Singapore. Education, culture and the Singapore developmental state: ‘World-soul’ lost and regained? By Yeow-Tong Chia Houndmills; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Pp. 263. Notes, Bibliography, Index.

Abstract

Education, culture and the Singapore state: 'World-soul' lost and regained? By YEOW-TONG CHIA Houndmills; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Pp. 263. Notes, Bibliography, Index. This book seeks to show that 'the history of citizenship education in Singapore is essentially the history of crisis management in the context of a state' (p. 10). It argues that 'the Singapore developmental state maintained its hegemony and legitimacy' (p. 180) through reforms and recalibrations of its educational policies in response to perceived crises of nation-building. Other than an introduction and a concluding reflection chapter, the book is divided into six chapters framed around each set of crises--the 'Crisis of Merdeka', the 'Crisis of national survival', the 'Crisis of deculturalisation', the 'Crises of legitimacy, national identity and Asian values', the 'Crisis of historical amnesia' and the 'Crisis of national security and social cohesion'. Each crisis forms the explanatory context for a major citizenship education programme which the Singapore government introduced between the 1950s and the present day. The book will resonate with young Singaporeans like myself who experienced and encountered many of these policies and pedagogical materials. Its strength is Chia's rich and detailed use of documents such as policy reports and curriculum materials to demonstrate how the Singapore government's educational objectives translated into the introduction and revision of programmes and curriculum materials aimed at the inculcation of a common consciousness, and a common set of values and ideals, among Singapore's young. This contribution will help students and scholars unfamiliar with Singapore to understand the central role the national education system plays in nation-building and state-formation through 'socializing students into their roles as future citizens in Singapore' (p. 1). They will also gain an awareness of the cultural challenges and social problems Singapore faced throughout its post-1945 history that motivated this long-standing and ongoing use of citizenship education to forge a national identity. A history of Singapore's education system, as this book shows, is partly a history of how Singaporeans are brought up to not just be well-skilled participants in economic development, but also morally-upright, cohesive and patriotic citizens. In other respects, the book's arguments and observations are more provocative and insightful for a non-Singaporean academic audience than a Singaporean one. While Chia neatly brings together the extensive literature written on the topic before 2010, the engagement of more recent scholarship produced in the last few years might warrant reconsideration of some observations, for instance, that 'the post 1965 history of Singapore is only just beginning to be written' (p. …