“Even if Singaporean public opinion were unusually economically literate, it
would still be hard to explain the PAP’s dominance. In the Median Voter Model,
opposition parties’ best response would be to mimic the policies of the ruling
party, leaving voters indifferent. Singaporean politics plainly doesn’t work this
way; it seems to be in a political class of its own as long as we think of it primarily
as a country.
This is where most people make a mistake. … I have tried to explain that we are
different. We are a city. We are not a country. He is the first writer I have seen
who has said that.
“The picture changes radically if we instead think of Singapore as a city. In the
United States, big city politics is often about as lopsided as Singaporean politics.
Democratic mayors have won without interruption since 1931 in Chicago and
1964 in San Francisco. While the Democrats have failed to monopolise the
mayor’s office in New York City, they have near-PAP dominance of the New
York City Council: Democrats hold 45 out of 48 occupied seats.”
But nobody questions whether there is a democracy in New York.
Finally, in conclusion:
“In the West, Singapore is widely perceived as a benevolent dictatorship. From
this starting point, social scientists have little to learn from Singaporean political
economy. The explanation for Singapore’s success is simply that it had the good
fortune to be ruled by the smartest, nicest dictators on earth.
Once misconceptions about Singapore’s democratic credentials are corrected,
however, the city-state looks “curiouser and curiouser”; it seems to contradict
everything that experts think they know about democracy. How can any party
honestly win election after election – much less a party committed to many
economically efficient but unpopular policies?
:oIo:
