From a Singapore Angle

So long and thanks for all the fish*

2006-06-26T15:13:00.000+08:00

Please go to http://www.singaporeangle.com.

*If you must know, see this wiki.

Something's Afoot on Singapore Angle

2006-06-26T07:50:00.000+08:00

If you are wondering why I've not been updating, that's because the blog is currently undergoing some important changes...

Taking stock / The way forward

2006-06-21T23:52:00.000+08:00

Had a long lunch with BL of Singapore Entrepreneurs and Heavenly Sword. The meeting (for both of them, our first meetings) was timely for me. Here I am, the madness of dissertation work behind me; but also looking forward to a full teaching schedule in just over a month. It is time to take stock, or as I said in the previous post, to think seriously about how I want the blog to continue, and what form it should take. Or whether it should continue at all. Several ideas were raised during lunch (thank you BL and HS) and I am giving very serious thought to them, enough to begin some negiotiations to see if some of these ideas have any future at all.

* * * * *

In the meantime, let me recall a conversation I once had with (serendipitously) BL a.k.a. Prodigal, HS and a few others on some related issues almost a year ago (an eternity in blogospheric time). I was lamenting on the fact that several unfinished projects were still collecting dust and said this:

A blog is, for the most part, occasional in nature. But the nature of some of my interests and the discussions generated often cry out for much more sustained reflection and exchange over a longer period of time...

Which was picked up by HS and others:

Heavenly Sword: I couldn't agree more....It actually takes time to write a proper article...and time is something that we're very short of right now...I think I may have to take a long break from blogging, due to the mega-project I have on hand...

Prodigal: Perhaps, it's better to lie low to write a good blog entry than to waste your time trying to churn out blogs without any quality control. Somehow, by looking through most blogs, it is reminiscent of the modern academia, where we are subjected to the "publish or perish" situation.

Hope that all are well.

Huichieh: "Publish or perish"? Note that the "or" is an inclusive "or"...

A lot really depends on what the blog entry is meant to do--even granting the ambition of a blog to be "serious". News links, for example, are really easy to do. Why bother? Well, sometimes, you are surfing and come across something interesting and would like to point your readers in that direction. The more extended commentary type entries are, of course, much more involved. But either way, it is not always easy to predict the subsequent discussion--which may open up new vistas previously not considered. Heavenly Sword will remember a long exchange we had over yoghurt. The original post was only a brief news link!

I think blogs need not be taken as "publications" in the full sense of the word--fully thought out pieces, edited, etc. They could. But I tend to see much of what I do more in the spirit of throwing out discussion possibilities, tentative arguments, an inviting to the reader to think about something in a certain way, you know, 抛砖引玉--all subject to revision, correction, even complete refutation. This applies especially to the longer argumentative entries here.

Anthony: The medium of blogging lends itself better to certain discussion methods than others. A publication where someone writes a full article, then someone writes a full article refuting that article etc works, just not as well as short snappy articles and plenty of comments.

In short, I'm with you insofar as the "throwing up of ideas in the spirit of discussion".

Prodigal: Well, I refer to an exclusive "or".

There are a few views that you can use a blog for:

(a)The blog as an idea tosser: You throw an idea and invite discussion from your peers. If the subject is thought provoking like whether we should allow cloning, then it will be great.

(b)The blog as a personal rant space: Yes, we see tonnes of that. My conjecture is that 80% of the blog is like that.

(c)The blog as an introduction to scholarly works: Something like what u did to the papers by Dominic Soon, Sze Meng and Lee Harris. It will fulfil both (a) and at the same time examine some of the issues in a piece of scholarly work. Well, a physicist Lubos Motl uses it to explain difficult theoretical physics in his blog. I actually like that kind of technicality.

(d)The blog as a bait: using to snare reporters and book publishers. It has happened for the Sarong Party Girl blog if I am not wrong.

I believe that there are many purposes for using a blog. It's a good and quick zeroth order way to throw ideas or thoughts into a place. However, like the early days of internet or in the forums, it's like the wild wild west. People can throw in any kind of comments they like without responsibility. It bewilders me that people are always complaining about freedom of speech, and I ask them, "Sure, that's one side of the equation. If u are given freedom of speech, what about the responsibility to that freedom of speech?"

Have a good day.

Huichieh: Quick one: the reason why I said "inclusive" is because I know of people who published (lots) but still perished... I think the better formulation is: "don't publish, then perish" (but even if you do, you may still perish), which does work out in propositional logic to be "publish inclusive-or perish". More later...

Ok, I'm not interested in (b) and (d), and I try my best to do (a) and (c). The heartening thing is that, in my own experience here, the discussions have generally been very civil and very substantial. Some of the comments are veritable posts of their own!

In any case, I'm not too concerned about the variety of stuff out there--people should be perfectly free to blog or rant whatever they want. After all, if I'm not interested, I don't read their stuff. And if they find my stuff boring, they don't have to read. Won't be tested in exams lah!

Freedom of speech and responsibility? In one sense, they already come together. In being free to think and speak as I please--with the understanding that everyone else has that same freedom--I must expect that other people might get offended by what I say, and they would be perfectly free to blast me (in speech) for it. That's their perogative. But to see this is already to see that I--and no one else--am responsible for what I say.

The other sense of "responsiblity" does not follow, however. That is, if everyone is free to think and say as they please--consistent with everyone else having the same freedom, it doesn't follow that everyone would be "responsible speakers"--in the sense that they speak civilly, decently, logically, in good taste, etc. It would be nice if everyone were responsible speakers--but that's actually not something that we can guarantee without compromising their freedom to speak whatever they want: we may have to compel them to say only the good and true things, thus curtailing their freedom of speech.

Prodigal: Hui Chieh,

Here's my question to you: Suppose an individual say something that incite people to vandalize others property, in your opinion, what are the rest of the people doing about it?

I agree with your definition that everyone is free to think and speak as they please. However, once you start bringing the rest of the world into the picture, the individual's views will interact with the rest of the world. I suppose that there is no objective criterion to decide what is a "responsible speaker". I will prefer to believe that is conditioned by the view of what society views as responsible.

Huichieh: Probably he should be charged--if causality can be proven anyway. My point was only that freedom of speech--qua freedom--does not contain within itself a criterion of "responsible speaking". But rights can be trumped by other rights, and particular rights may have to be abridged so as to secure other rights.

That is to say: we can't expect (as a matter of fact) that just because a bunch of people are committed to and engages in free speech, that they will all be responsible. Obviously, it would be a good thing that they are, that they are individually restrained by, e.g., a desire not to harm, etc. So if freedom of speech is such a paramount commitment, then we had better be ready for a lot of nonsense. But obviously, it can't be--we have other commitments as well...

* * * * *

Personally, I believe that the best things on this blog, the thing I enjoined most, are the exchanges in the comments, which are often of uncommon quality and civility. If I should continue blogging, it will certainly be for the prospect and hope of such leisurely and reasoned exchanges more than anything else--and a modest contribution to the spirit and practice of civil discussions between citizens--more than anything else. Whether or not I get my wish, is something else.

Returning to life in Singapore; identity and literary merit

2006-06-10T13:37:00.000+08:00

Returning to life in Singapore is a more drawn-out affair than originally anticipated. And even now, more than two weeks after touching down at Changi, there remains a considerable list of things to be done, mostly to do with setting up the apartment (it's a HDB 4A, nothing fancy, if you must know). All this is quite apart from the anticipation of another twenty (15x12x10") boxes, mostly books, still on a ship crossing the Pacific Ocean. But with the study in some semblance of order (photo to the left) and the internet connection up and running, it seems time to post a new entry.

Actually, it seems time for me to think seriously about how I want the blog to continue, and what form it should take. Once the semester starts, I can expect to be busy. Probably not as so thoroughly buried as I was over the last four months, but if past experience is any indication, it will be a full schedule.

In the meantime, a big "thank you" to all the well wishers (and in answer to this recent query: if I have my way, I will be studying for the rest of my life).

add: Penny is doing well. In fact, not only does she not seem to mind the heat or the humidity, she hardly missed a beat. The attention of four excited grandparents (and a host of uncles and aunties) goes a long way. There's also something to be said for not having to pad up just to go to the mall. (Photo: Penny's first day trip into Johor Bahru.)

* * * * *

The Kway Teow Man put up a long but interesting article by one Shirley Lim Geok-lin, "Singpore's elusive identity quest" (ST, June 8, 2006), which deserves to be read in full. I sympathize with much of the article, especially the parts to do with the author's identification of the problem. In a nutshell, as Singapore continues to connect up with (and benefit from) globalisation, there is an increasing felt "lostness" among Singaporeans of especially the younger generations. We are supposed to be more at home in the world at large than in any one given place, let alone Singapore. This is certainly an issue that will continue to haunt us for some time to come. But there are also less appealing parts to the article. What follows is not a detailedly argued critique or commentary, only some desultory reflections.

At one point, the author responds to an earlier letter to ST by a Li Shengwu, who "called to task an earlier letter praising the Ministry of Education's decision to review the literature syllabus to incorporate more local writing."

To insist on retaining an Anglo-American literature canon, which has already exited many British and US universities, on account of its supposed superior merit and universality indicates a mind that has not yet grasped the relation between aesthetic judgment and the ideology that produced the judgment.

The Internet and other IT technologies have spawned a younger generation of globally interlinked and hyper-modern sensibilities. The countries that produced Shakespeare, Yeats, Plath, Huxley and Larkin have revised their university curricula to include Anglophone literature by stunning masters such as Seamus Heaney, V.S. Naipaul, Toni Morrison and other writers who have emerged from new societies to produce texts received not just as local but as world writing.

First, notice that in revising their university curricula to include Heaney, Naipaul, Morrison and others, the British and American universities have not opted for that which is local to them, but that which is other. The example of these universities might suggest that we ought not be overly stubborn about Shakespeare and Yeats, but it does not support our including local literature--local to us--in our own curricula.

Second, there is a tension between, on the one hand, charging that Li has "a mind that has not yet grasped the relation between aesthetic judgment and the ideology that produced the judgment" that the old Anglo-American canon has "superior merit and universality" (which, incidentally, is a non-argument); but also saying that Heaney, Naipaul, Morrison and others have been received as "world writing".

