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Utilization of rapid antigen assays for detection of severe acute respiratory coronavirus virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in a low-incidence setting in emergency department triage: Does risk-stratification still matter?
- Liang En Wee, Edwin Philip Conceicao, Jean Xiang-Ying Sim, Indumathi Venkatachalam, Paul Weng Wan, Nur Diana Zakaria, Kenneth Boon-Kiat Tan, Limin Wijaya
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- Journal:
- Infection Control & Hospital Epidemiology / Volume 43 / Issue 12 / December 2022
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 15 September 2021, pp. 1974-1976
- Print publication:
- December 2022
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9 - The People’s Action Party in Government: The Pole for “Big Tent” Singapore
- Edited by Terence Chong
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- Book:
- Navigating Differences
- Published by:
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Published online:
- 24 November 2020
- Print publication:
- 29 May 2020, pp 148-164
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Summary
INTRODUCTION
As political society in Singapore matures, it has also become more diverse, presenting a significant challenge to the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) government's ongoing post-colonial nation-building project. The fact that Singapore is both a nation-state and a global city, a fundamental contradiction that has become more profound since the neoliberal developments of the 1990s, makes it imperative to go beyond the more conservative goal of national integration when it comes to ensuring Singapore's continued survival. What the PAP government should aim for, far beyond straightforward integration, is national resilience.
I will argue here that, as its context changes, the PAP itself needs to become more resilient as a party that, for about sixty years, has been at the centre of Singapore's political, governmental, and even—some might argue—social and cultural life. This will, among other things, mean that the PAP should embrace diversity more profoundly and become a “big tent” party, not only to better represent and be relevant and responsive to the evolving needs and interests of a more diverse society, but also to draw from a wider, deeper, and richer pool of talent and ideas in its endeavour to maintain high standards of governance and effective policymaking. Otherwise, the PAP runs the risk of becoming shackled to formulas that have delivered success in the past but could lead to failure in the future, if they do not adapt to changing circumstances.
This is not to say that a transformed and more resilient PAP in government will need to jettison a fundamental goal of keeping Singaporeans safe so that all who have a stake in the country can contribute to its material prosperity and be equally capable of enjoying the fruit of their labour. However, a resilient PAP government will need seriously to consider shedding its paternalist legacy of making life in Singapore so “safe” that it stifles creativity and variety, cultivates conformity and risk-aversion, encourages intolerance of change and difference, and entrenches an inactive culture of complaint. These qualities, when embedded in the system, can lead to its downfall. This is partly because such qualities work against resilience and partly because they do not adequately reflect the changing profile of a more diverse and cosmopolitan society.
Singapore
- Identity, Brand, Power
- Kenneth Paul Tan
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- Published online:
- 24 August 2018
- Print publication:
- 30 August 2018
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Contemporary Singapore is simultaneously a small postcolonial multicultural nation state and a cosmopolitan global city. To manage fundamental contradictions, the state takes the lead in authoring the national narrative. This is partly an internal process of nation building, but it is also achieved through more commercially motivated and outward facing efforts at nation and city branding. Both sets of processes contribute to Singapore's capacity to influence foreign affairs, if only for national self-preservation. For a small state with resource limitations, this is mainly through the exercise of smart power, or the ability to strategically combine soft and hard power resources.
Singapore in 2016: Life after Lee Kuan Yew
- from SINGAPORE
- Edited by Daljit Singh, Malcolm Cook
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- Book:
- Southeast Asian Affairs 2017
- Published by:
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Published online:
- 12 January 2018
- Print publication:
- 30 March 2017, pp 315-334
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Summary
For Singapore, 2015 was an extraordinary year. Proud of their country's numerous accomplishments, Singaporeans celebrated their fiftieth year of independence and participated in a year-long series of events and projects that were branded SG50. They mourned the death of their founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew and wondered what the future would bring in his towering absence. Would there be an SG100 for Singapore and, if so, what would it be like? Also in 2015, the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) surprised many observers by winning 69.9 per cent of votes, and 83 out of 89 seats, in a general election in which all seats were, for the first time, contested. This suggested that opposition parties, which had been making strong inroads since the general election of 2006, were not after all going to have an easy time strengthening their presence in Singapore's government and politics. Liberal democratization was not going to be a straightforward linear process in Singapore.
In the afterglow of its convincing electoral victory, a more confident PAP government concentrated on consolidating its power and protecting Singapore's interests in a post–Lee Kuan Yew world. In his National Day message, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong focused on the theme of political, economic, and social stability in Singapore amidst an increasingly uncertain global and regional environment.
