J. J. Woo

Policy Relations and Policy Subsystems: Financial Policy in Hong Kong and Singapore

Existing studies of Hong Kong’s and Singapore’s success as leading Asian international financial centers (IFCs) have largely focused on economic structural factors at the neglect of political economic contextual variables. Taking a policy subsystems approach and based on extensive field research, this article attempts to address this shortcoming by conceptualizing the “policy relations” that exist between state, industry, and other non-state actors in the two IFCs and delineating the “division of policy roles” among these actors. In the process, this article contributes toward the existing IFC literature and conceptualizes the sociopolitical relations that exist among financial sector actors.

Singapore’s policy style: statutory boards as policymaking units

Statutory boards represent an important feature of Singapore’s effective and efficient model of public administration. Despite their autonomy and separation from the rest of Singapore’s civil service, statutory boards represent policymaking units in their own right, developed and utilized by the government in the achievement of its policy objectives. Based on first-hand interviews and other primary data, this paper provides an analysis of two Singaporean statutory boards: the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the Land Transport Authority, focusing in particular on their roles as policymaking units. In doing so, this paper attempts to sketch out and understand Singapore’s unique policy style. This contributes to a better understanding of Asian policy styles in the process, a topic which has thus far received scant attention in the existing policy styles literature.

Financial sector reform and policy design in an age of instability

Abstract The Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2008 has revealed weaknesses in financial regulatory policies and institutions in many countries. These weaknesses extend to the regional and international domains of financial policy as well. This article calls for the need for better designed financial regulations and policies by taking a policy design perspective. It provides a multi-level approach to understanding financial reform as design that examines the various components of policy design — policy means, goals and change — at the three levels of policymaking — international regional, national. In doing so, we aim to provide a first step towards a more design-centric approach to financial sector reform.

Educating the developmental state: policy integration and mechanism redesign in Singapore’s SkillsFuture scheme

ABSTRACT As an archetypal developmental state, Singapore has always emphasized the role of higher education as a means of human capital development. The recent introduction of the SkillsFuture scheme represents a similarly development-oriented higher education policy initiative. Taking a policy design approach and drawing from mechanism design, this paper argues that the SkillsFuture scheme constitutes an act of policy ‘integration’, whereby new policy instruments and goals are added to an existing policy mix without compromising instrument mix consistency or coherence of policy goals. However, the presence of information asymmetries has also resulted in a need for ‘mechanism redesign’.

3-in-1: Governing a Global Financial Centre

3-in-1: Governing a Global Financial Centre provides a comprehensive understanding of Singapores past development and future success as a global financial centre. It focuses on three transformational processes that have determined the city-states financial sector development and governance — globalisation, financialisation, and centralisation — and their impacts across three areas: the economy, governance, and technology. More importantly, this book takes a multidimensional approach by considering the inter-related and interdependent nature of these three transformational processes. Just like the 3-in-1 coffee mix that is such an ubiquitous feature of everyday life in Singapore, the individual ingredients of Singapores success as a global financial centre do not act alone, but as an integrated whole that manifests itself in one final product: the global financial centre.