The suggestion of the latter claim seems to be something like this: Heaney, Naipaul, Morrison--or Chinua Acebe and Wole Soyinka--might have begun as 'local' writers, but they have been received by, e.g., the British universities, to be of world statue. In other words, their writings exhibit qualities that can be appreciated by non-Irish, non-Ghanians, non-Indians, non-Carribeans--the people of the world. In particular, dare I say that these writings exhibit qualities that warrant their reception as good literature, as writings that are worthy of serious attention by non-Irish, non-Ghanians, non-Indians, non-Carribeans, and so on? And as the author later tells us, "If Singapore authors have not received world attention, it is not because they are local"--in other words, their productions too, might one day be received as "world writing".

But what the author holds out with one hand, she might as well have taken back with the other. If I had taken Heaney, Naipaul, Morrison, Acebe, or for that matter any number of Singaporean writers to have produced writings of "superior merit and universality", I would merely have displayed "a mind that has not yet grasped the relation between aesthetic judgment and the ideology that produced the judgment". If Mr. Li's preference for Shakespeare and Yeats betrayed an underlying ideology that "produced" his preference, the same can only be suspected of the judgments that led to the inclusion of Heaney, Naipaul, Morrison in the British curricula ("diversity" or "multiculturalism" perhaps), and more importantly, should be suspected of any proposed inclusion of any writer--local or otherwise--to Singapore's literature curricula.

I am thoroughly sympathetic with giving our own writers a chance; but presumably it is not just because they are ours, but also because they are good and worthy of attention. But what the author has insinuated, is that I couldn't possibly make judgments of the latter sort, except perhaps as a reflection of my being beholden to some "ideology". To believe otherwise is merely to displayed "a mind that has not yet grasped the relation between aesthetic judgment and the ideology that produced the judgment".

Intermezzo

2006-05-12T08:30:00.000+08:00

In Berkeley until 23 May to file the dissertation and graduate (the paperwork thereof, mostly), and to catch up and say goodbye to friends and teachers. Vacating (or evacuating) Toronto took us some nights of sleeping at 4 am, 21 boxes of books, baby toys and other stuff shipped home, and many farewells. So this is also a much needed rest and recuperation, in the warmth of the Californian sunshine. Most asked question for the past week: "You're leaving Canada? Don't you like this place?" Expecting similar questions for these two weeks.

update: (19 May) confined to a 56K connection where I am staying in Berkeley. Don't expect to blog until I'm back in Singapore (end of month). Filed the dissertation a couple of days ago: what a relief. They gave me a lollypop with the words "Phinally Done" (sic) on it. In other news, Eric Kaplan was the speaker at graduation. Kaplan turns out to be an ex-graduate student, who did everything but the dissertation before he was wisked off to write for David Letterman, Futurama and Malcolm in the Middle. I finally know the reason why the Professor in Futurama is named Hubert Farnsworth. It was a good speech, not least because it wasn't a lecture. Otherwise very busy meeting with friends--people I won't get to see for a while. Last 4 days in North America for some time to come: the end of one chapter, and the beginning of another.

update: (27 May) Back safely home in Singapore.

Singapore Gaga Run Extended

2006-05-02T22:49:00.000+08:00

Just received this in my inbox:

* * * * *

No, this blog is not exactly dead or abandoned. The blogger is just very busy doing the final bits of editing for his dissertation, packing and selling stuff for a big move, saying goodbye to friends in Canada, and doing his part looking after a very active little girl... In the meantime, pop over and visit the Sg Elections '06 site.

Puzzling figures on university admissions

2006-04-26T09:59:00.000+08:00

Update: The profs on my committee are now chewing on my 300-page pile. A short break is thus in order. And just as I was about to sit back and have a cold drink, I ran into a bunch of ST Forum Page letters on university enrollment... which gave me an odd sense of déjà vu (bada bing, bada bong, bada bang).

Seems it was reported in ST recently that there were some 74,000 applications from junior colleges and polytechnic graduates for only 12,800 vacancies among all our three universities (I'm still waiting for a friend to help me track down the original report, but I'm assuming that the figures are as reported; update: got it).

The 12,800 (expected) intake figure rings true, considering the rate of increase over the past years (source).

But 74,000 applications?

The number of students graduating each year with 2 'A' and 2 'AO' passes (including GP) has been hovering around the 10,000 mark between 1991 and 2004 (source). Since Pre-U enrollment for the same period has been fairly consistent (source), we can expect that for 2005, there can't be that many more than 10,000+ graduating with the same qualifications.

The number of students graduating from the Polys in the same time period has been steadily increasing from 6,000+ to 16,000+ (source). Assuming that it's increasing at the same rate, there should be about 18,000+ Poly grads for 2005.

But once you add the two numbers together, you get about a total of 28,000 JC/Poly grads for 2005. This is the total local pool ("from junior colleges and polytechnic graduates ") of local applicants to the local universities. And since there is a well-known cap on the intake of Poly graduates, we should expect the actual pool to be considerably smaller. Let's say that all of the JC graduates (with 2 'A's and 2 'AO's) and 15% of the Poly graduates applied to the local universities this year. That gives about 14,200--let's round that to 15,000--applicants.

Where did the 74,000 applications from "junior colleges and polytechnic graduates" come from? --How many students are applying to more than one university?

more: Found an earlier news report (.pdf from SMU's site) from 2004. That year, NUS received 13,600 applications for about 6,000 places, NTU received 12,000 applications for 4,500 places and SMU received 7,000 applications for 850 places. (That will be 32,600 applications for 11,350 places--from probably plus minus 13,000 applicants.) The report also mentioned that the usual practice has been for students to send in one application to NUS/NTU's joint admission. 2004 was the first year students could apply separately to the two. But it turned out that many applied to both NUS and NTU anyway, and quite a few to all three. add: Looks like in the case of SMU, there were 10,600 applications for 1,260 places.

more: The ratio of number of local applications vs. number of places in the local universities is not a terribly instructive piece of information. What we need is historical data concerning the ratio between number of local applicants vs. number of places in the local universities. I believe that this is the only meaningful way to assess whether it has become harder for a local JC/Poly graduate to get a place in the local universities, and in particular, whether his or her position has been made worse by the influx of international students. And the short answer (I've blogged the long answer months ago; see links at top of this post) is: as far as getting a place in a local university is concerned, the position of the local JC/Poly graduate has been improving for the last 20 years, an improvement that has not been impacted--except in terms of largely unfounded emotional reaction about foreigners taking the locals' place--in any adverse way by the increasing international enrollment in NUS/NTU/SMU. This is not to say that the position of the local JC/Poly graduate cannot be made even better than it already is, but wanting another scoop of icecream is not the same as complaining that one has received one scoop less than those who came before.

maybe more later... (busy editing the dissertation, and selling stuff in preparation for the big move)

Sighted in Toronto

2006-04-10T09:59:00.000+08:00

(Loss for words)

(HDB block in the heart of Toronto)

(Penny having some grocery shopping fun)

...back to work now.

Short Update

2006-04-06T09:20:00.000+08:00

The (main) professor appears largely satisfied with the complete draft (minus introduction). It's all revisions, endnotes, front-matter, bibliography from this point on. In short: still extremely busy (I don't expect to be blogging much for the next month and a half). But I'm definitely seeing more of the light at the end of the tunnel. Taking the opportunity of a short break to make a few minor changes to the template--including changing the "Time Zone" from "Canada/East" to "Singapore". A big "Thank you" to all the readers who left such encouraging words in the comments to my previous post.

Punk'd!! And posting this at the expense of lunch...

2006-04-05T13:43:00.000+08:00

OK, ok... I'm taking a bit of time out of my ridiculously hectic schedule to fill out the 'It' in this ST article on Opposition Parties slamming podcast ban rule:

"However, teacher Victor Yang, 31, who blogs on politics here, said: 'It's a step forward.
'There is a generation that is trying to work towards more leeway and fewer restrictions, and by coming out to say this, the Government is acknowledging that the electorate is changing.'"

Context, tsk, tsk... context... sigh...

In the conversation I had with Serene, the point I was trying to make was that the government imposed restrictions on podcasting and vodcasting reflected its unwillingness to completely surrender control on the terms of political debate and discourse, but that the government was conceding the fact that bloggers will inevitably comment on politics. I was trying to explain the distinction between blogging about politics, and persistently promoting a political viewpoint (which is the condition under which blogs are required to register). Something Data at Singapore Ink also comments on.

I was making the point that since we are expressing political views without persisting in promoting any political viewpoints, we don't need (at Singaporeangle) to register as a political website, and the government isn't likely to clamp down on us. In that respect, the government was conceding ground to political debate that does not constitute the advocacy of a political position. Really, I have no issues with that. As discussed earlier on this blog by Huichieh, there is something in what MM Lee said to Jamie that resonates with me, the idea that if you are dissatisfied with what the political party in power stands for, organise yourself, win support for your cause and take on the government.

I do think the PAP stays in power because it does have broad support among the people, but here is where I made the other point, that the electorate is increasingly becoming vocal, and that the government, in conceding openly (rather than leave the OB markers invisible) that discussions of a political nature will be tolerated (ok, problematic word, I am not going to address at this point) is responding to the changing nature of the electorate.

I am interested in observing how the upcoming and the subsequent elections will reflect changing social norms given that a large part of PAP's success in maintaining its position in power will depend ultimately on the vote of a generation that has very different expectations concerning restrictions on expression compared to the ones before.

Of course, if our views are political and we express them consistently, then of course definitions over what constitutes 'persistent', 'political view' can be argued over (as Data points out)... but I did get the feeling that the fact that more explicit boundaries are being drawn is a step forward; and helps us decide what to say, and how to put it across.

So, those of you wondering how I managed to make such a comment in the context of the ST article, here's the story.

Perhaps Serene was just running a very tight deadline and was eager to put in the obligatory 'other point of view' and had run out of time to explain the context. But, sigh... should have replied through email instead, or if I didn't have the time to compose one, decline the interview.

P.S. I also made the point that the banning of podcasts and vodcasts was something I had no opinion on whatsoever because I have not ventured into the technology (yes, yes... I belong to the Stone Age) and that's something that really isn't a loss to me at this point of time.

Buried in work

2006-03-09T13:01:00.000+08:00

Attempting to close the books on a chapter (the penultimate) that has grown to about 1.5 x twice the size of most of the others, while battling flu season as winter draws to a close and spring looms on the horizon. See you soon, hopefully.