Leadership Succession and Renewal
In August 2016, midway through his National Day Rally speech, an annual address to the nation that can typically go on for more than three hours, PM Lee almost collapsed. Officially explained as a brief loss of consciousness caused by fatigue and dehydration, Lee's highly televised fainting spell was reported widely in both local and foreign news outlets. Earlier in May, Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat had suffered a stroke due to an aneurysm during a cabinet meeting and was only discharged from hospital in late June. These two events, still broadly in the shadow of Lee Kuan Yew's passing, brought focus once again to the longstanding question of top leadership succession and renewal in Singapore.
6 - The Evolution of Political Legitimacy in Singapore: Electoral Institutions, Governmental Performance, Moral Authority, and Meritocracy
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- By Kenneth Paul Tan, National University of Singapore, Benjamin Wong, University of California, Los Angeles School of Law
- Edited by Joseph Chan, The University of Hong Kong, Doh Chull Shin, University of California, Irvine, Melissa S. Williams, University of Toronto
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- Book:
- East Asian Perspectives on Political Legitimacy
- Published online:
- 30 December 2016
- Print publication:
- 17 November 2016, pp 135-165
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Summary
The People's Action Party (PAP) has been at the helm of a one-party dominant state since Singapore became independent in 1965. From 1966 to 1981, PAP members of parliament (MPs) occupied every seat in Singapore's Westminster-style parliament. As a founding member of the PAP and the country's first prime minister (PM), Lee Kuan Yew presided over the transformation of the country from Third World to First World status. Goh Chok Tong (PM from 1990 to 2004) and Lee Hsien Loong (PM from 2004 to the present) built on that foundation to turn the small island nation into an economic powerhouse. Each of them is rightly proud of his government's contribution to the many and continuing achievements of the nation. Singapore's leaders have always been deeply convinced of their strong mandate to govern and their right to be obeyed, especially when they had to make unpopular decisions that they considered to be necessary.
However, in general elections held on May 7, 2011, the PAP garnered only 60.14 percent of the total votes and won 81 out of 87 seats. The PAP's five-member team fielded in the Aljunied Group Representation Constituency (GRC) was beaten by the Workers’ Party team, the first time that any of these team-contested multi-seat GRCs ever went to the opposition. The PAP's Aljunied team included Foreign Affairs Minister George Yeo and Singapore's first female cabinet minister Lim Hwee Hua. Widely held to be a watershed event, the election was atypical. Compared to past elections, it saw the largest number of seats contested and, in connection with this, the largest number of Singaporeans – up to 2.06 million – casting their votes, many for the very first time.
Just three months later, Singaporeans voted again in presidential elections held on August 27. Though required to be nonpartisan, three presidential candidates were previously PAP members and one had been a member of the opposition Singapore Democratic Party. Tony Tan, former deputy prime minister and PAP chairman as well as the government's preferred candidate, won 35.2 percent of the votes and was announced as president. He beat his closest rival Tan Cheng Bock by a narrow margin. The outspoken former PAP backbencher won 34.8 percent of the votes.
11 - Meritocracy and Political Liberalization in Singapore
- Edited by Daniel A. Bell, Tsinghua University, Beijing, Chenyang Li, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
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- Book:
- The East Asian Challenge for Democracy
- Published online:
- 05 June 2014
- Print publication:
- 12 August 2013, pp 314-339
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Along with a pragmatic approach to policy making and a deep intolerance for corruption, meritocracy has featured prominently in the codification of Singapore's model of governance. Over the course of Singapore's short history since gaining full independence in 1965, this evolving model has served as a self-conscious consolidation of governmental assumptions, techniques, and relationships identified as essential for Singapore's survival and success. However, it has also served as an ideologically defensive weapon for countering the liberal-democratic criticisms of a West in need of finding new demons to battle in the post–Cold War world as well as a soft power resource that has made some aspects of Singapore's development experience attractive to increasing numbers of influential admirers in developing as well as advanced countries.
The basic definition of political meritocracy that underlies most of the essays in this book refers to political leadership by persons with above-average ability to make morally informed political judgments and a process that is designed to select such leaders. But this makes political meritocracy little more than a baggy concept, the intuitive attractiveness of which can obfuscate the problem of what actually counts as merit, who gets to decide what counts as merit, and how it is to be identified and rewarded. Amartya Sen notes that merit is normatively defined by “the preferred view of a good society.” In democratic systems of representative government, political elections are viewed – at least in theory – as the means through which “the people” are empowered to decide what counts as “merit” and who possesses enough of it to make them the best leaders. Representativeness is, here, viewed not so much in terms of leaders who say what the people want them to say, but of leaders who have superior ability to make decisions that are in the best interest of the people they represent, without of course excessively contradicting what the people think they know to be in their best interest. Democratic responsiveness and accountability have never been a straightforward matter, even for staunch liberals wary of the masses. Nevertheless, the idea that democracy and meritocracy are compatible is entirely conceivable.
