Lee Kuan Yew and the Singapore Problem: A City-State Without Territory or History

Thesis

Singapore in August 1965, at the moment of its unwanted expulsion from the Federation of Malaysia, faced a set of problems that most political theorists would have regarded as insoluble at the level of nation-state construction. The territory was a single tropical island of approximately 580 square kilometres (approximately half the size of the Rift Valley zone of the Oromia region), with no agricultural hinterland, no natural resources, no fresh water sufficient for its population, and no military defensibility against its immediate neighbours (Malaysia to the north, Indonesia across the strait). The population of approximately 1.9 million was 74 percent ethnic Chinese, 14 percent ethnic Malay, 8 percent ethnic Indian (predominantly Tamil), and 4 percent other (Eurasian, European, and various smaller groups) — an ethnic composition in which no group’s demographic dominance produced political dominance because the surrounding regional context (Malaysia’s Malay majority, Indonesia’s much larger Malay-speaking Muslim population) made the Chinese majority of Singapore appear regionally vulnerable. The languages spoken were Chinese in multiple mutually incomprehensible varieties (Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese, Hakka, Mandarin), Malay in its various regional dialects, Tamil, and English as the colonial administrative language. The religions were Buddhism-Taoism-Confucianism syncretism among the Chinese, Islam among the Malays, Hinduism among the Indians (with Christian and other minorities across all groups). There was no pre-existing Singaporean national identity because Singapore had been, before 1965, first a British colony (1819–1942), then Japanese occupation (1942–1945), then British protectorate (1945–1959), then internal self-governance under Britain (1959–1963), then the Federation of Malaysia (1963–1965) — never an independent Singaporean nation.

The article’s argument is that Lee Kuan Yew’s programme between 1965 and his retirement as Prime Minister in 1990 solved this problem. By 1990 Singapore had a per-capita income comparable to Britain’s, a functioning multi-ethnic society organised around a constructed Singaporean identity, a state whose institutions have since 2015 (Lee’s death) sustained the country without discontinuity, and a set of specific policy mechanisms — the HDB housing framework, the Ethnic Integration Policy, the bilingual education programme, the compulsory National Service, the Group Representation Constituency electoral system — that represent the most explicit and most successful identity-construction programme of any Asian case. This is why Singapore is the central case of this series. Lee’s programme is not directly transferable to Ethiopia — no comparator ever is — but it is the case that most directly demonstrates that a multi-ethnic society with no pre-existing national identity can be constructed into a functioning modern nation through sustained state action over one political generation. Ethiopia has the pre-existing national identity Singapore did not; Ethiopia has the population scale and territorial resources Singapore did not; Ethiopia lacks the sustained state action Singapore had.

The Singapore problem in 1965

The specific problems Lee’s government faced in August 1965 were both immediate and structural.

Immediate. No water. Singapore imported over 40 percent of its water from Malaysia at that time; the terms of the imports were subject to Malaysian political control. No defence. The Singapore Armed Forces did not exist as of 1965; the British military bases on the island were the primary defence assets, and Britain announced in 1968 its withdrawal from east of Suez by 1971. No employment for a growing population. Unemployment in 1965 was over 10 percent; the population was young and growing rapidly. No stable currency. Singapore had adopted the Malaya and British Borneo dollar during federation; the currency arrangements required immediate revision.

Structural. Multi-ethnic composition with no unifying identity. Every attempt at Chinese-nationalist framing (as had been proposed by some Singaporean Chinese politicians in the early 1960s) would have alienated Malay and Indian populations and provoked hostility from Malay-majority Malaysia and Indonesia. Every attempt at Malay-oriented framing would have alienated the Chinese majority. Every attempt at Indian-oriented framing would have been demographically incoherent. What was needed was a Singaporean identity that transcended the constituent ethnicities without abolishing them — an identity that would let a Chinese Singaporean, a Malay Singaporean, and an Indian Singaporean each be a Singaporean while remaining culturally, linguistically, and religiously distinct.

The 1964 and 1969 race riots (the 1964 riots occurring during the federation period in Singapore, killing 36 people; the 1969 riots occurring in Malaysia after the general election, killing approximately 200 to 600 people primarily in Kuala Lumpur) provided the specific historical backdrop against which the Singaporean identity problem had to be solved. Ethnic-communal violence had happened; it could happen again; the specific policies would have to prevent it.¹

Lee’s programme in outline

Lee Kuan Yew’s programme addressed the Singapore problem across multiple dimensions simultaneously. The specific components are examined in Articles 12, 13, and 14; this article introduces the overall framework.