Break over. Back to work.

update: the chapter's done and it's almost twice the size of the other chapters. One more to go.

Singapore GaGa at The Arts House

2006-03-07T08:49:00.000+08:00

Opens 11 Mar, through to April 16 (but not showing on April Fool's weekend).
Wednesdays (7.30pm), Saturdays and Sundays (4.30pm).
Ticket Price: $8 and $6 (student concession).
Ticket Hotline: 6332 6919
Email: tickets@toph.com.sg

More on singaporegaga.com

Nuff said.

update: Tym blogs about a blogger-only private screening which she attended Monday (6 Mar).

Reports on the Forum: The (In)Significance of Political Elections in Singapore

2006-02-26T15:28:00.000+08:00

(Cross posted on Sg Elections '06. From this point on, all posts that are directly related to the elections will be posted exclusively there, if I get around to do any.) [IMPORTANT NOTICE: Several readers have emailed saying that they believe the other site has been compromised. Until the issue is resolved, I'm delinking.]

Previously mentioned here. As I said then: Someone please attend and tell me about it. Well, reports are coming in. Wayne points to a report on ST. Mr. Wang has another. Double Yellow (bless his soul), attended the forum and came back with his "interpretation of what transpired at the forum", complete with summaries of each of the presentations. He even has the Q &A session written down "but will transcribe it only if people are interested and I recover from my carpal tunnel syndrome".

Ok, back to work...

quick update: I've posted this on the other site, but NUS has the webcasts out for the event.

Help Needed

2006-02-25T18:24:00.000+08:00

Hi everyone,

I was hoping to use video clips of the Jamie Han vs Harry Lee encounter at the Kent Ridge Forum for a class on civic discourse.

Does anyone know how I might find these someplace?

Thanks in advance.

First Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival: My Impressions

2006-02-19T09:20:00.000+08:00

The First Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival was a success. The organisers did a good job. Considering that this is the beginning of a week-long break at the University of Toronto, and the fact that temperature was minus 10 celcius (without windchill), the turnout out was excellent. I estimate probably more than a hundred but below two hundred, with a good proportion of non-Singaporeans as well as Singaporeans.

The only real glitch--and it turned out to be such a pity--was that the DVD for the last and longest film, Singapore Gaga by Pin Pin Tan was damaged and we only got to see about 1/5 of the whole thing. The organisers were saving the best for the last; but with that unforseen turn of events, the Fest ended with Singapore Rebel as the last number instead. The other regret is that I wasn't able to take many photos because of the lighting condition. Still, a couple of shots of the reception held during the intermission turned out decent. One of the organisers, Mr. Chia Yeow Tong, can be seen on the photo to the right (furthest guy on the right facing front)

As for the films themselves, I won't include the synopses here since they are all available on the Film Fest's site, and in most cases, the films have their own sites as well. Rather, I'll restrict myself to making a few brief comments about my own impression of the films, not all of which will make complete sense if you have not seen the films.

The first film is Cafe by Kelvin Sng, and a world premiere, no less! (Actually, I thought the "world premiere" took place in my living room when Yeow Tong showed Elaine and I the film; but I guess that didn't count.) The trick to seeing the irony is to actively compare and contrast how Yutaka understands or thinks he understand what is going on at the other tables in the cafe. For me, the strongest performance and most moving moments are from the exchange between Gabriel (Felimon Blanco) and Sophia (Gae Mendoza), two Filipinos working in Singapore while hoping to move on to greater things. In all, my favorite among all of the films shown.

The next film Parcel by Lu Lu Yang is somewhat more bleak, and without the redeeming irony of Cafe, or much of closure as well. In one word, depressing. And after a while, that very cliche piano music that introduces every moody SBC/TCS scene can really become a turn off. Otherwise, a good attempt.

Strings by Jon Lim is actually very gripping. In fact, it is the most gripping of all of the films shown; though being a horror flick ("in the same vein as The Ring and The Grudge" as the Film Fest's site puts it) helps in that department. Supposed to be inspired by true events. I have to admit that it really did keep me at the edge of the seat.

As the organisers later remarked, More Than Words by Kelvin Sng is meant to be modelled after the 70s style productions of the Shaw Brothers. In other words, what you see is what you get: you can more or less predict what will eventually happen to each character. But there is one small twist that, in a way, deviates elegantly from the surface simplicity. At one point in the story, Hao Nan tells his beau Yu Tong that he is not who he seems to be (i.e., beneath that shuai'ge exterior is a ruthless gangster; though, of course, beneath that is a heart of gold). But as the story works itself out, it was Yu Tong who was not who she seemed (to Hao Nan) to be--though, innocent girl that she is, this fact completely eludes her, leading to the ensuring tragedy. After Cafe, this one is a close second for me.

Past Tense by Mirabelle Ang is meant to be a documentary, though as is suitable in these sorts of settings, much more artistic than the ones one might expect from Discovery Channel. As the Film Fest's site puts it, it is "introspective and visually stunning"--and I agree; but the semi-philosophical ruminations and "raising questions of cultural identity" just doesn't do it for me (as is usually the case). In my opinion, it's too heavy-handed in that department, and that detracts a little from the otherwise excellent visuals.

Singapore Rebel by Martyn See should need no introduction. Furthermore, the earlier reviews by Convex Set, Police State and Chemical Generation are all good in their own ways and I do not have much to add to them. But I will make this tentative comment--the fact that after Strings, this turns out to be the most engaging of the lot testifies both to the abilities of Martyn See, but also to the fact that there is still a lot that can be improved with respect to the other films. (As the organisers point out during the Q/A, many of the films were made by budding artists; this makes their achievements all the more impressive.)

But perhaps I spoke too soon. After all, Singapore Gaga by Pin Pin Tan was supposed to be the best, which was why it was saved for the last. And the first 1/5 that we did manage to see was impressive. Maybe I'll find a way to watch the whole thing.

On a different note, Elaine and I are just glad that Penelope was well behaved. She actually sat through most of the films. Actually, she was such a charmer during the reception that she was practically passed from one auntie or uncle to another as several people asked to carry her (though, upon the protests of some, I referred to them as kor kor and che che's instead).

All in all, a good event.

Two different types of sensibilities and the use of "I think"

2006-02-18T03:38:00.000+08:00

Interesting observations on the use of such qualifiers as "I think" by Paddychicken. He was taking to "a friend of a friend"--"a hyperactive kid with strong opinions, a sharp mind and a very fake exterior (or so I thought)", the latter of which Paddychicken attributed to the kid's "thick American accent":

Somehow, the conversation drifted to the use of the words "I think" as a figure of speech. It was interesting to find some commonality in our distaste for these words. He said that this was a sign of weakness - if you think something it means you don't know. It means you are incompetent.

My own personal gripe was that these words are redundant. If you are giving an opinion, you can just state it. No one should misconstrue that you are giving facts, unless you specifically cite an authoritative source. If I say, "LKY is baiting the opposition parties to run for election in a GRC so they will lose everything", what else could this be but my own personal opinion? Even if I were to substantiate this claim with a 20-page academic paper, it would not be a fact. So why bother to start any sentence with "I think..."? It only serves to weaken the argument because it discredits the self-assuredness of the speaker.

The next time you are in a discussion, especially with a bigshot. Take a listen and see how many people start their spiels with "I think". (Emphasis mine)

Actually, my own sense is that a contrast between a more American-type as opposed to Anglo/British-type sensibility is probably at work here. The latter is much more characterised by the "I think" (and similar) qualifications. It is not unusual to hear older British academics--whom everyone knows to be among the foremost experts on a subject--to preface his remarks by saying "Now I don't really know a lot about his..." even as he goes on to discuss that very subject, complete with many qualifications and "ahems"!

This is also tied to the archtypically British taste for the understatement--of which a little bit rubbed off on us Singaporeans, by the way. Think of the locution, "it's not bad"--the typical American would most probably have said "it's very good", or even "awesome!" I still remember the first time I was asked if I liked my food in the US. My "this is not bad at all!" was (mis)taken for my saying or implying that it is "not good"--rather than the intended opposite. Also related is the habit of not actually saying something but implying it, sometimes by purposely not saying something.

Needless to say, these are all matters of degrees. And worst still, the British are past masters of both the understatement and the most slapstick and most unreservedly bawdy comedy; Monty Python and Blackadder being--in my opinion--excellent examples of precisely the strange combination of these two extremes.

Now since I do--if you might pardon my saying so--have a slight preference for the Anglo/British- as opposed to American-type sensibility on these matters (not in all respects though), ahem, perhaps you might consider the following remarks on the highlighted part of Paddychicken's disquisition. Now it seems to me that it is highly indicative of the very difference I was drawing above in sensibilities and thus associated expectations in a conversational setting.

For those with more of the American-type sensibility and conversing with others having the same sensibility, the default expectation of an assertion is that it is a personal opinion. That's why the qualifications indicating that it should be so taken are either redundant (or indicate an additional level of uncertainty). Which, by the way, suggests that the American-type sensibility is characterised by the expectation that people would be totally forthcoming with their opinions, whether or not backed by anything. In the best instances, we have "strong opinions" coupled with a "sharp mind"; in other cases, we have "strong opinions". It is thus not surprising that those with such a sensibility will find someone from the other side strangely unsure of himself.

For those with more of the Anglo/British-type sensibility and living among others with the same sensibility, the default expectation of an assertion is that it is backed by something solid. Otherwise, it would be prefaced by the qualifiers, or just not said at all. Being forthcoming with one's personal opinions is considered brash, vulgar--ahem, American.

But of course, these are just my personal opinions.

coda: Since I am at it, let me quote Christoph Harbsmeier on the Classical Chinese literary-rhetorical sensibility, which has a small connection with the above. In Classical and Literary Chinese:

Whatever the audience can understand from the context is preferably omitted in literary style. Explicitness is felt to be vulgar. It is not by chance that there is no word for scilicet 'i.e., you should remember, that is to say' in Classical Chinese. What you should know is omitted for the very reason that you should know it. (Language and Logic, 144)

As the Master himself puts it: 辭達而已矣！(LY 15.41).

Sourcing for information on the issue of international student enrollment in NUS/NTU

2006-02-17T00:50:00.000+08:00

Still on the objective impact of the increased international enrollment at NUS/NTU upon the local students, especially on the question whether the former development has prejudiced the educational opportunities of the locals. My attempted quantative analysis in the previous post suggests that the answer is "no" or "not obviously", that is, the data is at least consistent with the claim that (anecdotal observations, subjective perceptions aside) the increasing numbers of international students are not depriving locals of places, that the Government's international student program is a "separate 'package' running parallel to the education of local students".

