SSA2209 Assignment 2

“Singapore is not democracy”. Discuss.

Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, has been recognized as a representative democratic state since August 1965. Its government constitutes of a parliament with the People’s Action Party (PAP) dominating it. To discuss and answer the question of Singapore is not democracy, we must first define the definition of democracy and its parameters, and how Singapore fits into this definition. The word ‘democracy’ originated from M.Fr. democratie in the 1570s, with ‘demo’ referring to common people and ‘cratie’ referring to rule or strength (Douglas, 2010). Hence, by definition, Singapore is a democratic country as her citizens are given the power to decide their own government. However, democracy is not just about fair elections; there are many other components and various degrees to class it under. Singapore’s policies defer from the general expectations of what a democratic country should be and as such, a better statement would be to extent Singapore is democratic.

My own definition of democracy is a multi-party political system in which citizens has the absolute power of electing the best candidates through fair and equal elections. A Humanities studies lecture in Hilla University stated that democracy can be defined as four elements: a political system for choosing and replacing the government through free and fair elections, the active participation of the people, as citizens, in politics and civic life, protection of human rights of all citizens and a rule of law in which all laws and procedures apply equally to all citizens (Hilla University, Humanities Studies, 2004) Hence, to discuss the democracy of Singapore, we have to break it down into political system, rights and equality.

The political structure of Singapore is a unique design that evolved from the Westminster structure during post-independence days. As the society progress, policies such as GRCs, NMPs and NCMPs were introduced to adapt with the changes. At first glance, these policies appear to be democratic as it actually provides more opportunities for weaker oppositions to step into the parliament. Yet the GRC system has been deemed to be highly detrimental to the democratic development of Singapore as it has been constantly introducing Singapore Parliament members who have not been directly voted in by the people. Because of that, some of them have become out of touch, unsympathetic, or even condescending to the very people that they are supposed to serve (Boon, 2009). The electoral changes in Singapore political arena may appear to be democratic on the surface, but a deeper understanding of these changes seems to suggest that PAP is building a totalitarian state.

A democratic society has to have fair and equal elections in the process of voting for the parliament. The elections in Singapore are fair as it allows equal opportunities for both PAP and oppositions to showcase their policies and engage the general public. Yet there are several techniques employed by PAP that seem to swing the advantage to their side. Although adjusting policies right before an election will mean that all parties will be affected, PAP will be affected the least because of its long domination of the government and its overwhelming parliamentary majority (Gomez, 2005). In the latest change made to the constituencies, the maximum number of six NCMPs has been increased to nine. This latest change might seem as an effort by the PAP to even the playing field, as the disparity between them and the oppositions is just too large. But on taking a closer look, one finds that such changes are actually imposing a false impression that with opposition members will be nominated as NCMPs into the government; there is less need to vote for oppositions. Furthermore, we know that NCMPs are only letting their voices be heard in the parliament while lacking the voting power that ultimately makes the difference, making them mere figures.

Free and fair elections are one of the strongest factor as why Singapore pride itself as a democratic state, its voting process being considered as one of the most transparent in the world. Yet the democracy index, which rates countries based on political freedoms and civil liberties, rates Singapore at a lowly 84th rank in the world. It listed Singapore under the category of “Hybrid regimes” along with countries such as Iraq and Kenya (Kekic, 2007). It is an understatement to say that Singapore is democracy just because there are many political parties.

The situation of the political arena in Singapore is such that PAP is often confused as the government itself and opposition exist only as a form of check and balance for the PAP. As a result, opposition presence is only there to check on the complacency on the part of the ruling party leading to problems most commonly associated with a monopoly (Stark, 2007). This scenario is largely different from other democracy, where most parties have equal chances of winning an election. Although a multi-political party system exists in Singapore, the role played by opposition is different from the democracy that other country practises.
The PAP has been at the driving seat of Singapore’s politics since its separation from Malaysia in 1965. This hegemony of more than 40 years has allowed them to handpick talents even before they enter the political scene, leaving the oppositions without any credible personnel to mount a real challenge on PAP. Although the citizens are given the free will of choosing the people they want to be placed in parliament, a Hobson’s choice will still occur, meaning that they will still choose the better alternative which is PAP. This violates the meaning of democracy as the members of parliament are not elected by choice; rather they are chosen due to the lack of choice.

