mathew
Mathews, a sociologist, we quickly gravitated to the buzz word, “diver-
sity”, which was a concept common in all of our respective disciplines.
Since we were located in a policy institute, we were also well aware that
our roles were not merely to explicate on the realities of diversity but also
to examine the governance of this diversity. This is why we then scoped
our project to focus on the management issues related to diversity.
Our then Director, Ambassador Ong Keng Yong was interested in our
proposal to put together this volume primarily because he felt that this
information would be useful for the many outside Singapore who look to
Singapore’s model’s relative success at dealing with heterogeneity in the
population. We are very thankful for Amb Ong’s support and hope that
this volume would, in a modest way, contribute to a critical understanding
of diversity issues in Singapore. While the chapter writers have docu-
mented how Singapore’s management strategies on various fronts of
diversity management have proven to be successful, they have also pointed
out areas where such strategies have, in their opinion, not produced the
best outcomes. Such critical review is indeed useful as Singapore society
strives to become progressive and inclusive.
Mr Janadas Devan, the current Director of IPS continued his support
for this project. We are grateful for his help and comments during an early
workshop based on contributions from this book.
It has been a number of years before this edited volume could be
finally completed. We are appreciative of all the authors who kindly
vi Preface
contributed to this volume and stuck through the editing process. While
the chapters have been updated whenever possible to incorporate newer
developments, the main arguments proposed by the authors often
reflect their views at the start of the project. In some cases, changes in
government policies have addressed many of the issues which they
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chapters. They provided useful comments which helped our chapter writ-
ers balance their arguments at times. We do not provide their names here
as some preferred to be anonymous — but we thank all of them for their
generous efforts.
Our assistants at the institute provided much support in organising
workshops, editing, and writing literature reviews, all of which allowed us
to complete this manuscript. Our special thanks to Danielle Hong, Zhou
Rongchen and Wong Fung Shing for their assistance.
Leong Wenshan provided much needed help with proof reading while
Dr Gillian Koh and Mr Christopher Gee assisted us with the publication
process in their respective tenures as IPS Publication coordinators.
We also appreciate the assistance of Sandhya Venkatesh and her team
at World Scientific Press and Imperial College Press, who helped with the
production of this edited volume.
Mathew Mathews
Chiang Wai Fong
CONTENTS
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Preface v
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vii
viii Contents
Ho Kong Weng
Contents ix
Conclusion 329
Chiang Wai Fong
Index 349
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9”x6” b2351 Managing Diversity in Singapore
INTRODUCTION: DIVERSITY
IN SINGAPORE: HISTORICAL
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Mathew Mathews
GENESIS OF DIVERSITY
Emile Durkheim (1893/1933), often credited for the founding of the
academic discipline of sociology was particularly concerned about how
diversity affected the functioning of society. Based on his observations,
before wide-scale industrialisation became common in most urban centres,
societies were marked with relatively high levels of homogeneity. Those
who shared a space in these pre-modern societies were part of the same
economy and tended to be homogeneous on many fronts — ethnically,
linguistically, religiously, and in the norms and values that they embraced.
Even when there were clear differences between members of these socie-
ties — notably age and gender — there were well accepted cultural pre-
scriptions for how these differences had to be dealt with.
Modern society on the other hand, according to Durkheim, is marked
with high levels of differentiation, a characteristic that arose as a result of
the specialisation of labour during economic industrialisation.
Theoretically, this differentiation does not necessitate a loss of social
cohesion in societies. Greater differentiation actually means that people
are increasingly mutually interdependent; without cooperating with one
another, they are not able to fulfil their own individual needs. In reality
though, based on Durkheim’s observations, modern societies have low
xi
levels of social cohesion. For Durkheim, this was because modern socie-
ties lacked a collective conscience, a solidarity based on common values
which was common in pre-modern societies. The high levels of diversity
in these societies have thrown the system into confusion in terms of the
norms that are needed to regulate behaviour.
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CATEGORISING DIVERSITY
While race, and later gender, featured prominently in discussions of diver-
sity in the United States and the immigration situation in Europe (Bell and
Hartmann, 2007; Lentin and Titley, 2008), the contemporary discourse
around diversity went beyond these to a plethora of categories that socie-
ties tried to be mindful of. These include: “race, gender, ethnicity, culture,
social class, religious beliefs, sexual orientations, mental ability, physical
ability, psychological ability, veteran or military status, marital status,
state of residence, nationality, perspectives, insights, backgrounds, experi-
ences, age, education level, cultural and personal perspectives, viewpoints
and opinions” (Vertovec, 2012, pp. 295–296). In diversity management
textbooks, the dimensions of difference are either ‘‘fixed’’ or ‘‘fluid’’
(Lituin, 1997; Lorbiecki and Gavin, 2000). The former refers to differ-
ences that are inborn or immutable such as age, gender, race, physical
abilities or disabilities, while the latter denotes those differences that are
amenable to change such as educational attainment, religious belief, work
experience, ideological stances and tastes.
Western society for the last few centuries, and Asian societies in the
more recent century. However, social changes in the post-1960s era have
resulted in increasing diversity of family forms in many Western nations.