Even granting the truth of my tentative conclusion above, it doesn't mean that one cannot have a deeper philosophical disagreement with the policies driving the recent developments in the local university scene. That is, even granting the claim that the increasing numbers of international students are not depriving locals of places, one might nevertheless believe that tax dollars should not be spent on foreign students simpliciter, that if there is going to be any increase in enrollment, it should all go to the locals (i.e., calling for an increase to the proportion of each local cohort entering university), and so on. These are much more contentious issues that cannot be resolved by any straightforward appeal to data; but by the same token, they should not be confused with the more mundane issue underlying my tentative conclusion.

One question now is, are there other sources of relevant information that will make the analysis more complete. The answer is a qualified "yes"--it exists, but not as much or as comprehensive as one might wish. Since I don't actually have the time to look through the stuff found so far, this is just a link dump for the moment. If you know of any information, do drop me an email or leave a comment. I would be much oblidged.

Statistical Data

- Education Statistics Digest Online (has data going as far back as 1984, but not specifically on international students).

A couple of useful overview articles that contain some analysis as well

- Jason Tan, "Recent Developments in Higher Education in Singapore", International Higher Education (Winter 1999)

- G. Sanderson, "International Education Developments in Singapore", International Education Journal 3.2 (July 2002)

Stuff from the MOE website

- Press releases on the meetings of the International Academic Advisory Panel (IAAP) in 1997, 1999, 2001, 2003, 2005. This is more tantalizing than useful. We know that NUS/NTU increased their international student enrollment upon the recommendation of the IAAP. It would have been useful if the actual recommendations and reasoning of the panel are available.

- A couple of Forum Page replies from MOE: "Reducing Tuition Grants for Foreign Students" (Dec 21, 2004), "More varsity places part of reform" (Jan 21, 2005). As with the case of most official forum page replies, they tend to be rather useless. However, the second letter contains an interesting bit of data:

Currently, about 21 per cent of the primary one cohort every year enters our local universities. Of this number, about 2 percentage points come from the polytechnic route while the remaining 19 percentage points come from the junior college route. By 2010, when the projected 25 per cent of the primary one cohort is admitted into our local universities, the polytechnic route's share will be increased from 2 percentage points to 6 percentage points. This translates into a tripling of the number of polytechnic graduates admitted into our local universities.

- Several Parliamentary Replies on university education: Sep1, 2004, Apr 20, 2004, Jan 5, 2004, Apr 19, 2005. The Apr 20, 2004 and Apr 19, 2005 replies are especially relevant.

- Archived Speeches by Minister/Acting Minister of Education--I've not have a chance to comb this yet. (see below)

update:

- The Percentage of the Primary 1 Cohorts admitted to NUS/NTU either via the JCs/PUCs/CIs or via the Poly's, 1980-1997 (click to see larger version):

I've also turned the data into a chart, together with extrapolations based on the information in the forum letter quoted above:

corrected: Looks like the data and chart are ok, just that I interpreted them incorrectly. For instance, the figure for 1997 (20.4%) tells us that 20.4% of the relevant P1 cohort (presumably of 1983) entered the local universities in 1997. (I wrongly read it as saying that the 20.4% of the 1997 P1 cohort entered the local universities, which would be impossible as a statistics since that cohort has not entered the right age!) Note also that the information is from 1997, and the projections are projections given the data known then. It would be interesting to see how the actual figures for 1998-2004 go. I'll update that when I have the data. (My thanks to ted for his alertness.)

- A reader points to the MTI Economic Review Committee Report, which has a section on education.Relevant speeches archived on the MOE website with the important bits extracted where possible.

DPM LEE, 23 Aug 97:

- "6. When you go to university, if you are a good student, you will find many scholarships chasing you. There are PSC scholarships, EDB scholarships, MAS scholarships, SPH scholarships, and company scholarships. There are SAF scholarships, even for women. (This year we awarded the SAF Merit Scholarship to two very good recipients.) Plus, for those who prefer not to be tied down by a bond after graduation and want to keep their options open, there are in extremis father-mother scholarships, for with rising incomes, nearly every family can afford to pay tuition fees in NUS or NTU. In any case, NUS and NTU now have a "needs blind" admission policy, so any student who wins a place will be able to fund his studies through scholarships, bursaries, loans or paid work."

PM GOH, 24 Aug 97 NDP Rally Speech:

- GLOBALISATION (read ss. 46-84)

DPM TAN, 19 Feb 98:

- IAAP, EDUCATION IN A GLOBALISED ECONOMY (read ss. 6-21)

RADM TEO, 20 Mar 98:

- "Will there be enough places for Singaporeans? ...there will be enough university places for Singaporeans who...make the grade. The increase in intake of foreign students will be undertaken as part of the university's overall expansion plans and will not be at the expense of Singaporeans. There is flexibility to enlarge the intake in most courses if there is demand. In fact, for the coming academic year, 1998/1999, there will be increases in intakes in almost all the faculties, ranging from 1% to 11%, except for Dentistry, Law and Business, where the intakes will remain about the same. Members will understand the reasons for Dentistry and Law. For Business, we are making adjustments as well. The total intake will increase by about 4½%. For the academic year 1999-2000, a further 4½% increase in undergraduate intake has been projected. We will refine this number as we go along. So there is no shortage of places for Singaporeans."

- "The establishment of the Management University in 2000 will result in an increase in the number of places for students wishing to pursue an undergraduate business course. While NUS will reduce its undergraduate Business Administration intake slightly from the current 600 to 500 in the year 2000, and NTU will stop offering its undergraduate Business programme, there will be more places available in SMU to make up for these changes. So in fact the Business intake will increase overall. The facilities given up by NTU's undergraduate Business programmes will be used for an expansion of NTU's post-graduate Business programmes and increase in the number of engineering students taking Business minors and to house the overall expansion in post-graduate students in all disciplines.

- "Bilingualism is a cornerstone of Singapore's education system. SMU has stated that applicants will need to satisfy the minimum grade in the mother tongue, as in the case for admission into NUS and NTU. There is no change to this policy and we do not intend to make any changes. The minimum requirement to apply for NUS and NTU is a grade of D7 in mother tongue, either as a second language taken at the "A" level examination or as a first language taken at the "O" level examination. Currently, candidates who do not satisfy the above requirements for mother tongue may still submit an application for NTU or NUS. If selected, they will be admitted on a provisional basis. During the course of their study, they will be required to meet the requisite minimum language requirements before they are allowed to graduate. I am sure SMU will apply the same flexibility for deserving candidates."

DPM TAN, 17 Apr 98:

"At my speech at NTU in February, I emphasised three fundamentals which should not be compromised in the review of the University Admission System : First, continued emphasis on high academic standards and rigorous selection criteria in order to identify and reward students who work hard and who perform well academically; Second, retention of reasonable standards of competence in the Mother Tongue and English because bilingualism is the cornerstone of our education system; and Third, gradual implementation of the new University Admission System to allow sufficient time for students and teachers to adapt to the new requirements."

RADM TEO, 31 Jul 98:

"I am pleased to note that NUS and NTU have marketed themselves aggressively in the past years and are on track to reach their target of 20% foreign intake. For the academic year 1998/99, preliminary figures (up to 20 Jul 98) indicate that NUS and NTU have recruited more than 1,500 foreign students which make up 16.5% of their undergraduate intake. 70% of these foreign students are taking up courses in Engineering, Computers and Science. It is particularly important for Singapore to build up centres of excellence in these areas in order to catalyse the growth of high technology industries and ensure an adequate supply of qualified persons."

RADM TEO, 13 Oct 98:

"15. In 1981, we had about 10 research scientists and engineers per 10,000 labour force. Today, there are more than 60. [please see Graph] In 1985, the mean years of schooling in Singapore was 5.7. Today, about 20% of each cohort reach university, another 40% graduate from a polytechnic and more than 20% receive vocational skills training. Together, this implies that more than 80% of each cohort will receive some form of post-secondary education."

DMP LEE, 20 Jan 99:

MINISTERIAL STATEMENT ON CHINESE LANGUAGE IN SCHOOLS (read the whole thing)

PM GOH, 27 Aug 99 NDP Rally Speech:

"We also want to make NUS and NTU first-rate universities. NUS and NTU have already achieved high standards. They do not lack facilities and resources. Their constraint to doing better is talent.

Top universities in the US like Harvard and MIT recruit from the top 0.25 percent of a cohort of nearly 4 million, taking just over 1,000 students each per year. Only the brightest students have a chance. Furthermore, they recruit not just from the state they are in, or even the whole of the US. They draw outstanding students from the world over. So they attract top-rate professors, which in turn makes more top students want to enter these universities. Harvard and MIT can do this because they are private, not state universities. They do not have to look after all the students from the state of Massachusetts. They also have the advantage of long histories, and huge endowment funds from alumni and well-wishers. There are other state universities, which take the many other good students who do not make it to the elite institutions.

NUS and NTU are state universities. They have a responsibility to take in all Singaporeans who qualify. They admit about 20% of every population cohort, thus catering to a wide range of talent and ability. Together they take in 8,000 students.

To upgrade themselves, NUS and NTU must systematically enrol bright students from the region. Though they can never match the academic excellence of Harvard and MIT, they can emulate Harvard and MIT, and try and attract top students from Asia. Not every bright Asian student can afford to go to Britain or the US. Singapore is cheaper and closer to home. We do not expect all these students to stay on in Singapore. Many will go back and contribute to their home countries. Over time, they will form a regional network of old school ties, people who are well disposed to Singapore and whom we can do business with.

Last year, foreign students made up 16% of the total undergraduate intake in NUS and NTU. The two universities will increase their intake of foreign students to 20%. This increase in foreign students will not be at the expense of Singaporeans. We will always provide enough university places for local students who meet the admission standards."

DPM TAN, 18 Dec:

UNIVERSITIES IN A KNOWLEDEG-BASED ECONOMY (relevant section)

RDAM TEO, 7 Jan 2000:

"Singapore’s Universities of Tomorrow" | Interesting statistics: at the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign, the enrollment is 79% in-state, 12% out-of-state and 9% international; at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, it's 65%, 30% and 5%; for NUS, it's 85% local and 15% international, while at NTU, it's 77% and 23% respectively; note: the populations of the states of Illinois and Michigan were approx. 12.3 million and 9.9 million respectively according to the 2000 census.

