A Global City in an Age of Global Risks: Singapore’s Evolving Discourse on Vulnerability

Abstract

As Singapore becomes a leading city, perceptions of the country's vulnerability are evolving as a result of its hyper-connectivity and exposure to risks. First-generation leaders such as Lee Kuan Yew, S. Rajaratnam and Goh Keng Swee of the ruling People's Action Party (PAP) viewed Singapore's strategic predicament as a function of its miniscule size and lack of resources and hinterland, as well as the country's turbulent history and a multi-ethnic population surrounded by larger Muslim neighbours. To overcome its vulnerabilities, its first foreign minister, S. Rajaratnam, presented the alluring vision of Singapore as a that would become a key node in the international system coordinating flows of trade, money, materials, goods and people. Singapore's hub status in maintaining the smooth functioning of the economy would also enhance its strategic relevance: major powers would have a vested interest in the country's survival. Being a city, however, is not without its perils. Singaporean leaders have long realized that recent crises (e.g. pandemics, financial meltdowns etc.) affecting Singapore are related to its position as a highly connected urban node in the age of interdependence. This paper examines the conundrum in Singapore's attempts to deal with its perceived vulnerabilities. While the drive to become a global city articulated by Rajaratnam has largely succeeded, Singapore's highly globalized status has ironically meant vulnerabilities to fast-spreading phenomena that characterize what sociologist Ulrich Beck terms a global risk society. The first section outlines the core components of Singapore's early post-independence vulnerability as expressed by its leaders, providing a baseline for comparison. The second section describes Rajaratnam's vision to ameliorate such professed vulnerabilities and examines measures of its connectivity as a sign of success. The final section shows how becoming a as part of an attempt to enhance survival prospects has paradoxically introduced new elements into Singapore's earlier discourse on vulnerability. A discourse analysis is undertaken to identify emerging features of Singaporean leaders' perception of vulnerability to risks. Key sources of data include policy documents, media interviews, speeches and statements. The focus here is on recurrent patterns whereby key code words to convey certain ideas are shared among political leaders holding Cabinet-level positions or senior policy-makers with Director-General or above rank in government bureaucracies. The sample is fairly representative of elite beliefs, drawing from the Prime Minister to a range of ministers and senior bureaucrats holding diverse portfolios from customs, transport, defence, health, to monetary regulation. These political and bureaucratic elites hold policy responsibilities for addressing vulnerability-related issues in their specific areas of work. Corporate elites are thus not included to the same extent in this analysis. The paper concludes that vulnerability is now seen to be coalescing around three types of critical infrastructure that Singapore paradoxically depends on to coordinate flows as a city. First, as a maritime port hub, Singapore faces exposure to Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) proliferation. Second, its aviation hub at Changi can also become a gateway for importing pandemics. Third, its financial centre is exposed to terrorist financing risks and financial contagion. Singapore's Early Notion of Vulnerability This paper concentrates on Singapore's perceived vulnerability, assuming in good faith that the leaders quoted believed what they said. (1) There are of course difficulties with analysing so-called crisis rhetoric, because whether Lee's or the PAP's private sense making coincided with their public pronouncements remains unclear. ... they might have believed their own, self-confident rhetoric. …