The People’s Action Party (PAP) as institutional vehicle. The PAP, which Lee co-founded in 1954 and led as Prime Minister from 1959 until 1990, provided the political-institutional framework within which the programme was executed. The PAP won every general election with substantial majorities from 1959 forward, held all or nearly all parliamentary seats through the 1960s and 1970s, and has continued as the dominant party through 2026 (though with progressively more competitive elections since the 1980s). The PAP was not the only political party permitted in Singapore, but its dominance was operationally near-absolute for the identity-construction period. This is examined in Article 14 as one of the costs.

Economic Development Board (EDB) and foreign direct investment. The EDB, established in 1961, courted multinational corporations to establish operations in Singapore, providing tax incentives, industrial-estate infrastructure (Jurong), and workforce guarantees. Singapore’s economic model was foreign-investment-oriented rather than domestic-industry-oriented — a variant of the Asian model in which the state supported foreign firms operating within Singapore rather than developing domestic chaebol-analogues. The model produced rapid industrial development and high employment.²

Housing and Development Board (HDB) and public housing. The HDB, established in 1960, built public housing on a scale unprecedented for the population. By 1980, over 80 percent of Singaporeans lived in HDB flats. The housing programme was operationally the identity-construction programme’s physical infrastructure — the specific mechanism by which the ethnic-integration policy would operate. This is examined in Article 12.

Bilingual education. Every Singaporean student studies in English (the working language of state and economy) and in a mother tongue (Mandarin, Malay, or Tamil, according to ethnic identification). The bilingual policy was designed to produce a workforce fluent in English while maintaining connection to distinct ethnic cultural traditions. This is examined in Article 13.

National Service. Compulsory military service was introduced in 1967. Every male Singaporean citizen serves two years of full-time National Service between ages 18 and 21, followed by decades of reservist obligations. National Service is the specific mechanism by which young Singaporean men from different ethnic backgrounds serve together, share the standardised working language, and produce the cross-ethnic personal networks that support the pan-Singaporean identity.³

Group Representation Constituency (GRC) electoral system. Introduced in 1988, the GRC system requires that certain parliamentary constituencies be contested by teams of three to six candidates, of which at least one must be from an ethnic minority (Malay, Indian, or Other). This ensures minority representation in parliament while operating within the framework of majoritarian electoral competition. The GRC system is a specific institutional innovation for multi-ethnic representation.⁴

Ethnic Integration Policy (EIP). Introduced in 1989, the EIP established ethnic quotas for HDB blocks and neighbourhoods to prevent the re-formation of ethnic enclaves that had been observed to develop through the 1970s and 1980s. The quotas track the national demographic proportions with allowance for local variation: at the block level, 87 percent Chinese, 25 percent Malay, 15 percent Indian and Others (revised in 2010); at the neighbourhood level, 84 percent Chinese, 22 percent Malay, 12 percent Indian and Others. This is examined in Article 12 as the specific forced-proximity mechanism.⁵

Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) and anti-corruption framework. The CPIB, established in 1952 and progressively strengthened, provided the anti-corruption infrastructure that Lee’s government treated as central to Singaporean identity and governance. Singapore has, since the 1980s, been consistently ranked among the world’s least corrupt states, with the CPIB’s independence and effectiveness a specific institutional achievement.

High civil-service compensation. Lee’s government adopted the principle that civil servants and political leaders should be paid at levels comparable to private-sector executives, on the theory that this would attract capable personnel and reduce the incentive for corruption. Prime Ministerial salaries in Singapore, at approximately US$1.6 million in the 2020s, are the highest of any government leader globally. Civil-service salaries at senior levels are comparably high.

The identity content

The Singaporean identity that Lee’s programme constructed has specific content that is worth stating explicitly.

English as working language, mother tongue as identity language. Singaporean identity is bilingual by construction. A Chinese Singaporean speaks English at work and in public administration, and Mandarin (increasingly Mandarin rather than the regional Chinese varieties that had been the family languages of the pre-1965 population) at home and in cultural life. A Malay Singaporean speaks English at work and Malay at home. An Indian Singaporean speaks English at work and Tamil at home. The specific Singaporean-English (Singlish) that has emerged in informal speech is one of the specifically Singaporean cultural products of the identity construction.

Multi-ethnic multi-religious pluralism as national commitment. Singapore’s national identity explicitly includes the multi-ethnic, multi-religious composition of the population. National ceremonies include Buddhist-Taoist, Christian, Islamic, Hindu, and other observances. The National Day observances on August 9 (commemorating the 1965 independence) explicitly celebrate the multi-ethnic composition rather than any single ethnic identity. The pledge of allegiance recited by schoolchildren includes the commitment to build “a democratic society, based on justice and equality, so as to achieve happiness, prosperity and progress for our nation” — language that explicitly transcends ethnic categorisation.