"17. ...France has an open-admission university sector where everyone who graduates from high school can enrol, and a highly selective grandes écoles sector which admits only the crème de la crème – the top 2%. Even among the grandes ecoles, there is a pecking order. I recently visited one institution in Paris which admits only the top 0.1%. If we scale this to Singapore's size, this translates to an intake of just 50 students per year.

18. To take an even more extreme example, China's prestigious Tsinghua University admits 2,500 students a year, which if scaled to Singaporean terms, translates into 5-6 students per year. This is like NUS or NTU picking only each year's President's Scholars for the freshman class."

RDAM TEO, 13 Mar 2000:

"33. ...While there are students who score within the top 30% in English, Mathematics and Science but bottom 30% in Mother Tongue Language in PSLE, none has been channelled to the Normal stream as a result...

34. ...only about 2% of students who sit for the Mother Tongue Language papers at 'O' and 'AO' level fail to meet the requirement of grade D7 or better..."

(Done for 1997-2000)

Thoughts on some Singapore education statistics

2006-02-16T03:23:00.000+08:00

[note: the title was changed to reflect the contents of the post more accurately. | followup: here.]

Thanks (or no thanks) to this at Mr Wang's (see the comments), I found myself pouring over what little is provided by way of statistics on the Singapore Education Digest. (update: and more; scroll down) There are no specific statistics for international students in Singapore. The question is whether proxies can be arrived at. Here, a few items stand out.

(a) From 2000-2004, the "Gross Enrollment Ratio" for the Tertiary age (16-20) has been consistently 45-47% (very slow increase). [NOTE: "Gross enrollment ratio for a given level of education is derived by dividing the total resident enrollment for a particular level of education, regardless of age, by the resident population of the age group which according to national regulations, should be enrolled at that level."]

(b) The full time enrollment at the pre-U level (both JCs and Institutes) is 24,800-24,600 (slow decrease).

(c) On the other hand, The full time enrollment in the polys in the same period increased from 52,000 to 56,000; and more importantly, the same for the universities increased from 36,000 to 41,000+ (and quite possibly still growing at the same rate!).

What the figures suggests to me is that the massive expansion of NUS/NTU plus establising of SMU (in 2000) over the past few years is basically an expansion of the international student component--which would collaborate subjective or anecdotal impressions. (Anyone has any better grasp of the numbers?) But this also means that--objectively speaking, assuming that I've taken the numbers right--approximately the same (or a very slowly increasing) proportion of Singaporeans per education cohort has been entering the local universities over the past few years.

(One problem is that "Gross Enrollment Ratio" does not distinguish between university and poly enrollment. But the fact remains that full time enrollment at the pre-U level has been fairly steady, while university enrollment has massively expanded. So let's say that the figures are at least compatible with and suggestive of the impression that roughly the same proportion of Singaporeans per education cohort has been entering the local universities from 2000-2004.)

Here's the more controversial part: If my take on the numbers is correct, it seems that the typical Singaporean student (say, in 2004) stands more or less the same (or a very slighly improved) chance as his or her predecessors (within the time frame) at enrolling in one of the local universities--that is, in the specific sense that roughly the same proportion in each cohort makes it.

What then is the basis of the oft heard claim (see the comments here) that it has become harder for the local to get into the local universities; and specifically, because of the increased emphasis on recruiting international students?

One thing is for sure, because of the changes in the system at the secondary and pre-U level in the same period of time, the local student now has to do more--e.g., project work--then his or her predecessor. And anecdotally at least, it is more pressurizing now than, say, ten years ago. Secondly, there is also the factor of increasing social expectations. Neither of my parents entered university; but all three of their children are graduates. The gaozhong diploma was already quite something in their time; the same cannot be said today. Conversely, more people now expect to enter university. Yet all this is compatible with the objective possibility that from 2000 to 2004, the typical Singaporean student at the pre-U level stands more or less the same chance at entering one of the local university.

But this also means that the claim that it has become harder for the local is at best only tangentially related to the issue of an increasing number of interational students in the local universities. For instance, it is just not obvious that he or she is fighting with more people for either fewer or the same number of places--in fact, there are more places in general. And abstracting from the international students, roughly the same number of locals are fighting for roughly the same number of places. That seems to be the impression given by the numbers.

Note: this does not mean, of course, that there aren't other serious issues that can't be raised with regards to the increasing number of international students--whether it is such a good thing to have so many of them, whether they should be given the same level of tuition grant, whether Singaporeans have been discriminated against when applying for a place in the residential halls, whether the international students are sufficiently competent in English, whether having such a large international student body has any connection whatsoever with improving education experience, or university reputation, or rankings--all of which are good questions that can and should be debated (assuming that we even have hard data to work with). My point is only this: it is just not obvious that even if all the international students are not there, anything would really change--objectively speaking--for the typical local student applying for admission at one of the local universities, unless, one assumes that a larger proportion of the local students at the pre-U level (which, incidentally, has been fairly constant in absolute terms in the time period) ought to be given a place in the local universities.

I'm not even sure where this is going--there are just too many pieces of the puzzle missing. For one thing, a more complete set of statistics over a longer period of time would be helpful--both for the overall local education scene, and for each of the local universities. (update: I found somewhat more data to work with, scroll down)

coda: this article (jump to p. 85) on the international education scene in Singapore is very interesting (hat tip: knightofpentacles): G. Sanderson, "International Education Developments in Singapore", International Education Journal 3.2 (July 2002): 85-103. First, it seems that the increase in international student enrollment is not just a purely Singaporean's initiative. There has been input from an "international advisory panel" (1997):

...perhaps the most resource-intensive initiative thus far arising from the 1997 recommendations by the international advisory panel, has been subsidised expansion of the international student program in Singapore with the clearly-stated aim to 'recruit top talent' to enhance the reputation for excellence of local institutions. (p. 96)

Furthermore, officially at least, the increase in international student enrollment is meant achieved on top of rather than in place of existing local enrollment:

In 2000, the Minister Rear Education reported that both NUS and NTU had met their targets of 20 per cent enrollment of international students. This appears to be the limit at which the Government is prepared to subsidise the program to achieve goals associated with building the reputation of Singapore's institutions. Public perception is that the increasing numbers of international students are depriving locals of places, but it is clear that the Government's international student program is a separate 'package' running parallel to the education of local students. Senior Minister of State (Education), Dr. Aline Wong, stated that "foreign students who enrol in institutes of higher learming are, on the whole, better qualified than their Singapore peers and they will raise the quality of the institutions and add to the vibrancy of the academic environment". Further, she maintained that all local students who qualify for a university place would gain entry to a Singapore university and that places would always be competitive due to their number being determined by 'projected manpower needs'. (p. 97)

Needless to say, I have no comments for or even any way to objectively verify Dr. Wong's claim. Anyway, the next bit is also interesting:

It is clear that Singapore's international student program is focused on 'spreading the word' about Singapore's institutions around the globe. The program has concentrated on enrolling students from neighbouning countries in the first instance, because of the Perception that students from western countries do not yet see Singaporean institutions as attractive options far a full degree in terms of relative standing and career enhancement. Many students from western countries are, however, beginning to gravitate to Singapore for exchange opportunities. The Government's subsidy program is akin to the aims of the International Postgraduate Research Scholarship (IPRS) in Australia, where excellent students from abroad we sponsored to undertake postgraduate studies at Australian institutions. A main aspiration of the IPRS is that Australia's reputation as a provider of postgraduate tertiary education will be enhanced by the academic carerrs of the IPRS students and positive word-of-mouth marketing. (ibid.)

This is enough of a break from work.

ok: I found more data to work with. Maybe there will be more to this post later. Sigh...

update: more data is available from the Education Statistics Digest Online, which has quite a bit of data, some of which goes back to 1984. But again, there is no specific data on international students. It took me a while to extract what I think is the relevant data, part of which I've turned into a chart (click to see larger version):

The main points:

The Pre-University Cohort: Between 1984 and 2004, the enrollment in the JCs have increased from 14,000 to 23,000, but as early as 1986, the trend is that JC enrollment has not seen tremendous growth, but has instead fluctuate mostly between a little below 20,000 (lowest 18,901 in 1992) to just above 24,000 (1988, 1989, 2001). Enrollment for the PU-Centers and Centralised Institutes, however, have definitely seen a decline. Until 1992, they still given a combine enrollment of some 6,000. Since then, it's been a steady decline to under 1,000 in 2004. The combined pre-university enrollment has moved from over 21,000 in 1984, to a peak of over 30,000 in 1988-89, to basically a steady trend fluctuating between 21,000 to 24,000 from 1992 to 2004. There is also data for students who sat and passed at least 2 'A's, 2 'AO's (including GP) from 1991 onwards. The number is, not surprisingly, also fairly constant--anywhere from just below 8,800 to just above 11,000, with the trend from 2000 onwards basically just above 10,000.

University intake and enrollment: The above contrasts sharply with the situation in the universities--NUS/NTU, and since 2000, SMU. The basic trend is one of steady and fairly consistent increase in intake and thus enrollment of approximately 5% (on average) per year. Consider: in 1984, the universities take in 5131 students and have a combined enrollment of 14,666. In 2004, the numbers are 12,194 and 41,628 respectively.

I am not a statistician--so take what I say with a pinch of salt--but unless I am completely mislead by the numbers, it seems that since as early as the late 1980s, approximately the same number of pre-university level students per year have been competing for not fewer, but a steadily increasing number of places in the local universities.

Now there is no hard data for the proportion of international students in the universities, but let's grant that in 2000, they achieved the target of having 20% of the enrollment for international students. Since this increased emphasis on international students was first established in 1997, let's say that for 1998 and 1999, they managed somewhat below that percentage while aftger 2000, around 20%, plus and minus some. But even with these complications factored in, we are still talking about either roughly the same (or a much more slowly increasing) number of places for a fairly steady (or at best, very slowly increasing) number of pre-university students per year. This means that at best, the conclusion of the last paragraph should be qualified to: since as early as the late 1980s, approximately the same number of pre-university level students per year have been competing for not fewer, but roughly the same or a very slowly increasing number of places in the local universities.