Contributors
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- By Rose Teteki Abbey, K. C. Abraham, David Tuesday Adamo, LeRoy H. Aden, Efrain Agosto, Victor Aguilan, Gillian T. W. Ahlgren, Charanjit Kaur AjitSingh, Dorothy B E A Akoto, Giuseppe Alberigo, Daniel E. Albrecht, Ruth Albrecht, Daniel O. Aleshire, Urs Altermatt, Anand Amaladass, Michael Amaladoss, James N. Amanze, Lesley G. Anderson, Thomas C. Anderson, Victor Anderson, Hope S. Antone, María Pilar Aquino, Paula Arai, Victorio Araya Guillén, S. Wesley Ariarajah, Ellen T. Armour, Brett Gregory Armstrong, Atsuhiro Asano, Naim Stifan Ateek, Mahmoud Ayoub, John Alembillah Azumah, Mercedes L. García Bachmann, Irena Backus, J. Wayne Baker, Mieke Bal, Lewis V. Baldwin, William Barbieri, António Barbosa da Silva, David Basinger, Bolaji Olukemi Bateye, Oswald Bayer, Daniel H. Bays, Rosalie Beck, Nancy Elizabeth Bedford, Guy-Thomas Bedouelle, Chorbishop Seely Beggiani, Wolfgang Behringer, Christopher M. Bellitto, Byard Bennett, Harold V. Bennett, Teresa Berger, Miguel A. Bernad, Henley Bernard, Alan E. Bernstein, Jon L. Berquist, Johannes Beutler, Ana María Bidegain, Matthew P. Binkewicz, Jennifer Bird, Joseph Blenkinsopp, Dmytro Bondarenko, Paulo Bonfatti, Riet en Pim Bons-Storm, Jessica A. Boon, Marcus J. Borg, Mark Bosco, Peter C. Bouteneff, François Bovon, William D. Bowman, Paul S. Boyer, David Brakke, Richard E. Brantley, Marcus Braybrooke, Ian Breward, Ênio José da Costa Brito, Jewel Spears Brooker, Johannes Brosseder, Nicholas Canfield Read Brown, Robert F. Brown, Pamela K. Brubaker, Walter Brueggemann, Bishop Colin O. Buchanan, Stanley M. Burgess, Amy Nelson Burnett, J. Patout Burns, David B. Burrell, David Buttrick, James P. Byrd, Lavinia Byrne, Gerado Caetano, Marcos Caldas, Alkiviadis Calivas, William J. Callahan, Salvatore Calomino, Euan K. Cameron, William S. Campbell, Marcelo Ayres Camurça, Daniel F. Caner, Paul E. Capetz, Carlos F. Cardoza-Orlandi, Patrick W. Carey, Barbara Carvill, Hal Cauthron, Subhadra Mitra Channa, Mark D. Chapman, James H. Charlesworth, Kenneth R. Chase, Chen Zemin, Luciano Chianeque, Philip Chia Phin Yin, Francisca H. Chimhanda, Daniel Chiquete, John T. Chirban, Soobin Choi, Robert Choquette, Mita Choudhury, Gerald Christianson, John Chryssavgis, Sejong Chun, Esther Chung-Kim, Charles M. A. Clark, Elizabeth A. Clark, Sathianathan Clarke, Fred Cloud, John B. Cobb, W. Owen Cole, John A Coleman, John J. Collins, Sylvia Collins-Mayo, Paul K. Conkin, Beth A. Conklin, Sean Connolly, Demetrios J. Constantelos, Michael A. Conway, Paula M. Cooey, Austin Cooper, Michael L. Cooper-White, Pamela Cooper-White, L. William Countryman, Sérgio Coutinho, Pamela Couture, Shannon Craigo-Snell, James L. Crenshaw, David Crowner, Humberto Horacio Cucchetti, Lawrence S. Cunningham, Elizabeth Mason Currier, Emmanuel Cutrone, Mary L. Daniel, David D. Daniels, Robert Darden, Rolf Darge, Isaiah Dau, Jeffry C. Davis, Jane Dawson, Valentin Dedji, John W. de Gruchy, Paul DeHart, Wendy J. Deichmann Edwards, Miguel A. De La Torre, George E. Demacopoulos, Thomas de Mayo, Leah DeVun, Beatriz de Vasconcellos Dias, Dennis C. Dickerson, John M. Dillon, Luis Miguel Donatello, Igor Dorfmann-Lazarev, Susanna Drake, Jonathan A. Draper, N. Dreher Martin, Otto Dreydoppel, Angelyn Dries, A. J. Droge, Francis X. D'Sa, Marilyn Dunn, Nicole Wilkinson Duran, Rifaat Ebied, Mark J. Edwards, William H. Edwards, Leonard H. Ehrlich, Nancy L. Eiesland, Martin Elbel, J. Harold Ellens, Stephen Ellingson, Marvin M. Ellison, Robert Ellsberg, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Eldon Jay Epp, Peter C. Erb, Tassilo Erhardt, Maria Erling, Noel Leo