Analysis of the questioning of the Singaporean model

Singapore does not talk about ideology, but only about ****enjoyment values. It combines its own culture, with a constitutional system, and is the second country in Asia to best combine Eastern and Western civilizations. In my opinion, Japan is the first country that best combines its traditional culture with western political democracy. Japan is not a completely Western-style democracy. Japan combines traditional culture, especially Confucianism, with Western constitutional democracy. The fact that factions within the LDP were able to reach a **** understanding is inseparable from traditional culture. Japanese politicians also have the courage to take responsibility, which is also part of traditional culture. Singapore's leaders have also taken a political path with their own characteristics through their own efforts. System transplantation did not happen in Singapore, what happened was system innovation.

The U.S. system has been around for more than two hundred years and has taken root, and no one can destroy it. In Asia, Africa and Latin America, many democracies have operated in a very problematic manner and have become a source of social instability. Originally, the spirit of democracy is mutual compromise, but these countries often attack each other. In Asia, democracy has been practiced in many countries for many years, but the political situation is still so chaotic and socio-economically underdeveloped. Singapore has avoided the detour that many developing democracies have taken. Institutional innovation has played a great role in this process. However, Singapore has also raised the question of the "post-Li Kuan Yew era". My own judgment is that in the "post-Lee Kuan Yew era", the system established during the Lee Kuan Yew era is precisely the institutional guarantee to ensure the continuity of this system, and at the same time, this system also contains a great spirit of institutional innovation. Singapore is an anomaly in the eyes of many Chinese intellectuals. Because common sense tells us that a country is not democratic, do not allow the people to fully enjoy the right to monitor the government, the government will inevitably degenerate into the people's lords, it is impossible to make the government clean and diligent, to establish a civilized and harmonious society. Singapore, however, let us have nothing to say: it believes in authoritarianism, not the true meaning of democracy, there is no full freedom of the press, 40 years after the founding of the country, has been ruled by the People's Action Party, the father can pass the throne to his son; but it is also very civilized, no one spitting, with clean air, beautiful environment, the people enjoy good welfare, the people at least seem to be living in a very happy.

Once upon a time, we wanted to turn China into a "Greater Singapore". For example, the Chinese people hate official corruption, while the Singaporean government has a higher level of integrity, why? The reason is that Singaporean civil servants have a high salary level, so there is no need to engage in corruption. This experience is very easy to learn, in order to make our country's civil servants clean, just give them more wages and benefits can be.

Chinese civil servants do get pay raises all the time, but so far we haven't seen a direct correlation between civil servants' pay raises and their level of integrity. Is it because we don't get enough pay raises, or is this Singaporean experience not suitable for "China's national conditions"? Unfortunately, many people do not understand.

Singapore is indeed a miracle, especially for the Chinese community. What is the problem with the domestic coverage of the Singaporean experience?

Most of these reports, either directly or indirectly, have been taken out of context, and over the years, only one side of the story has been made known, without letting people know the other side. The information the public receives is filtered through an irresponsible filter.

If a minister loses a general election, he has nothing. A minister's salary may seem a lot, but it is all he earns, nothing more, and no other special privileges, even housing has to be bought on the market like ordinary citizens.

Also, there is a very clear division between public and private in Singapore's government. There is one thing that shocked me a lot. A Singaporean minister was invited to Beijing on official business and had some free time to look at some of the city's distinctive attractions, which I introduced to him. The minister and his party of four wanted to take a taxi, so I said, "I'd better drive to pick them up. I joked with the minister that it was unthinkable for me to drive for him.

Relative to Singapore's overall affluence, the benefits that Singaporean officials receive from their positions are not that high, if China is used as a frame of reference.

It is also worth noting that Singaporean officials do not become wealthy by leveraging on government power and connections. Often, they were already wealthy and able to command high salaries before they joined the government. For example, if a person who used to be able to get an annual salary of $3 million in a company enters the Government to get an annual salary of $1 million, to him, this can only be regarded as a relatively decent income, not a high income. These people have everything they should have, and they are already recognized as elites in society. The original purpose of entering the Government is often to give back to society. Singapore is indeed authoritarian, but their authoritarianism is nothing like what we think it is.