During the Singapore general election in 2001, PAP won 82 out of 84 seats in the election, including 55 walkovers. Once again, majority of the parliament got in without actually depending on the votes of the citizens themselves. The dominance of a one party rule meant that even with free elections, there was not much of an option except to keep the dominant party in place. Using an analogy of marriage to illustrate my point; when it comes to choosing a spouse, one has the freedom of picking the partner of their choice. However, if all except one of the available choices are below expectation, it is in human’s nature to pick the one that stands out from the remaining unattractive options. My point is not that PAP is an incompetent party and the only reason the citizens voted for them is because the rest are worst, rather it is how PAP dominated the political scene that left no room for another party to enter, hence there was not much of a democracy to begin with.

There have been many strong accusations by the opposition that the PAP controls the mass media for their own advantage. PAP has been monitoring the mass media since gaining its dominance, and oppositions such as Singapore Democrats (SDP) accused the PAP of regulating the cyberspace during elections, fearing that this new media might provide a foothold for oppositions (Singapore Democrats, 2010). This lack of freedom in mass media puts Singapore under an authoritarian state rather than democratic; however PAP argues that it controls the mass media to prevent any malicious intent from harming the social structure. Former Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong claims a liberal press is not necessarily good for every country (Lloyd, 2005).

The PAP sees itself as the umpire of Singapore, denying pluralism in the media and it feels that media are able to manifest threats to the social development of Singapore. To make the situation worse, Singapore has the culture of political timidity. Timidity creates a culture of self-censorship and a readiness to censor others around us who might speak up, out of fear that their speaking up might put themselves at risk, because they may be assumed to be associated with them in some ways (Waipang, 2009). This ends up multiplying the effect of the initial intention of the government to keep the mass media at bay.

As pointed out by Freedom House, press freedom in Singapore media is constrained to such a degree that majority of journalists practise self-censorship rather than risk being charged with defamation or breaking the country’s criminal law on permissible speech (House, 2004). Although the degree of censorship is not as severe as other countries such as China, the curbing the freedom of media, results in a restriction of human rights.

Another interesting point to note is that the period between each election is slightly longer than other major democratic countries such as United States, where elections have been held consistently for every four years since 1792. This means that the political system of Singapore is not as flexible as other democratic states. In the event that the population demand to have an election, that will not take place as the citizens do not even have the knowledge of the exact period in which elections are held, as the government only announce news about the election just before the election itself. This takes away the sacred rights of the people in deciding when they want to have an election.

Nonetheless, opportunities and human rights are equally distributed among Singaporeans; from education to business to medical service. The society operates on a meritocratic basis, whereby rewards will be given based on their performance, regardless of language, religion, race or social status. The votes of every individual are equal, with no preference of who is more important. The law protects the rights of every individual, where no one is above the law, not even ministers or the elected president. Singapore has prided itself as being one of the safest and fairest country to live in.

To conclude, Singapore is still a long way from being a democratic state. It has made reforms to the political structure that suits only the community of Singapore. These reforms deviated from the Westminster model commonly seen in other democratic states. While there might be dubious policies that seem ambiguous as to which party it actually benefits, we cannot deny the fact that democracy is still upheld in Singapore. It will be harsh to say that Singapore is not democratic just because of certain curtailment in media and political arena. The political struggle of the past and the unique community of Singapore have shaped its politics into what it is today. In the end, Singapore is a still a democracy whose uniqueness is a by-product of its past.


Bibliography

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Gomez, J. (2005). Freedom of expression and the media in Singapore. Article 19 , 13.
Hilla University, Humanities Studies. (2004). What is democracy? stanford.
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