Erskine, Gillian R. Evans, Virginia Fabella, Michael A. Fahey, Edward Farley, Margaret A. Farley, Wendy Farley, Robert Fastiggi, Seena Fazel, Duncan S. Ferguson, Helwar Figueroa, Paul Corby Finney, Kyriaki Karidoyanes FitzGerald, Thomas E. FitzGerald, John R. Fitzmier, Marie Therese Flanagan, Sabina Flanagan, Claude Flipo, Ronald B. Flowers, Carole Fontaine, David Ford, Mary Ford, Stephanie A. Ford, Jim Forest, William Franke, Robert M. Franklin, Ruth Franzén, Edward H. Friedman, Samuel Frouisou, Lorelei F. Fuchs, Jojo M. Fung, Inger Furseth, Richard R. Gaillardetz, Brandon Gallaher, China Galland, Mark Galli, Ismael García, Tharscisse Gatwa, Jean-Marie Gaudeul, Luis María Gavilanes del Castillo, Pavel L. Gavrilyuk, Volney P. Gay, Metropolitan Athanasios Geevargis, Kondothra M. George, Mary Gerhart, Simon Gikandi, Maurice Gilbert, Michael J. Gillgannon, Verónica Giménez Beliveau, Terryl Givens, Beth Glazier-McDonald, Philip Gleason, Menghun Goh, Brian Golding, Bishop Hilario M. Gomez, Michelle A. Gonzalez, Donald K. Gorrell, Roy Gottfried, Tamara Grdzelidze, Joel B. Green, Niels Henrik Gregersen, Cristina Grenholm, Herbert Griffiths, Eric W. Gritsch, Erich S. Gruen, Christoffer H. Grundmann, Paul H. Gundani, Jon P. Gunnemann, Petre Guran, Vidar L. Haanes, Jeremiah M. Hackett, Getatchew Haile, Douglas John Hall, Nicholas Hammond, Daphne Hampson, Jehu J. Hanciles, Barry Hankins, Jennifer Haraguchi, Stanley S. Harakas, Anthony John Harding, Conrad L. Harkins, J. William Harmless, Marjory Harper, Amir Harrak, Joel F. Harrington, Mark W. Harris, Susan Ashbrook Harvey, Van A. Harvey, R. Chris Hassel, Jione Havea, Daniel Hawk, Diana L. Hayes, Leslie Hayes, Priscilla Hayner, S. Mark Heim, Simo Heininen, Richard P. Heitzenrater, Eila Helander, David Hempton, Scott H. Hendrix, Jan-Olav Henriksen, Gina Hens-Piazza, Carter Heyward, Nicholas J. Higham, David Hilliard, Norman A. Hjelm, Peter C. Hodgson, Arthur Holder, M. Jan Holton, Dwight N. Hopkins, Ronnie Po-chia Hsia, Po-Ho Huang, James Hudnut-Beumler, Jennifer S. Hughes, Leonard M. Hummel, Mary E. Hunt, Laennec Hurbon, Mark Hutchinson, Susan E. Hylen, Mary Beth Ingham, H. Larry Ingle, Dale T. Irvin, Jon Isaak, Paul John Isaak, Ada María Isasi-Díaz, Hans Raun Iversen, Margaret C. Jacob, Arthur James, Maria Jansdotter-Samuelsson, David Jasper, Werner G. Jeanrond, Renée Jeffery, David Lyle Jeffrey, Theodore W. Jennings, David H. Jensen, Robin Margaret Jensen, David Jobling, Dale A. Johnson, Elizabeth A. Johnson, Maxwell E. Johnson, Sarah Johnson, Mark D. Johnston, F. Stanley Jones, James William Jones, John R. Jones, Alissa Jones Nelson, Inge Jonsson, Jan Joosten, Elizabeth Judd, Mulambya Peggy Kabonde, Robert Kaggwa, Sylvester Kahakwa, Isaac Kalimi, Ogbu U. Kalu, Eunice Kamaara, Wayne C. Kannaday, Musimbi Kanyoro, Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen, Frank Kaufmann, Léon Nguapitshi Kayongo, Richard Kearney, Alice A. Keefe, Ralph Keen, Catherine Keller, Anthony J. Kelly, Karen Kennelly, Kathi Lynn Kern, Fergus Kerr, Edward Kessler, George Kilcourse, Heup Young Kim, Kim Sung-Hae, Kim Yong-Bock, Kim Yung Suk, Richard King, Thomas M. King, Robert M. Kingdon, Ross Kinsler, Hans G. Kippenberg, Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan, Clifton Kirkpatrick, Leonid Kishkovsky, Nadieszda Kizenko, Jeffrey Klaiber, Hans-Josef Klauck, Sidney Knight, Samuel Kobia, Robert Kolb, Karla Ann Koll, Heikki Kotila, Donald Kraybill, Philip D. W. Krey, Yves Krumenacker, Jeffrey Kah-Jin Kuan, Simanga R. Kumalo, Peter Kuzmic, Simon Shui-Man Kwan, Kwok Pui-lan, André LaCocque, Stephen E. Lahey, John Tsz Pang Lai, Emiel Lamberts, Armando Lampe, Craig