Once again, I will have to be circumspect. The available data does not allow for hard conclusions. But what it does suggest is that, subjective perceptions to the contrary, it is not obvious at all that it has actually become harder--competition wise as opposed to, say, the increasing workload across the board in the schools--for the local pre-university level student to gain admission in the local universities. Nevertheless, there is something in the data that is worth noting. In the decade from the late 1980s to the late 1990s, the steady increase in university enrollment--without the additional complication of an increasing number of international students--is not matched by any correspondingly increasing pre-university enrollment. It might well be the case that in those years, it became (in some sense) 'easier' to gain entrance into the universities than before. If this is right, then what might have happened is that the new emphasis on international enrollment in the late 1990s onwards slowed this trend (of there being an increasing number of university places for the same number of locals). This might well be the 'objective' basis of the more recent unhappiness.

afterthought: there is one other complication that I almost forgot to mention. In the above discussion, the "local student at the pre-U level" refers to someone who is enrolled in one of the local JCs, Pre-U Center, CI, etc, i.e., someone in the local system. But this doesn't mean that he must be local--he could well be an international student who came to Singapore to do his Secondary or Post-Secondary education. Again, I have no knowledge of any statistics concerning their numbers and what proportion of each cohort they occupy. How this additional complication will end up qualifying my (already tentative) analysis above remains to be seen. Nevertheless, it is highly indicative that the usual complaint is that international student enrollment at the university level is somehow depriving the local pre-U student of his place in the universities, rather than at the lower levels. [A preliminary glance at the data indicates that enrollment in the primary schools--as in the case of the pre-U level institutions, seems to have stablized at around the 30,000 level since the late 1990s. The enrollment in the secondary schools has been even more stable--and for much longer; around the 16,000-18,000 level, that is, until the 2000s, where it shows an increasing trend (towards and past the 21,000 mark). Don't ask me what to make of all this...]

another chart: at the prompting of Elia's comment, I am also putting up the data for university intakes (1997-2004) sorted by courses. As can be seen, the two courses that show the most increase are Engineering and Science, also anecdotally the two in which most of the international students can be found (click to see larger version):

additional: Now, anecdotally, the bulk of the international students are in Engineering and Science--which, as can be seen from the above chart, are the very two faculties that saw the greatest expansion since 1997. For Engine, the intake in 1997 was 3,017, and 4,320 in 2004--that's a 43% increase over the period. For Science, it's from 920 to 1,592, a 73% increase. In the same period, overall intake grew from 9,250 to 12,194--a smaller 30% increase.

But most importantly of all, the number of students with 2 'A's and 2'AO's (including GP) has been fairly stable at 10,000 plus/minus for the entire period (scroll up to see previous chart).

Now I would find it highly implausible that there has been a massive increase in the number of local students wanting to study Science and/or Engineering over the period 1997-2004--i.e., as high as an increase of 43 or 73%. If anything, I expect the number of local students wanting to study Science and/or Engineering to be fairly stable through the same period given that the number of students with 2 'A's and '2AOs' (with GP) is so stable (in fact, the entire JC/PUC enrollment is fairly stable as well).

The data is certainly consistent with and suggestive of the proposition that roughly the same number of local students are fighting for a steadily increasing number of places--for them--in faculties such as Engineering and Science.

(Notice also that through the same period, the intake for most of the other courses is fairly stable, or at best, saw much smaller rates of increase than either Engineering or Science. This ties in with my point that, once you abstract from the international enrollment, the demand for the various courses is fairly stable, because the size of the 'A' level cohort is fairly stable.)

Singapore Elections '06

2006-02-11T01:25:00.000+08:00

The contributors at Singapore Ink, The Void Deck and From a Singapore Angle has just started a joint-venture: Sg Election '06. Go take a look! (I will have to say up front that I might not have time to do much blogging either there or here; see this.)

[IMPORTANT NOTICE: Several readers have emailed saying that they believe the other site has been compromised. Until the issue is resolved, I'm delinking.]

Other sites to do with the elections: Singapore Elections, Singapore Elections Watch, and Singapore Rally.

Pundits and junkies alike: Enjoy!

Off to Chicago

2006-02-07T22:45:00.000+08:00

To present a paper; back Thursday.

Buried by work...

2006-02-05T14:32:00.000+08:00

On hand: a first complete draft of five chapters (ca. 41,000 words). Projected another two chapters (ca. 18,000 words) more to write up from existing notes; and then a long Introduction, the Appendix, the Bibliography, etc. This is on top of a paper to give at a workshop in Chicago the coming week, and another presentation obligation the next week. Not expecting to blog much anytime soon...

update: but I like this piece by Mark Steyn so much I just have to quote a couple of extracts:

...the Danes are a little bewildered to find that this time it's plucky little Denmark who's caught the eye of the nutters. Last year, a newspaper called Jyllands-Posten published several cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed, whose physical representation in art is forbidden by Islam. The cartoons aren't particularly good and they were intended to be provocative... we should note that in the Western world "artists" "provoke" with the same numbing regularity as young Muslim men light up other countries' flags. When Tony-winning author Terence McNally writes a Broadway play in which Jesus has gay sex with Judas, the New York Times and Co. rush to garland him with praise for how "brave" and "challenging" he is. The rule for "brave" "transgressive" "artists" is a simple one: If you're going to be provocative, it's best to do it with people who can't be provoked...

Very few societies are genuinely multicultural. Most are bicultural: On the one hand, there are folks who are black, white, gay, straight, pre-op transsexual, Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist, worshippers of global-warming doom-mongers, and they rub along as best they can. And on the other hand are folks who do not accept the give-and-take, the rough-and-tumble of a "diverse" "tolerant" society, and, when one gently raises the matter of their intolerance, they threaten to kill you, which makes the question somewhat moot...

Read the whole thing. | also relevant is this. (On the term "fundamentalist", see this long discussion, the whole thing.)

coda: a voice of reason from the Muslim world--

We will note that we find the cartoons to be incendiary, insulting and very abrasive. We also take issue with the general stance of the Danish Newspaper Jyllands-Posten, which has a reputation for publishing inflammatory material. Yet, it would be wrong to take away their freedom of expression, regardless of how horrid their material is...

When confronted with such a situation, we deplore the use of violence in all its forms, as well as threats of violence and derogatory and racist remarks being thrown in the opposite direction. We condemn the shameful actions carried out by a few Arabs and Muslims around the world that have tarnished our image, and presented us as intolerant and close-minded bigots.

Anyone offended by the content of a publication has a vast choice of democratic and respectful methods of seeking redress. The most obvious are not buying the publication, writing letters to the editor or expressing their opinions in other venues. It is also possible to use one’s free choice in a democracy to conduct a boycott of the publication, and even a boycott of firms dealing with it. Yet an indiscriminate boycott of all the country’s firms is simply uncalled for and counter-productive. We would be allowing the extremists on both sides to prevail, while punishing the government and the whole population for the actions of an unrepresentative irresponsible few.

We apologize whole-heartedly to the people of Norway and Denmark for any offense this sorry episode may have caused, to any European who has been harassed or intimidated, to the staff of the Danish, Norwegian and Swedish Embassies in Syria whose workplace has been destroyed and for any distress this whole affair may have caused to anyone.

Well said! | elsewhere: somebody compiled an archive of the depictions of Mohammed throughout history; very educational. | the Guardian reports on how a failed attempt to find an illustrator for a children's book led to a clash of cultures.

First Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival: Island on Celluloid

2006-01-31T10:49:00.000+08:00

latest: my impressions of the films.

Supercedes earlier post. | Scroll down to see latest updates.

Newly received from my friend the mastermind behind the project (the programmer for this festival, who got the short films from the Singaporean film makers, who met up with all the student clubs involved, and who represents rOCKERpOET):

1st Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival: Island on Celluloid

Date: February 18, 2006 (Saturday)
Time: 12.45 pm to 4.15pm
Venue: Innis Town Hall

The Cinema Studies Student Union, in association with Asian Institute of the University of Toronto presents the 1st Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival. This inaugural event is co-organized by rOCKERpOET, the Malaysian Singaporean Students' Associations of the University of Toronto and York University, as well as the Asian Film Society of the University of Toronto. ADMISSION IS FREE, and all are welcome.

The 1st Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival is the first film festival of its kind in Toronto. Our objective is to introduce Singapore to the audiences of Toronto through short films made by Singaporean filmmakers. Film is an incredible combination of sound and images, which could well be the most realistic depiction of life as compared to other art forms. To be able to see Singapore on celluloid is a unique experience, since audiences in Toronto know little about the country, not to mention the films it produces.

note: Innis Town Hall is in the Innis College Building (marked "IN" on this map)

update: They've put up a website now.

update (1 Feb): Thanks, to Olorin, a small mistaken in the title is being corrected. | The synopses for the films are now up on the website as well. So far, we have Café (22 min) by Kelvin Sng, Parcel (13 min) by Lu Lu Yang, Strings (28 min) by Jon Lim, More Than Words (18 min) by Kelvin Sng, Past Tense (30 min) by Mirabelle Ang, Singapore Rebel (26 min) by Martyn See and Singapore Gaga (55 min) by Pin Pin Tan. Languages include: English, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien, Malay, Japanese and Filipino!

somewhat related: Justina of Singapore Watch has a bit about the local film industry.

Happy Chinese New Year!

2006-01-29T05:20:00.000+08:00

Penny in the new outfit from Nainai.

Forum: The (In)Significance of Political Elections in Singapore

2006-01-27T09:31:00.000+08:00

(Someone please attend and tell me about it...)

Organized by the Department of Political Science, NUS, no less, and supported by Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung.

25 February 2006 (Saturday), 8.30am
NUS Lecture Theatre 8

Since the 1960s, general elections in Singapore have continued, many say convincingly, to reinstate the People's Action Party as the ruling party. Since the early 1990s, when the Presidency became an elected office, Singaporeans have only voted once for their President. What does all of this mean for the future of elections as an institution of democratic politics in Singapore? Are elections really able to express the will of the people? Have elections ever presented real choices and alternatives for voters? Can elections continue to act as a government's main source of political legitimacy? Are elections anything more than political spectacle to periodically re-enchant a depoliticized administrative state? These questions and others will be discussed by a panel of experts in the Singapore Forum on Politics 2006:

Dr Gillian Koh
Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Policy Studies
"This Is Not An Election Ploy!" Dissecting the Government's Policy Agenda

James Gomez
Assistant Secretary-General (2nd), Workers' Party
You Have a Choice: Empowering Singaporeans to Elect their Representatives

Viswa Sadasivan
Chairman, The Right Angle Group
The Media's Roll In Political Elections

Chandra Mohan
Advocate & Solicitor, Tan Rajah & Cheah and former Nominated Member of Parliament
Political Elections in Singapore: Constitutional and Legal Perspectives

Dr Geh Min
Nominated Member of Parliament and President of Nature Society (Singapore)
Do We Have the Government We Want?