There is a departure from the dominance of the traditional, two-parent,
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
(Owen, 2005).
These ideas percolate various policies that structure contemporary
Singapore society. The Singapore government has managed Singapore’s
multicultural landscape through instituting various measures, such as
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
investing in both hard and soft infrastructure and ensuring that both the
physical landscape and its people are equipped to compete in the global
economy (Yeoh, 2004, p. 2435). Such a “state-driven, state-engineered,
neo-liberal globalization project” produced notions of Singapore as a
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
grants has come under scrutiny. This is partly due to multiple high-profile
incidents that involved foreigners, the increasing strain on the infrastruc-
ture and economy felt by locals, and the government’s Population White
Paper published in 2013 which attracted a lot of criticism and even a
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
platforms such as the now defunct The Real Singapore (which was
ordered by Singaporean authorities to be discontinued) took advantage of
such a positioning and sought to further the rift by altering news articles
to contain statements which would heighten locals suspicions of foreign-
ers (Au-Yong, 2015). Nonetheless, there have been mature responses to
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the issues; there are those who go beyond primordial sentiments to adopt
a more humanist language calling for greater respect regardless of nation-
ality and encouraging netizens to disaggregate errant individuals from
their racial or nationality background.
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The Internet has contoured the views of the younger generation, who
are normally more critical of status quo, less likely to vote for the PAP,
more likely to consume political content, and more likely to see govern-
ment control of media and bias in reporting compared to older persons
(Tan, Mahizhnan and Ang, 2011).
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Muslim women to don the tudung in uniformed services; and how neti-
zens have sought accountability from various public office such as the
National Parks Board on its procurement processes. All of these issues
were promoted and actively pursued using online platforms. Skoric,
Ying and Ng (2009) suggest that the Internet provides a “feeling of
togetherness which may help mobilise politically inactive citizens ….
Furthermore, strong online bonding ties may alleviate the fears associ-
ated with attending political rallies, speaking publicly about politics or
joining political parties, which certainly represent barriers to traditional
political participation in Singapore” (2009, p. 427).
The diversity in public discourse in Singapore has also been fuelled
by the proliferation of civil society groups, which also utilise online
platforms to promote their views. They, in addition to the opposition
politicians, provide a wider range of perspectives to issues. The preva-
lence of online petitions, social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram and blogs, as well as alternative news sites, are signs of an
increasing democratisation of public discourse. It is quite clear that a
burgeoning educated middle class has contributed to the shift to a society
which values individualism, autonomy and self-expression, as antici-
pated by modernisation scholars. Using results from the World Values
Survey, Inglehart and Welzel (2005) highlighted that as national econo-
mies grew out of the need to merely survive and are mature enough to
provide their citizens with the Maslovian fundamentals, its people will
become more involved in the political discourse and place more impor-
tance on self-expression.
No doubt, the confounding of factors have resulted in a more diverse
and complex Singapore society. How the government and society reacts to
xx Mathew Mathews
SCOPE OF BOOK
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The chapters in this book are written by scholars who are interested in
exploring the notions of diversity and how it has affected various institu-
tions in Singapore. The chapters reflect the fact that 50 years after
Singapore’s independence, the number of areas where diversity is pro-
Managing Diversity in Singapore Downloaded from www.worldscientific.com
has seen several highly publicised events where religious, ethnic, and
cultural sensitivities have been infringed. The chapter by Lai and Mathews
delves into some of the current challenges in cultural diversity that exist
today through discussing several high-profile incidents. These incidents
include (1) a Facebook post complaining of the Muslim azan (call to
prayer) being broadcasted in a MacDonald’s outlet; (2) a Bollywood-
themed dinner and dance event; (3) a posting of a young PAP member
questioning whether Muslim kindergarten children wearing headscarves
would be future terrorists; and (4) the “curry incident” where a local
Indian family could cook curry only when their Chinese immigrant neigh-
bours were not at home. These events are selected as they garnered high
media attention and were widely discussed by the public over the last few
years. The chapter moves on from the tensions highlighted to how they are
articulated along majority-minority and local-foreign lines. By doing so,
it allows closer analysis on how these tensions are negotiated, managed or
resolved by the various stakeholders. This helps to better identify the
prized societal values and principles as well as approaches of inter-group
negotiation in Singapore.
There is an increasingly concentrated effort in handling conflicts that
are inevitable in Singapore, as a result of new cultures being introduced
by migrants of diverse ethnicities and fears of religious terrorism and
fundamentalism. Religion, a strong marker of identity, is a calculated
risk in need of constant governance. As such, while hard measures such
as the law, censorship and policing are consistently employed, soft meas-
ures such as education and community networks are also seen as instru-
mental pre-emptive initiatives for possible intercultural and religious
conflicts.
casting has become much more accessible to many different artistes and
political groups. As a result, the state’s ability to actively censor content
becomes much more difficult. Liew argues that with a much more diverse
population, “rather than defending seemingly outmoded ‘Asian values’,
it is perhaps necessary for the government to use film as a test-bed for
discussions, to bring out new values”.