Lampe, Beverly J. Lanzetta, Eve LaPlante, Lizette Larson-Miller, Ariel Bybee Laughton, Leonard Lawlor, Bentley Layton, Robin A. Leaver, Karen Lebacqz, Archie Chi Chung Lee, Marilyn J. Legge, Hervé LeGrand, D. L. LeMahieu, Raymond Lemieux, Bill J. Leonard, Ellen M. Leonard, Outi Leppä, Jean Lesaulnier, Nantawan Boonprasat Lewis, Henrietta Leyser, Alexei Lidov, Bernard Lightman, Paul Chang-Ha Lim, Carter Lindberg, Mark R. Lindsay, James R. Linville, James C. Livingston, Ann Loades, David Loades, Jean-Claude Loba-Mkole, Lo Lung Kwong, Wati Longchar, Eleazar López, David W. Lotz, Andrew Louth, Robin W. Lovin, William Luis, Frank D. Macchia, Diarmaid N. J. MacCulloch, Kirk R. MacGregor, Marjory A. MacLean, Donald MacLeod, Tomas S. Maddela, Inge Mager, Laurenti Magesa, David G. Maillu, Fortunato Mallimaci, Philip Mamalakis, Kä Mana, Ukachukwu Chris Manus, Herbert Robinson Marbury, Reuel Norman Marigza, Jacqueline Mariña, Antti Marjanen, Luiz C. L. Marques, Madipoane Masenya (ngwan'a Mphahlele), Caleb J. D. Maskell, Steve Mason, Thomas Massaro, Fernando Matamoros Ponce, András Máté-Tóth, Odair Pedroso Mateus, Dinis Matsolo, Fumitaka Matsuoka, John D'Arcy May, Yelena Mazour-Matusevich, Theodore Mbazumutima, John S. McClure, Christian McConnell, Lee Martin McDonald, Gary B. McGee, Thomas McGowan, Alister E. McGrath, Richard J. McGregor, John A. McGuckin, Maud Burnett McInerney, Elsie Anne McKee, Mary B. McKinley, James F. McMillan, Ernan McMullin, Kathleen E. McVey, M. Douglas Meeks, Monica Jyotsna Melanchthon, Ilie Melniciuc-Puica, Everett Mendoza, Raymond A. Mentzer, William W. Menzies, Ina Merdjanova, Franziska Metzger, Constant J. Mews, Marvin Meyer, Carol Meyers, Vasile Mihoc, Gunner Bjerg Mikkelsen, Maria Inêz de Castro Millen, Clyde Lee Miller, Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Alexander Mirkovic, Paul Misner, Nozomu Miyahira, R. W. L. Moberly, Gerald Moede, Aloo Osotsi Mojola, Sunanda Mongia, Rebeca Montemayor, James Moore, Roger E. Moore, Craig E. Morrison O.Carm, Jeffry H. Morrison, Keith Morrison, Wilson J. Moses, Tefetso Henry Mothibe, Mokgethi Motlhabi, Fulata Moyo, Henry Mugabe, Jesse Ndwiga Kanyua Mugambi, Peggy Mulambya-Kabonde, Robert Bruce Mullin, Pamela Mullins Reaves, Saskia Murk Jansen, Heleen L. Murre-Van den Berg, Augustine Musopole, Isaac M. T. Mwase, Philomena Mwaura, Cecilia Nahnfeldt, Anne Nasimiyu Wasike, Carmiña Navia Velasco, Thulani Ndlazi, Alexander Negrov, James B. Nelson, David G. Newcombe, Carol Newsom, Helen J. Nicholson, George W. E. Nickelsburg, Tatyana Nikolskaya, Damayanthi M. A. Niles, Bertil Nilsson, Nyambura Njoroge, Fidelis Nkomazana, Mary Beth Norton, Christian Nottmeier, Sonene Nyawo, Anthère Nzabatsinda, Edward T. Oakes, Gerald O'Collins, Daniel O'Connell, David W. Odell-Scott, Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Kathleen O'Grady, Oyeronke Olajubu, Thomas O'Loughlin, Dennis T. Olson, J. Steven O'Malley, Cephas N. Omenyo, Muriel Orevillo-Montenegro, César Augusto Ornellas Ramos, Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, Kenan B. Osborne, Carolyn Osiek, Javier Otaola Montagne, Douglas F. Ottati, Anna May Say Pa, Irina Paert, Jerry G. Pankhurst, Aristotle Papanikolaou, Samuele F. Pardini, Stefano Parenti, Peter Paris, Sung Bae Park, Cristián G. Parker, Raquel Pastor, Joseph Pathrapankal, Daniel Patte, W. Brown Patterson, Clive Pearson, Keith F. Pecklers, Nancy Cardoso Pereira, David Horace Perkins, Pheme Perkins, Edward N. Peters, Rebecca Todd Peters, Bishop Yeznik Petrossian, Raymond Pfister, Peter C. Phan, Isabel Apawo Phiri, William S. F. Pickering, Derrick G. Pitard, William Elvis Plata, Zlatko Plese, John Plummer, James