Singapore's press does not dare to criticize the government casually, but their government does not directly interfere with the operation of the press; instead, it solves the problem through legal prosecution after the fact, for example, by suing people for defamation, and by means of a public defense. In addition, when the press openly criticizes government officials, the government often does not take blocking measures, but takes the initiative to expose and fully disclose to the community, and takes the initiative to review and seriously deal with the problems if there are any, and gives detailed explanations to the community if there are no problems. Singapore's achievements, there are two views, one attributed to the Confucian tradition and "East Asian values", and one believes that it is because of "economic transparency and the rule of law".

Singaporean government officials tend to be highly educated in the West, and most of their leaders come from bourgeois backgrounds and are mostly Cambridge-educated undergraduates. In Singapore, the lower classes generally speak Chinese, for example, you sit in a cab, or eat wontons in the stalls, you and the boss in Mandarin communication is no problem at all; but you go to the government to do business, everyone speaks English, as if all of a sudden switched to another system, you seem to be in and a bunch of yellow-skinned Europeans to deal with.

Confucian traditions and values certainly play a part. "Choosing the best and the brightest" could be considered Confucian. The People's Action Party (PAP) advertises itself as a political party composed of elites, and its leaders, including Lee Kuan Yew, are indeed a group of elites who have been systematically educated and inculcated in the West, so being able to become a member of the PAP represents a certain social status in Singapore. It is not easy to effectively centralize power, maintain it and use it. There has to be a vehicle for power and an organizational structure is needed. The PAP in Singapore is an elite party. The party is divided into two parts: cadre members and ordinary members. There are not many ordinary party members and even fewer cadre members. People in society do not feel the existence of the party. The party is invisible, the "invisible hand" in the political arena. In other words, political parties are integrated into society. In fact, the party must be a part of society, an elite part of society. This is the essence of the Leninist party. Politicians come from the people. If the political party becomes a self-contained vested interest group detached from society, then the party is in crisis.

Singapore's political system is open to the society despite the fact that it is a one-party rule. From the inception of the country, Singapore's leaders realized that in a country without any resources, political talent is the key to the country's survival, development and upliftment. In developed Western countries, the best people go into business. Singapore wants to bring these best people into politics. Therefore, one of the important functions of the ruling party is to play the role of "Bole" in "Bole Xiangma", looking for the best talents in the whole society and the world.

In Singapore, civil servants in the government bureaucracy are selected internally, but many of its political elites are trained by society for the ruling party. Or rather, many of the political leaders were not groomed by the ruling party itself, but absorbed into it from society. In the 1970s, the People's Action Party (PAP) absorbed Goh Chok Tong, who later became prime minister, and Tan Keng Yam, who became deputy prime minister. In the 1980s and 1990s, it absorbed elite talents such as Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng, who were already in office. These leaders were elite talents in various fields of society before they became leaders of the ruling party. It was only after they had succeeded in whatever field that the ruling party invited them to join the party and serve the nation. Therefore, there is no such thing as "party age" in Singapore. If you are not a member today, you can become a member tomorrow when the party needs you. This solves the problem of seniority within the party of many Leninist parties. The essence of Leninist political parties is to absorb the elites of society, but after Leninist political parties have become organizations, they often evolve into vested interest groups. Singapore has effectively solved this problem. The solution was to maintain the openness of political parties to the community. Singapore itself is a very small city-state. The PAP parliamentarians are all required to meet their constituents directly on a regular basis to discuss issues of concern to them, which brings together the ruling party within the party and the community. If the representatives and members do not have an organic mechanism to connect with the society, none of them have a direct relationship with the people. If these representatives are not directly connected to the society and the people, how can they represent the interests of the people?

