G. Rodan

The political economy of Singapore's industrialization : national, state, and international capital

Acknowledgements - Abbreviations - Tables - Prefatory Notes - Preface - Theoretical Introduction - Pre-Industrial Singapore: General Structural Developments until 1959 - The Political Pre-Conditions - Export-Oriented Manufacturing - Second Industrial Revolution - Singapores Ongoing Future as a NIC - Conclusions: Singapore and NIDL - Endnotes - Bibliography - Index

The internet and political control in Singapore

GARRY RODAN investigates the political implications of the Internet in Singapore, where authorities have embarked on an ambitious attempt to restrain the liberalizing impact of the new technology. His findings contradict popular expectations of the Internet necessarily aiding the erosion of authoritarian rule.

Beyond Hybrid Regimes: More Participation, Less Contestation in Southeast Asia

Transition theory literature has been preoccupied with either identifying why democracy has not arrived or with how it can be consolidated where it has emerged. Most recently, arising out of the interest in consolidation, attention has turned to scrutinizing institutions for their democratic quality or lack thereof, not least within so-called hybrid regimes. However, such approaches obscure important political regime dynamics in Southeast Asia. This article argues that the definitive features of a political regime pertain to how social conflict is organized, managed or ameliorated through modes of political participation. Modes of participation encompass institutional structures and ideologies that shape the inclusion and exclusion of individuals and groups in the political process. The paradox in Southeast Asia over the last decade has been that increasing political participation has often been accompanied by a narrowing of the channels for political contestation. The article argues that modes of participation in the region have militated against the organization and mobilization of collective actors around socio-economic cleavages. The emergence of such modes of political participation is also related to neo-liberal globalization and late industrialization, which have been more hostile to collective class-based political mobilization than was true of the experience in Western Europe when representative democracy consolidated.

The technocratic politics of administrative participation: case studies of Singapore and Vietnam

In the last decade in Southeast Asia there has been a trend towards new modes of political participation for citizens to provide feedback to government officials or to provide new methods for holding public officials to account. Regimes in Singapore and Vietnam have to differing degrees pioneered and embraced this direction through various such new administrative modes of political participation. But the paradox is that these modes of political participation have not replaced but complemented tight controls on political expression. It is argued here that these new modes work against independent collective political action through: the state defining what issues are available for participation; the state controlling who gets access to administrative institutions involving political participation; and the state shaping the form that this access takes. The end result is political rule by administrative means. Politics is not so much suppressed as transformed into a set of technocratic processes and ideologies intended to narrow the scope and nature of contestation.

Civil society and other political possibilities in Southeast Asia

ISSN: 0047-2336 (Print) 1752-7554 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rjoc20 Civil society and other political possibilities in Southeast Asia Garry Rodan To cite this article: Garry Rodan (1997) Civil society and other political possibilities in Southeast Asia, Journal of Contemporary Asia, 27:2, 156-178, DOI: 10.1080/00472339780000111 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/00472339780000111

Capitalist development, regime transitions and new forms of authoritarianism in Asia

Abstract The possibility of viable alternatives to the historical combination of liberal democracy and capitalist development is now widely acknowledged in the analysis of late industrializing countries. For example, within the transitions literature notions of hybrid regimes and closer scrutiny of institutional functioning are being employed to capture complex variations in authoritarianism. Less acknowledged is the significance of capitalist dynamics and related geopolitics for the character and performance of political institutions. We argue that late industrialization in Asia has especially militated against middle-class/labor alliances and produced a general fragmentation of social forces restricting the scope for democratic coalitions. But as well as helping to explain the consolidation and refashioning of existing authoritarian regimes, analysis of these social foundations of political institutions also helps account for strands of authoritarianism within so-called post-authoritarian polities. The Pacific Review has long fostered debate about the durability or otherwise of authoritarian regimes and alternative models to Western capitalism in Asia.

The internationalization of ideological conflict: Asia's new significance

Abstract The idea of a clash of values between the ‘East’ and ‘West’ enjoys influence amongst academics, politicians, journalists and others interested in the implications of Asias changing position in the global political economy. However, false monoliths are being depicted in the notion of ‘Asian values’ versus ‘Western liberalism’ which conceal major and unresolved political and ideological disputes within Asia and the West. Indeed, it is the universality of these disputes which accounts for the extensive interest outside Asia in the idea of ‘Asian values’: in particular, the resonance of so‐called ‘Asian values’ with conservative ideology and philosophy. Meanwhile, self‐appointed custodians of ‘Asian values’ from the elite in Asia attempt to portray emerging challenges to conservative values, from a variety of competing political and ideological perspectives, as ‘unAsian’.

Asian crisis, transparency and the international media in Singapore

The Asian economic crisis brought the institutional framework within which markets operate in this region under scrutiny. This gave rise to a broad consensus that both recovery and more sustainable markets require major governance reform, not the least being a shift towards more transparency. Adequate, timely and reliable information was portrayed as a major factor in the crisis, preventing informed investment decisions and contributing to a dramatic loss of business confidence. But what does this imply for authoritarian controls over the media? Are they a likely casualty as the objective needs of markets now assert themselves? In this study, we examine one of the most advanced economies in the region where transparency and media freedom have been markedly absent. Yet the city-state’s policy-makers have responded to the crisis by forcefully promoting Singapore as an international finance centre – wherein a free flow of information is thought to be critical. The rhetoric of transparency, and even some reforms in that direction, has been adopted. However, neither a free media nor political openness is part of the government’s agenda. To date, this selective approach certainly does not appear to have deterred investment. This not only suggests that the People’s Action Party’s brand of authoritarianism is durable, but that the institutional frameworks within which advanced capitalism can operate remain varied.

Singapore: Emerging tensions in the ‘dictatorship of the middle class’

Singapores economic expansion in recent decades has been dramatic. Since 1960 its per capital GNP has increased seventeen-fold and now approximates that of New Zealand. The inter-related objectives of employment creation and economic growth through industrialization have long given way to more ambitious aims. For at least the last decade, economic policy has been oriented towards securing technology-intensive niches in the international economy in a range of service and manufacturing industries.

Accountability and Authoritarianism: Human Rights in Malaysia and Singapore

Abstract The concept of accountability enjoys wide and growing appeal, its advocates submitting both normative and functional arguments for institutions limiting discretionary powers of political and economic elites. This development is seen as facilitative of democratisation, especially in post-authoritarian societies. Yet it has gone almost unnoticed that not all authoritarian regimes have dismissed accountability reform and some are adopting reforms in its name. This article contrasts the patterns in Malaysia and Singapore on a specific accountability institution – human rights commissions – offering explanations for why the former has established one and the latter not. It is argued that intra-state conflicts associated with Malaysian capitalism have created pressures and opportunities for accountability reform not matched in Singapore where there is a more cohesive ruling elite. Moreover, the PAPs acute ideological emphasis on meritocracy concedes no space for horizontal political accountability.