Professor Kirpal Singh
Associate Professor of Literature & Creative Thinking, Singapore Management University
Alternatives to Political Elections: A 'Post-Electoral' Democracy?

Chaired by
Dr Kenneth Paul Tan
Assistant Professor, Political Science Department, NUS

Admission is free. All are welcome.

But you need to register.

Please confirm your place by sending an email to Zauwiyah Majid (polzm@nus.edu.sg) with the following details:

Title/Name: ______________
Designation: _____________
Organization: ____________
Telephone number: _______
Postal address: ___________

As these Forums have been very well attended in the past, please register early to avoid disappointment. All enquiries should be directed to Dr Kenneth Paul Tan, c/o polzm@nus.edu.sg.

About the Speakers:

Dr Gillian Koh contributes to the Institute of Policy Studies' work in the area of Politics and Governance. Her on-going research interests lie in the areas of state-society relations, public consultation, and the development of civil society in Singapore. Her recent projects include a study on public consultation reviewing the work of the Economic Review Committee (2002-2003), Remaking Singapore Committee (2002-2003), and the Censorship Review Committee (2002-2004), and organizing a cross-sectoral public forum on the Government's proposal to license a casino in Singapore. She is also currently involved in a survey on national identity and other political attitudes of Singaporeans, and another project focused on developing scenarios of Singapore in 2030. She is also currently a member of the Supervisory Panel of the Feedback Unit, Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports. She obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree (1988) from the National University of Singapore, a Master of Arts degree (1990) in Third World Studies at the Department of Sociological Studies, University of Sheffield, United Kingdom, and a PhD in Sociology from the same department and university in 1995.

James Gomez is the 2nd Assistant Secretary-General of the Workers' Party (WP). He joined the WP in 2001 and served for a period as chairman of its Policy and Communications committee chairing two public consultation exercises on the New Poor and Social Cohesion and the Casino Proposal. He was also recently part of a six-person committee that put together the latest Workers' Party Manifesto. He is presently, vice-chairman of the North-East Area Committee and advisor to the Northern Area Committee. James by profession is a researcher and has lectured at various universities and published widely in scholarly books and journals.

Viswa Sadasivan is Chairman and founding partner of The Right Angle Group of companies - one of the largest independent TV production companies and consultancies in Singapore. With more than 20 years in the TV and media industry - in news and current affairs as TV anchor of programmes such as Feedback and Talking Point, Senior Controller, and in other top management positions - Viswa is one of the most respected and experienced media figures in Singapore. Over the past 7 years, Viswa has also established his credentials as a much sought after strategic communications and crisis management coach and consultant. In public service, Viswa has been on several key government committees and boards that include the Economic Review Committee (2003), Remaking Singapore Committee (2003), Media Development Board, the government's Feedback Unit, the Central Singapore Community Development Council, Singapore Indian Development Association (SINDA), National Youth Achievement Award Council, the Singapore Mediation Centre, and the Government Parliamentary Committee on Defence & Foreign Affairs. He is a respected political and media commentator/observer in Singapore. Viswa holds a Master of Public Administration degree from the Kennedy School of Government and Administration, Harvard University.

Chandra Mohan has been an advocate & solicitor of the Supreme Court of Singapore since 1977. He is a partner in the law firm of Tan Rajah & Cheah. He is the current President of the National University of Singapore Society (NUSS). He graduated from the University of Singapore in 1976 with a Bachelor of Laws (Honours). From 2001 to 2004, he served as Nominated Member of Parliament of Singapore. He is a member of the Council of the National University of Singapore, Chairman of the International Relations Committee of the Law Society of Singapore, member of the Management Committee of Action Group for Mental Illness, Justice of the Peace and Deputy Registrar of Marriages and Licensed Solemniser, and member of the Criminal Law Advisory Committee, Ministry of Home Affairs. In the past, he has served as President of the Law Society of Singapore (1995 to 1997), Board Member of the Board of Legal Education of Singapore (1995 to 1998), Vice President and Senate Member of the Singapore Academy of Law (1995 to 1998), President and Secretary of the Roundtable (a civic and non-partisan organization in Singapore) (2001 to 2004), and member of COMPASS, Ministry of Education (2002 to 2004).

Dr Geh Min (MBBS, FRCS, FAMS) is an ophthalmologist by profession. She is a nature lover and a committed conservationist of both our natural and man-made heritage. She is presently serving her 5th term as President of the Nature Society (Singapore) and has sworn in as a Nominated Member of Parliament on 29 November 2004 with serving term from 1 January 2005 to 30 June 2007. She is a board member of The Nature Conservancy's Asia Pacific Council and the Water Network of Public Utilities Board. She is also on the Board of the Singapore Environment Council and heads the Environment and Health Functional Committee of the South-West Community Development Council. She was also a member of the URA Focus Group on Land Allocation for Concept Plan 2001, the URA Subject Group on Rustic Coast Parks & Waterbodies Plan, the Air & Climate Change focus group for the implementation of the Singapore Green Plan 2012, SGP2012 Coordinating Committee, the resource panel for Women's Workgroups at Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports, and the Advisory Committee of the National Weather Study Project. She sits on the board of many arts organizations.

Professor Kirpal Singh is today recognized internationally as a Creativity Guru and is a frequent Keynoter and Plenary speaker at some of the world's most powerful conferences and seminars on Creativity & Innovation. As a writer of fiction and poetry he has an established reputation and he is always on the international Reading/Performing circuit. As a boundary-breaking scholar his numerous essays/articles/books continue to prove provocative and engaging and, as he ruefully puts it, "if only people had listened 15-25 years ago"! Kirpal is now working on a book Leadership Across Cultures: Do We Ever Learn?

Confucianism and Liberal Democracy

2006-01-23T14:54:00.000+08:00

I was particularly struck by two recent posts on The Void Deck concerning the alleged Confucian character of Singapore, and the comments thereof. And this is an issue that bears more than a passing interest for me.

Now, obviously, the issue is not whether the man on the street in Singapore cares about Confucius--he does as much as the man on the street in the US has heard of John Locke ("Johnny who?"). In fact, whether or not the so called ordinary Singaporean cares about the issue is really quite besides the point--whoever said that the best understanding of the politics of a place must necessarily be one that is shared by the man on the street. I bet that for two thousand years of Imperial history in China, the man on the street--or in this case, the village--doesn't know or care much about Confucius or Mencius, or their many philosophical opponents and successors.

But that doesn't negate the fact that for the longest time, Imperial China was ruled by an elite that was quite self-avowedly "Confucian" in outlook, nor the fact that broadly "Confucian" type ideas inflitrated deeply into ordinary beliefs and widely shared values and ideals concerning filial piety, obedience to authority, respect for book learning, etc. The man in the village may not be able (nor would he care to) cite the Analects or the Mencius; but he can still be counted on to respect his elders and take his filial responsibilities to his parents very seriously.

That said, it is an entirely open question whether, one, the Chinese segment of Singapore society is broadly "Confucian" in its native beliefs and values; and two, whether the political structures are influenced by "Confucian" type ideas. And despite whatever the proponents of "Asian Values" and "Confucian Values" might say, the answer is hardly an obvious "yes" to either question.

In Imperial China, if a member of the elite cites Confucian ideas in discussion (by chapter and verse, no doubt), he is often counting upon a widely shared belief among his fellow elites that here are the notions of a sage, the values that we share, the stock of ideas by reference to which we justify our value claims and policy opinions to one another. When a modern Singapore policy maker claims that "this is the Confucian Way" (or sometimes, "this is our Asian heritage"), the putative audience is not necessarily his peers, or even the ordinary man in the street--at least, not directly. (If we can know that "Confucius, he says..." cuts no ice with most young Singaporean Chinese, would our policy makers not know that as well?)

The audience is the opinion leaders of the world, especially of the Liberal Democratic West. The implicit message is a simple one too: "You have your John Locke and Immanuel Kant and stuff, we have our Confucian tradition; are your ideas necessarily better than ours? Why then are you breathing down our neck on individual rights and other Western concerns?"

Singapore's material prosperity is evident for all to see. The question is whether its departures from a more liberal democratic model can be grounded not merely in the mere fact of material success (which, being merely factual, is also in that sense vulgar), but at the level of ideas, whether what is the case has a foundation in what ought to be the case. The very existence of a Confucian Values discourse testifies to the fact that the defenders of the Singapore Model has deeper ideological ambitions beyond the mere pragmatism and the citation of our material success.

And it remains an open question whether and to what extent the ideological ambitions of the Singapore Model can succeed--at the level of ideas--and what exactly are the consequences of its success or failure. But one thing is certain: for those who care about ideas (and if you don't, you must be very bored to be snooping around here), these issues cannot be resolved without a deeper understanding of the philosophical foundations of both liberal democracy and the Confucian tradition--not the stuff purveyed by self-serving activists or politicians on either side. Saying that the man on the street does not know or care about something is not the same as saying that he has no reason to.

* * * * *

Some good books in the general area of interest that I've found useful in thinking about some of these issues:

- Chua Beng Huat's Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore is still very much a must read for its attempt to get theoretically clear about "the attempt to develop a particular form of anti-liberal democratic polity by a highly ideologically conscious political elite". The book has a chapter overviewing the rise and fall of the "Asian/Confucian Values" disourse in Singapore the 80s, which makes for excellent background material.

- Daniel Bell's East Meets West (e-version available as well) is an interesting one--the whole thing is a series of fictional dialogues between a human rights activist with, first, a democracy worker from Hong Kong, then Lee Kuan Yew (sic), then a political scientist from China. Bell taught for a few years in NUS before (se he does know a thing or two about this place--which is more than what many critics of Singapore can claim), then eventually Hong Kong and Tsinhua. A communitarian (and therefore a critic of liberalism), he takes the Confucian challenge to liberal democracy very seriously--the last time I saw him, he was giving a paper about how Confucian ideas might be used to resolve some of the issue relating to foreign domestic workers in Hong Kong.

