Professor Terence T. Lee

This paper considers the contemporary mechanics of government communication in Singapore under the Lee Hsien Loong administration (from 2005 to the present). It examines the Singapore government’s use of contemporary tools, the co-employment of ‘spin’ and substance in the ‘Great Casino Debate’ of 2004-05, and the management of its official feedback channel ‘REACH’ to mediate its messages to the people. It then analyses the successes and failures of government communication evidenced at and by the watershed General Election of May 2011, and thus offers a timely rethink of what government communication in Singapore might look like post-elections 2011. It will argue and conclude that while an increasingly sophisticated citizenry and generational change has altered the government communication landscape in Singapore, the regime is nonetheless keenly aware that the raison d'être for supremacy both in governmental control and communication requires constant updating and modification. Whether the PAP government is up to the task of dealing with demands for change, or not, would make the vital difference.

Singapore’s technological prowess as one of the most networked city, society and nation is reflected in most statistical data. Indeed, Singapore is relentless in its pursuit of making technological and Internet history/ies. In its latest Intelligent Nation 2015 (iN2015) master plan, Singapore plans to integrate all aspects of info-communications into a single ultra-fast broadband platform that will be capable of delivering ultra-fast Internet. This paper provides a brief update on the extent of technological and Internet deployment. More importantly, it looks at how the Internet has further developed by analysing the events surrounding the 2006 General Elections in Singapore. Each election in Singapore is arguably a key regulatory milestone for the Internet because new rules are either invoked via new or revised legislation or new warnings issued to keep a lid on the effectiveness of new technologies. While Singapore has undoubtedly made ‘history’ in its regulatory approaches and strategies in managing the liberatory impulses, with outright censorship of racial, religious and pornographic – and, since 11 September 2001 (9/11), terrorist-related – websites making headlines around the world, it has also been able to score impressively in the technological competencies of its citizens. In the discussion that follows, we examine the current state of the Singaporean blogosphere and considers if the regulatory landscape has been altered following pressures brought about by blogs and other alternative websites. It argues that the implementation of both overt and subtle controls of alternative political websites as well as heavy-handed actions by the authorities to rein in on errant Internet users and bloggers, along with the occasional talking-down of the significance of the Singaporean blogosphere, have accentuated the ambivalence that the Internet in Singapore has (re)presented.

According to Singapore-based academics Randolph Kluver and Wayne Fu, there is a need to seek out cultural proxy signifiers “which indicate the extent to which beliefs and values are moving across national boundaries” (Kluver and Fu 2004). This paper examines how Singaporeans who have settled in the Western Australian city of Perth – which houses the largest single concentration of Singaporeans outside Singapore, to the extent that it has been dubbed ‘Singaperth’ by The Straits Times (Long 2003a; 2003b) – reconnect with Singapore culturally in and through their creative pursuits. The motivations and thoughts of three Perth-based Singaporeans who belong to the ‘creative class’ (Florida 2002), and who continue to relate to Singapore in their work and cultural activities, are presented and analysed. Using these three respondents as ‘proxies’, this paper considers the extent which Perth might be seen as a creative suburb of Singapore where cultural globalisation entails the embrace of the new creative and cultural ‘network’, one which enables these ‘Singaperthians’ to enjoy their ‘new’ suburban home, yet gives them autonomy to selectively, albeit consciously, mediate their diasporic ‘homeland’ and cultural ‘centre’ identities.

Singapore has most of the trappings of democracy parliamentary system of government with, additionally, an elected president; regular, free and accurately counted elections, and universal suffrage. However, certain draconian laws, controls on political participation, and measures limiting civil and political rights and freedom of the press, mean that Singapore is, to some extent – critics vary on the degree—an authoritarian state (Mauzy & Milne, 2002: 128).