Newton Poling, Ronald Popivchak, Andrew Porter, Ute Possekel, James M. Powell, Enos Das Pradhan, Devadasan Premnath, Jaime Adrían Prieto Valladares, Anne Primavesi, Randall Prior, María Alicia Puente Lutteroth, Eduardo Guzmão Quadros, Albert Rabil, Laurent William Ramambason, Apolonio M. Ranche, Vololona Randriamanantena Andriamitandrina, Lawrence R. Rast, Paul L. Redditt, Adele Reinhartz, Rolf Rendtorff, Pål Repstad, James N. Rhodes, John K. Riches, Joerg Rieger, Sharon H. Ringe, Sandra Rios, Tyler Roberts, David M. Robinson, James M. Robinson, Joanne Maguire Robinson, Richard A. H. Robinson, Roy R. Robson, Jack B. Rogers, Maria Roginska, Sidney Rooy, Rev. Garnett Roper, Maria José Fontelas Rosado-Nunes, Andrew C. Ross, Stefan Rossbach, François Rossier, John D. Roth, John K. Roth, Phillip Rothwell, Richard E. Rubenstein, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Markku Ruotsila, John E. Rybolt, Risto Saarinen, John Saillant, Juan Sanchez, Wagner Lopes Sanchez, Hugo N. Santos, Gerhard Sauter, Gloria L. Schaab, Sandra M. Schneiders, Quentin J. Schultze, Fernando F. Segovia, Turid Karlsen Seim, Carsten Selch Jensen, Alan P. F. Sell, Frank C. Senn, Kent Davis Sensenig, Damían Setton, Bal Krishna Sharma, Carolyn J. Sharp, Thomas Sheehan, N. Gerald Shenk, Christian Sheppard, Charles Sherlock, Tabona Shoko, Walter B. Shurden, Marguerite Shuster, B. Mark Sietsema, Batara Sihombing, Neil Silberman, Clodomiro Siller, Samuel Silva-Gotay, Heikki Silvet, John K. Simmons, Hagith Sivan, James C. Skedros, Abraham Smith, Ashley A. Smith, Ted A. Smith, Daud Soesilo, Pia Søltoft, Choan-Seng (C. S.) Song, Kathryn Spink, Bryan Spinks, Eric O. Springsted, Nicolas Standaert, Brian Stanley, Glen H. Stassen, Karel Steenbrink, Stephen J. Stein, Andrea Sterk, Gregory E. Sterling, Columba Stewart, Jacques Stewart, Robert B. Stewart, Cynthia Stokes Brown, Ken Stone, Anne Stott, Elizabeth Stuart, Monya Stubbs, Marjorie Hewitt Suchocki, David Kwang-sun Suh, Scott W. Sunquist, Keith Suter, Douglas Sweeney, Charles H. Talbert, Shawqi N. Talia, Elsa Tamez, Joseph B. Tamney, Jonathan Y. Tan, Yak-Hwee Tan, Kathryn Tanner, Feiya Tao, Elizabeth S. Tapia, Aquiline Tarimo, Claire Taylor, Mark Lewis Taylor, Bishop Abba Samuel Wolde Tekestebirhan, Eugene TeSelle, M. Thomas Thangaraj, David R. Thomas, Andrew Thornley, Scott Thumma, Marcelo Timotheo da Costa, George E. “Tink” Tinker, Ola Tjørhom, Karen Jo Torjesen, Iain R. Torrance, Fernando Torres-Londoño, Archbishop Demetrios [Trakatellis], Marit Trelstad, Christine Trevett, Phyllis Trible, Johannes Tromp, Paul Turner, Robert G. Tuttle, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Peter Tyler, Anders Tyrberg, Justin Ukpong, Javier Ulloa, Camillus Umoh, Kristi Upson-Saia, Martina Urban, Monica Uribe, Elochukwu Eugene Uzukwu, Richard Vaggione, Gabriel Vahanian, Paul Valliere, T. J. Van Bavel, Steven Vanderputten, Peter Van der Veer, Huub Van de Sandt, Louis Van Tongeren, Luke A. Veronis, Noel Villalba, Ramón Vinke, Tim Vivian, David Voas, Elena Volkova, Katharina von Kellenbach, Elina Vuola, Timothy Wadkins, Elaine M. Wainwright, Randi Jones Walker, Dewey D. Wallace, Jerry Walls, Michael J. Walsh, Philip Walters, Janet Walton, Jonathan L. Walton, Wang Xiaochao, Patricia A. Ward, David Harrington Watt, Herold D. Weiss, Laurence L. Welborn, Sharon D. Welch, Timothy Wengert, Traci C. West, Merold Westphal, David Wetherell, Barbara Wheeler, Carolinne White, Jean-Paul Wiest, Frans Wijsen, Terry L. Wilder, Felix Wilfred, Rebecca Wilkin, Daniel H. Williams, D. Newell Williams, Michael A. Williams, Vincent L. Wimbush, Gabriele Winkler, Anders Winroth, Lauri Emílio Wirth, James A. Wiseman, Ebba Witt-Brattström, Teofil Wojciechowski, John Wolffe, Kenman L. Wong, Wong Wai Ching, Linda Woodhead, Wendy M. Wright, Rose Wu, Keith E. Yandell, Gale A. Yee, Viktor Yelensky, Yeo Khiok-Khng, Gustav K. K. Yeung, Angela Yiu, Amos Yong, Yong Ting Jin, You Bin, Youhanna Nessim Youssef, Eliana Yunes, Robert Michael Zaller, Valarie H. Ziegler, Barbara Brown Zikmund, Joyce Ann Zimmerman, Aurora Zlotnik, Zhuo Xinping