Singapore has a good combination of democracy and one-party rule. Westerners say that Singapore is an illiberal democracy, but the name does not matter, the point is that democracy should be able to produce a good and effective government. In the West, the effective functioning of democracy benefits from the building of basic national institutions prior to democratization, as well as from a relatively high level of socio-economic development. In Asia, a number of countries and regions were democratized by various factors before they were able to establish basic State institutions and achieve socio-economic development. Democratic politics are thus often problematic. In particular, democratic politics are irreversible in nature. Once democratized, many basic State systems are difficult to establish. This has the potential to leave these countries in a chronically weak position.

It should be emphasized that a good government is possible in any political system. Ancient China also produced good emperors and good governments, but that depended on the personal qualities of a leader. If the leader is good, the government is good, and the personal factor plays a major role, lacking institutional safeguards. Singapore uses a democratic system to ensure this good government. The ruling party must pass the "big test" once every five years, that is, the general election. There are many opposition parties which, although small, constitute good competition. The opposition parties themselves have no substantial constraints on the ruling party and have only a handful of seats in parliament. But if the people are dissatisfied with the ruling party, they can in principle support the opposition party in the general election. Therefore, there is always pressure on the ruling party. The ruling party's governing behavior must satisfy the majority of the people.

At the same time, it is important to ensure that genuine talents are hired. There are officials in Singapore who were critical of the government before they entered politics. But the ruling party is very open. The government needs people who have constructive criticism. As long as the criticism is justified, the ruling party will use them. The ruling party dislikes mediocre people who can just say nice things. The party can take you in if you are capable, have a track record and have constructive opinions. How to keep the regime open to represent the interests of the society is a problem for the ruling party to solve, otherwise the ruling party itself will evolve into a vested interest.

It is important for the ruling party to represent the interests of the people. In this regard, the Singapore government has done what many developed democracies cannot do. The founding spirit of the Singaporean government is people-oriented, in the spirit of the authentic Chinese tradition. In many places, there are endless debates on the roles of the government and the market, and on the roles of capital and the people. But Singapore has managed to strike a good balance between these aspects. The Singaporean government has found a balance between "pro-business" and "pro-people". Being "pro-business" means being pro-businessman and emphasizing the role of capital. Politics can be centralized and power can be centralized, but it must be ensured that those who hold the power must be the best people in society. This is an important consideration for the leaders of Singapore. In democratic politics, the role of opposition parties is to be able to restrain the ruling party, but other more effective restraints also exist. As stated above, the most effective constraint on the ruling party in Singapore is not the opposition party, but society, that is, the people.

It should be noted that selection is not designation; selection is intra-party democracy and intra-party competition. For Singapore's leaders, the PAP's intra-party buy-in is important. Lee Kuan Yew once said that between Goh Chok Tong and Tan Keng Yam, the former was not his first choice. But the party supported Goh Chok Tong, and in the end, it was the party's elite identity rather than personal identity that played a role.

Guaranteeing the quality and talent of a candidate makes the people's vote meaningful. This is something that Singapore does very well. MPs have to be elected. For example, register a person who has done well in a certain field to a specific constituency and let the people elect you. He is first identified with the community and then with the political party. Those who do well outside the party will be directly absorbed by the party, so he will be easily elected.

Singapore is also making political reforms, mainly for more democracy, to increase the proportion of opposition parties in parliament. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said the reforms were aimed at maintaining political stability and a strong popular mandate for the government. Singapore has decided to amend its electoral regulations to increase the number of guaranteed seats in Parliament for opposition parties, namely non-constituency MPs, from a minimum of three to nine. Regardless of the number of votes won by opposition candidates, they will have a minimum of nine seats in Parliament, increasing the proportion of opposition parties in Parliament to 20 per cent. The Government of Singapore emphasized that proportional representation would not be an option for political reform, as it would otherwise create a weak government. That is, developing more democracy does not necessarily mean learning from the West. Many practices in the West are more just in theory, but not in practice. Many practices in the West are not compatible with Asian countries. The spirit of what Singapore has done is to provide more space for different interests and voices within the system, to digest and harmonize different interests within the system.