Meritocracy as social principle. Singaporean society is organised around examinations, credentials, and performance metrics. School placement, university admission, civil-service recruitment, and business advancement all operate through documented meritocratic mechanisms. The specific content of the merit is contested (particularly the extent to which the mechanisms favour the culturally-Chinese “kiasu” competitive orientation) but the framework as principle is embedded in Singaporean identity.

Rule of law and low corruption as governance principle. The Singaporean commitment to rule of law and low corruption is embedded in national identity as a distinctive feature that separates Singapore from its regional peers. The commitment has been operationally sustained across leadership succession (Lee to Goh Chok Tong to Lee Hsien Loong to Lawrence Wong).

Economic pragmatism as policy principle. Singaporean identity includes explicit rejection of ideological rigidity in economic policy. The framework is what works, tested against measurable outcomes, adjusted based on evidence. This is contrasted, in Singaporean self-understanding, with the ideological rigidities that produced problems in neighbouring countries.

Vulnerability and security consciousness. Singaporean identity includes explicit awareness of the country’s geographic vulnerability (small island surrounded by larger states), demographic vulnerability (Chinese majority in a Malay-majority regional context), and economic vulnerability (dependence on international trade and foreign investment). The vulnerability produces the specific Singaporean disposition toward preparation, contingency planning, and defence investment.

The Ethiopian implications

Singapore is not directly transferable to Ethiopia, but the Singapore case establishes propositions relevant to the Ethiopian argument.

First, that multi-ethnic identity can be constructed from raw materials that include no pre-existing national identity. Singapore had less to work with, in identity terms, than Ethiopia has. Ethiopia has substantial historical inheritance (Aksumite, Solomonic, Amharic literary, Oromo, Somali, southern-nationality traditions) that Singapore did not have. Ethiopia’s identity-construction problem is, on this axis, more tractable than Singapore’s was.

Second, that the specific mechanisms of identity construction can be institutional rather than purely rhetorical. The HDB housing, the ethnic-integration quotas, the bilingual education, the National Service, the GRC electoral system are institutional mechanisms operating on daily life across generations. Ethiopian identity construction cannot proceed through symbolic gestures (the Ethiopian rhetorical adoption of Medemer) alone; it requires institutional mechanisms that operate on daily life across generations.

Third, that identity construction of this scale requires state capacity and sustained political will comparable to what the PAP maintained across sixty years. The Ethiopian equivalent of the PAP is not any single existing political party; it is the sustained coalition (over decades, across leadership changes) that would be required to execute the construction. Neither the Derg, the EPRDF, nor the Prosperity Party has produced this coalition. Whether it can be produced in the post-2018 political framework is one of the questions of Part VII.

Fourth, that identity construction can succeed in ways that produce continuing costs. Lee’s Singapore paid substantial costs — PAP political monopoly, constrained press, restricted opposition, restrictions on labour organisation, restrictions on personal conduct (chewing gum, media consumption, association). The Singaporean population that consented to these costs received in return the economic transformation and identity construction. Ethiopian identity construction would carry analogous costs that would have to be acknowledged and consented to (or resisted).

What comes next

Article 12 examines the housing and ethnic-integration policies in detail — the specific forced-proximity mechanism that is at the heart of the Singaporean identity construction and that Zef’s salt-and-neighbour analogy captured exactly. Article 13 examines the language and education construction of Singaporean public culture. Article 14 examines the specific costs of the framework and asks whether they are acceptable in the Ethiopian case.

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References

Footnotes

1. On the 1964 and 1969 race riots, see Cheng Guan Ang, Southeast Asia’s Cold War: An Interpretive History (Hawaii, 2018). ↩

2. On the EDB and foreign-investment model, see Peter Wilson and Ryan Yong-Wei Lee, eds., Handbook on Singapore’s Economy (Routledge, 2024). ↩

3. On National Service, see Ho Shu Huang, Defending Singapore: A Public Analysis (S. Rajaratnam School, 2020). ↩

4. On the GRC system, see Kevin Y. L. Tan, An Introduction to Singapore’s Constitution, 4th ed. (Talisman, 2020). ↩

5. On the Ethnic Integration Policy, see multiple recent analyses; the 2010 revision of the block-level quotas to 87 percent Chinese, 25 percent Malay, 15 percent Indian and Others is the current framework, with neighbourhood-level quotas of 84 percent Chinese, 22 percent Malay, 12 percent Indian and Others. ↩