Changing visions of society must be accompanied by new mindsets to
better adapt and adjust to the changing global and local landscapes. As
pointed out earlier in this chapter, language and education policies have
been constantly modified to adjust to changing societal and global
demands. One of which is the introduction of a Bicultural Studies
Programme on top of the bilingual education policy. This has an undeni-
able economic impetus. Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean pointed
out that “Singapore needs to step up its efforts to groom bicultural indi-
viduals, not just bilingual ones, to ensure that it has a real advantage when
engaging with China” (Teo, 2011).
Hence, in extension of the state’s support for a strong base in
mother tongue linguistic abilities, bicultural education was introduced
to the education system in 2004 to inculcate a deeper and wider knowl-
edge of the cultural aspects of the Chinese language. The impetus for
the programme is apparent in its economic and political desires to
nurture a group of Singaporeans who are able to participate in the
Chinese economy. Chiang and Low conducted discourse analysis on
newspaper reports on the programme to examine the perceived motiva-
tions and objectives of the programme, as well as public reactions to the
ideological shift from bilingualism to biculturalism. The analysis also
unveils an apparent conflict between multiculturalism and meritocracy,
various forms; and (3) the armed forces that looks to integrate local born
and new citizens.
Singapore’s need to recruit foreign human capital — in order to sus-
tain its rate of economic growth — has compounded urban problems.
There has been noticeably worse traffic congestion and more frequent
breakdowns in public transport. In addition, there have also been nega-
tive spillover effects such as rising inflation, escalating property prices,
and general greater competition for employment opportunities. However,
the need for foreign labour remains a necessity, and managing a larger
transnational immigrant population requires careful balancing to abate
economic, social and political consequences.
The state has moved towards integrating new immigrants through
various sites of interaction — one of which is the workplace. Yahya’s
study on transmigrant identities and the flow of human capital looks
in-depth at integration in the workplace. The study also documents the
problems and challenges of integration at the workplace and how these
have been mitigated or resolved. Yahya notes that while integration has
taken place, both culturally and economically, there is often a lack of
Singaporean identity in some workplaces. Foreign bosses hire people of
the same nationality or social background, which can prove to be detri-
mental to social integration in the workplace and the society at large.
With considerable proportion of the workforce being foreign (including
PRs), and few are represented by the National Trades Union Congress
(NTUC), there is a need to tweak workplace policies amidst complaints
of discriminatory hiring practices against Singaporeans, so as to achieve
better synergy between locals and foreigners.
Quah notes that there are many other changes that affect traditional fami-
lies. She notes the multiple and contradictory demands on time because of
work that consumes both husband and wife and the spillover from work
to family, which affects family cohesion. She argues that some of these
struggles are due to the rise of technology and its role in shaping the fam-
ily. While some propose that families will no longer continue to be what
Singaporean politicians often refer to as the “building block of society”
because of the contradicting demands on families, Quah seems to provide
a different take. She asserts that families will continue to be the force of
stability amidst the changes that society will experience. This is because
Singapore’s social policy has effectively kept families strong and resil-
ient. However, Quah suggests that the state can give better and more
assistance to families, especially those in crisis and reform policies
related to ageing.
Another common space for inter-ethnic interaction is National
Service (NS), which is helmed as the national bedrock of defence and
security. As an intrinsic component to nation-building and defence, it is
more importantly a rite of passage for all Singaporean men who reach the
age of 18. Not only is it a personal progression into adulthood, it is also
an embodiment of equality, where people from different social back-
grounds, race and religions are deployed based on the best fit and bond
through shared memories and adversaries. The changing socio-economic
terrain that features rising income disparity and changing values of Gen
Y Singaporeans has impacted the institution to a significant extent. This
has resulted in NS being a sore point for segments of the population.
Some of these sore points include the exclusion of Malays from vocations
CONCLUSION
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The types of diversity addressed in this volume do not cover the full range
of diversity that currently exists in Singapore. Much more can be dis-
cussed on issues ranging from the diversity posed by gender and sexuality,
age cohorts, political affiliation and the digital divide. However, what is
crucial is that we consider the complexity that is intrinsic in diversity —
intersectionality being one of the key points which future discussions on
diversity should address. Individual experiences of diversity are varied
with forces such as gender, age, class and employment status interacting
in a complex manner and potentially discriminating certain groups. A crit-
ical approach to understanding diversity is therefore crucial especially for
policymakers and programme planners. As Singapore rapidly ages and
demands higher volumes of immigration, the opportunities and challenges
accompanying a diverse society will be at the heart of public discussion.
A diverse population will have diverse needs and expect diverse services,
which will result in the government having to cater to a range of voices
and expectations. It is then crucial to build the capability to dialogue and
come to decisions that are inclusive.
The focus on individual differences in a dialogue on diversity can
give very direct implications on the way people perceive others.
Ethnicity/race, gender, age, sexuality and disability are now categories
that people are arguably more aware of, alongside other axes of differ-
ences such as personal outlooks and experiences. While the discourse
can lead to social progress and better outcomes for the marginalised, it is
important that this does not spiral out of control and tear down the social
glue that holds our society together. To be able to dialogue about diver-
sity constructively, we must recognise the common denominator in every
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