Singapore's Success Model Defies Western Economics, Study Finds
A new analysis argues Singapore operates as a "middleman minority state"—applying free-market pressures to itself as a nation while maintaining strict group cohesion domestically. The finding challenges how policymakers and investors understand Asia's most competitive economy and suggests Western economic frameworks miss crucial dimensions of what makes it work.
Originaltitel: Middleman Minority Nation: A New Conceptualisation of the State in Singapore
<p>The Singaporean state is often conceptualised as neoliberal, but I argue that this conceptualisation is mistaken. While Singapore embraces the neoliberal 'all you have is yourself' ethos, I contend, the state does not apply this ethos to individuals and families, but to society as a whole: to the relation between Singapore and 'the world', rather than to the domestic realm within Singapore. That is, Singapore is a communalist and not an individualist society - a society in which the group is paramount, and in which the rights and responsibilities of individuals are subordinated to group interests. I introduce the term 'middleman minority state' (MM state) to capture this social phenomenon, whereby the state scales up the tactics of the classic middleman minority to the level of a small nation-state. I argue that the uniqueness of Singapore as a polity is not fully reflected in 20th-century economists' views on society and economics, which provide only a partial map of Singapore. Instead, we must look to Singapore's history as a centre for middleman minorities, whose values and behaviour patterns were transformed into a successful state strategy as the country became an independent nation-state in the 1960s.</p>