- Edited by Daniel Patte, Vanderbilt University, Tennessee
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- Book:
- The Cambridge Dictionary of Christianity
- Published online:
- 05 August 2012
- Print publication:
- 20 September 2010, pp xi-xliv
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16 - The Transformation of Meritocracy
- from SECTION 4 - THE TRANSFORMATION OF SOCIETY
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- By Kenneth Paul Tan, National University of Singapore
- Edited by Terence Chong
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- Book:
- Management of Success
- Published by:
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Published online:
- 21 October 2015
- Print publication:
- 25 June 2010, pp 272-287
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Summary
CLASS POLITICS IN SINGAPORE?
In the 1989 volume of Management of Success, Ezra Vogel identified a “strong central meritocracy” not only as one of the pillars of good government in Singapore, but also as a type of government that Singapore leaders — namely, the People's Action Party (PAP) government — had historically chosen to establish. Remarkably, meritocracy in the selection of bureaucrats, commonly practised among the East Asian countries, extended, in Singapore's case, to the selection of political leaders as well, with academic performance as a pivotal measure of merit. Amidst triumphant though spurious attempts to explain the East Asian economic miracle of the 1980s in terms of “Confucian” virtues such as meritocracy, Vogel could already point critically to the way that meritocracy in Singapore also emitted an “aura of special awe for the top leaders … [which] provides a basis for discrediting less meritocratic opposition almost regardless of the content of its arguments”. In 1984, for instance, then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew publicly compared the GCE ‘O’ Level results of the PAP candidate and his electoral opponent, suggesting that if the former were to lose, democracy's one-man-one-vote principle would itself need to be questioned. Articulate, confident, and energetic, political leaders in Singapore were part of what Vogel vividly called a “macho-meritocracy”.
Meritocracy is an essentially unstable concept, binding aspects that work together in productive tension. Over the decades, the delicate balance between the contradictory egalitarian and elitist aspects of meritocracy, preserved so skilfully by the PAP government in the decades following Singapore's independence, has shifted towards a market-driven concern with rewarding the winners, leaving the losers more sceptical about their own prospects for upward mobility. Today, meritocracy and, in particular, its macho manifestations are coming under strain as fast-globalizing Singapore gears up to deal with new forms of national crisis, alternative sources of information and beliefs about merit, and widening income disparity, all of which the government finds itself less able to control fully. More deeply embedded in the networks and flows of globalization, Singapore is facing new forces that are threatening to pull apart and destabilize this long-standing pillar of governance.
Service Learning Outside the U.S.: Initial Experiences in Singapore's Higher Education
- Kenneth Paul Tan
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- Journal:
- PS: Political Science & Politics / Volume 42 / Issue 3 / July 2009
- Published online by Cambridge University Press:
- 26 June 2009, pp. 549-557
- Print publication:
- July 2009
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Service learning in higher education is an American creature. But outside the U.S., practices that resemble American service learning or that have begun self-consciously to describe themselves as “service learning” may also be found. This article gives an account of a proto-service-learning course on civil society in Singapore and discusses some similarities and differences between the U.S. and Singapore contexts in which the practices of service learning have evolved, identifying how this civil society course in particular was both a product of as well as a challenge to Singapore's somewhat different priorities in higher education, political culture, and attitudes to social justice and cultural diversity.
17 - Religious Reasons in a Secular Public Sphere: Debates in the Media about Homosexuality
- from PART III - Religion in the Media
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- By Kenneth Paul Tan, National University of Singapore
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- Book:
- Religious Diversity in Singapore
- Published by:
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Published online:
- 21 October 2015
- Print publication:
- 31 July 2008, pp 413-433
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Summary
INTRODUCTION
A secular public sphere is neither in practice nor in theory a straightforward arrangement. For one, the distinction between the religious and the secular is a false one. Secularism has religion-like qualities, even dogmas, rituals, cults of personality and leaps of faith; just as religions can be, and have been in history, tolerant, inclusive, self-reflective, self-critical, adaptable, philosophically rigorous and even radical. Instituting strict formal secularism can have the effect of distorting free and open communication in the public sphere, by excluding legitimate religious reasons and thereby eliciting a defensive and even fundamentalist reaction from religious communities. A conceptually false dichotomy in this way turns into a battle line, preventing real discussion and debate. An insistence on formal secularism is therefore at least partly responsible for a distorted public sphere that is defensive, dogmatic and disengaged.
The formal secular public sphere in Singapore cannot be understood without considering the mass media. With its long-standing role as a key nation-building tool of the government, the media has the power to shape what can be said in the public sphere, determine how and when it is said, and decide who gets to say what, all according to the parameters laid out by the state. This chapter examines the role of the national media in admitting religious reasons and arguments into the secular public sphere, looking closely at the way that it stage-managed public debate in 2003 over the question of non-discriminatory hiring policies in the Singapore civil service with respect to homosexuals. This was an issue that the then prime minister (PM) had raised in the international Time magazine in an interview probably meant more for the attention of prospective foreign talent hesitant about working in sterile Singapore, but turned into an issue that sparked some heated reactions from Singaporeans.
This sympathetic acknowledgement (though by no means the decriminalization) of homosexuals by the government in 2003 signalled increased levels of openness perceived by some religious communities as moral degeneration and even a betrayal of the government's moral basis of authority.
Crisis, Self-Reflection, and Rebirth in Singapore's National Life Cycle
- from SINGAPORE
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- By Kenneth Paul Tan, National University of Singapore
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- Book:
- Southeast Asian Affairs 2003
- Published by:
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Published online:
- 21 October 2015
- Print publication:
- 08 July 2003, pp 241-258
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Summary
The year was marked by economic and security crises on the one hand, and on the other by national consultation, self-reflection, and self-critique, all with the aim of remaking a nation that by most accounts has not even been made yet. But a nation-building project with a clear start and a conceivable moment of completion is little more than a fiction, though a useful one because it narrates (and so explains) past, present, and future in ways that orientate individual experiences and values to the needs, purposes, and destiny of the imaginary nation. But Singapore, as with all living nations, can only be alive if its meanings and purposes are the site of an inconclusive and dialectical relationship between conflict and celebration, a slippery and fragile balance that serves to re-enchant the national imagination within processes of globalization that curiously homogenize as much as they fragment.
Dealing with Terrorism: The Strategies
On 11 September 2001, explosions rippled out from the economic and political capitals of the most powerful nation on earth, and the rest of the unsuspecting world was stunned. Ordinary people reacted with sympathy, empathy, and righteous indignation, while the political élite grappled internationally with the difficult question, “What is to be done?” For Singaporeans, the answers were clear as an increasing stream of media images put real names and faces to the shadowy, and at one time faraway, world of international political violence. It was no longer just a story of an American tragedy that inspired, far beyond its shores, a sense of pity and terror. It had become a sobering realization that slippery, transnationally organized, and highly motivated networks brought the possibility of terrorist activity much closer to home.
In less than three months, the Singapore Government detained under the Internal Security Act fifteen men suspected of terrorist activities that included drawing up plans to attack U.S. interests in Singapore such as the Embassy and other commercial buildings, and even American personnel who were known to travel by the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system from the station at Yishun, a public housing estate.