- Theodore De Bary's The Trouble with Confucianism is actually from the 1988 Tanner Lectures at UC Berkeley. By "Trouble", he meant the "different kinds of trouble Confucianism either fell into, made for itself, or created for others"--and it is easy to forget that Confucianism is a critical tradition that cause as much trouble for authoritarian rule as it was supposed to be an asset. The .pdf file for the lecture itself is available here (I think the book has slightly more stuff), so you might not even have to buy the book.

Registration for Overseas Voting Now Opened

2006-01-18T10:59:00.000+08:00

You know where to go. The FAQs is important. Wayne has more.

update: incidentally, if you are registering as an overseas voter, you have to submit (and I quote a helpful email from the relevant authorities): along with your application, ...your supporting documents for our verifications--that's referring to the documents supporting your qualifications under 13A, apart from the usual IDs, I presume. Also: Your application must be made by the submission of a duly completed and signed "Application to Be Overseas Elector" form to the Elections Department or to any of the overseas registration centres within the stipulated registration period (i.e 17 Jan 2006 to 6 Feb 2006). So do take note.

by the way: you can contact the relevant authorities by going here. They seem quite prompt in replying.

Zaobao: "Expand the Cake of Political Openness"

2006-01-15T10:47:00.000+08:00

First noticed this on Wayne's (he posted the Chinese text). I am quite impressed, enough to whip up a translation. So here goes. Other new reports on the Conference can be found here, here and here.

* * * * *

"Expand the Cake of Political Openness" by Lin Yiming

The day before yesterday, at the Singapore Perspectives Conference organized by the Institute of Policy Studies, well known local English writer Catherine Lim expressed her regret concerning Singapore's poor performance in the sphere of political freedom and freedom of expression, which forms a stark contrast with its outstanding achievements in economics and other non-political fields.

She said that Singapore's achievements in economics are especially dazzling, surpassing even some advanced countries; but once we come to the area of political freedom and freedom of expression, our rankings are counted from the bottom, almost putting us on par with the likes of Myanmar.

Lim is indeed a reputable writer: she speaks without a script, her language moving and articulate, and even the British colleague sitting beside me was deeply drawn to her, frequently indicating her agreement. Later, this British journalist had a mini conference with her Singaporean colleagues on whether Singapore politics will open up.

The British colleague expressed her astonishment at the ability of Singaporeans to endure "the suppression of free speech" for so long. To Westerners, this is simply inconceivable.

I heard that this British journalist recently applied to be a Singapore permanent resident; and so I asked her why she chose to do that? She said that there is no secret to the matter: the reason why she and her husband chose to stay in Singapore is because of the comfortable and safe environment, and the fact it is the best place in the world to bring up children.

"I no longer have to worry about the safety of my family, and that is a tremendous advantage."

But she did not forget to add: "Even though I like living in a place that is well regulated and safe, I also wish to trade part of that safety for more political freedom and freedom of expression."

Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Dr. Vivian Balakrishnan also expressed his views on political openness at the conference. He said that the government's most fundamental responsibility is to look after the wellbeing of the people, and political openness is only one aspect of the entire process.

We can put it this way: suppose [the sum of] the government's responsibilities is like a cake; then if we cut the cake into several pieces, one of those pieces will be political openness.

Then comes the problem: How big should the slice for political openness be? A quarter? An eighth? Or one sixteenth? Perhaps even one part out of thirty-two? In the eyes of the government, there is also the question: How big should the cake as a whole be? How big do the people wish the cake to be? Do the two sides agree? These are all questions that deserve deeper thought.

Singapore's government has always been known to consider economic development, providing good employment opportunities for the people, and improving the overall level of the people's standard of living as its chief task. In fact, many Asian countries agree that this is the right way to do things. Ensuring the wellbeing, material prosperity and safety of the people are indeed the fundamental demands that many Asians make upon their governors.

Consequently, Catherine Lim worries that Singapore's prosperity has already become something of a brand-name, and this will induce more countries to emulate the "Singapore Model", leading even more Singaporeans to believe that the government is right to put political openness second.

Her concerns are understandable. If a person is too comfortable in the way he lives, he would not want to change the way he has being doing things, let alone when his way of life is something that others admire and wish for but could not have.

In a day when globalization continues apace and the boundaries between country and country are increasingly blurred, all openness, including political openness are irrevocable, and in this, Singapore is no exception. Even if Singapore can continue to use its outstanding economic performance to prove that the "Singapore Model" works, in the end it still has to face the people's wish to expand that slice of the cake that is political openness.

Needless to say, we have to confront the political realities in Singapore: we are a multi-racial, multi-religious and multi-lingual society; what sort of impact will the freedom made possible by political openness have upon such a society? But we also cannot turn our back upon political openness for fear of the risks; hence the importance of calculating the risks and planning for contingencies beforehand. Just as my British colleague put it, safety is very important; the question is how much safety are you willing to trade for political freedom and freedom of expression.

Please do not misunderstand: I am not saying that political openness will definitely impact Singapore adversely. In fact, political openness is not some terrible scourge ("torrential floods and savage beasts"), nor is Singapore's safety so fragile. The key issue concerns how fast and how much should we move when we expand the slice of the cake that is political openness.

This issue should naturally be an important topic of discussion between the government and the people. As long as a common understanding can be reached, and calculations made for the risks that we have to bear, the issue of how fast and how much should not be irresolvable.

* * * * *

somewhat related: It's one thing to agonize over a trade between safety, on the one hand, and freedom on the other. But this is just ridiculous:

The organising committee of this morning's Buangkok MRT Station opening ceremony celebrations has been warned by police that if people turn up for the festivities wearing T-shirts printed with 'white elephants', they might cause misunderstanding to others, and even contravene the Miscellaneous Offences (Public Order and Nuisance) Act.

A police spokesperson said, 'When the police receives any calls or complaints from the public, we will investigate as we've always done.'

So, if you happen to have this T-shirt, should you wear it today, or not? Please think thrice.

(Translated from Zaobao by Jeff Yen. Earlier post on those T-Shirts here.)

'Sexy' code of conduct for authentic expression

2006-01-14T16:39:00.000+08:00

I really have to say that Today has been getting better. Ted points me to this article: "Take the half step towards openness" by Frances Ong Hock Lin (Today, Jan 14), proposing a "code of conduct" for "authentic expression", the flourishing of which is a half step that needs to be taken by Singaporeans, if Singapore is to become more of an open society:

First, let's develop the habit of being impeccable with our words. Words are a powerful double-edged sword: They can cut a person down to size or inflate a person's ego. The wrong choice of words spoken in the heat of the moment can cause personal embarrassment or bring about momentous changes. If we choose our words with care when expressing opinions or engaging in discussion or debate, the chances of being misunderstood or sued for defamation would be minimised.

Second, don't take anything personally. When someone challenges our views or opinions, we must not feel they are attacking us. Conversely, when we challenge others on issues, we must not engage in name-calling or character assassination. Last year, a blogger was charged in court for attacking a specific ethnic group because of its view on dogs. He would not have found himself in the soup if he had confined his discussion to how to handle dogs in public.

Third, never make assumptions. Often, when we are engaged in heated debate, we do not have the time to reflect on our underlying assumptions about an issue. We must have the courage to inquire each time we encounter doubt. We must develop the culture of asking tough, uncomfortable questions. I believe this process has begun with the NKF saga. Already, we are engaging in active debate about stunts performed by artistes to raise funds for charity. We are beginning to examine if this is the proper and effective way.

The best part (for me) is that Mr. Ong said that learned this from a real life philosopher, who runs a Philosophy Cafe that meets once a week, and who even has a sexy (I kid you not) acronym to sum up the above: Separate the argument from the person, Examine all angles of an argument, with "X" standing for the unknown answer we are searching for.

Read the whole thing. (Nice touch there about the defamation thing.)

Voting for Singaporeans overseas: Letter by JS Tan

2006-01-14T15:35:00.000+08:00

Continuing from the earlier post linking the article about overseas voting by Wayne Soon in Today (Jan 10). A reader by the name of JS Tan left some comments in which is also included a forum page letter he wrote last year (published ST Nov 6, 2004). I thought that the original, unedited version is interesting (and not to mention detailedly argued) and reproduce it below with the author's permission:

It is the duty and responsibility of Singaporeans to vote in the coming election. I participated in the last presidential election and the polling center was conveniently located at the void deck, accessible to all qualified voters, regardless of race, language, religion or affiliation. I applaud the efforts of the government to set up overseas voting stations in the coming election to allow the increasing number of Singaporeans based overseas to vote at more convenient places. However, I would like to highlight the problem with regards to the unequal rights to vote for all overseas Singaporeans.

I am a student in the fourth year of a five-year overseas PhD program. As I am here in my own capacity and currently not associated with any government or public agency, I will not be allowed to register for overseas voting. Section 13A of the Parliamentary Elections Act states that:

13A.—(1) Any person who is entitled to have his name entered or retained in any register of electors for an electoral division and who —
(a) is not resident in Singapore but has resided in Singapore for an aggregate of 2 years during the period of 5 years immediately preceding the prescribed date referred to in section 5; or

(b) is —
(i) a member of the Singapore Armed Forces on full-time training or service outside Singapore;
(ii) a public officer or an employee of any public authority employed in full-time service outside Singapore;
(iii) a public officer or an employee of a public authority on full-time training outside Singapore;
(iv) a citizen of Singapore of not less than 21 years of age on full-time training outside Singapore that is sponsored by the Government or any public authority;
(v) employed outside Singapore by an international organisation of which Singapore is a member or by any other body or organisation designated by the President under Article 135 (1) (c) (ii) of the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore; or
(vi) the spouse or a parent, child or dependant of any person referred to in sub-paragraph (i), (ii), (iii), (iv) or (v) and is living with that person,
may, not later than 21 days after the date of publication in the Gazette of the notice under section 10 (3) or 15 (2), as the case may be, of the notice of completion of the register, apply to the Registration Officer to be registered as an overseas elector for an electoral division at —
(A) any place in or near the electoral division specified in that notice; or

(B) any overseas registration centre. [19/2001]
I understand the government’s concern about overseas voting and Section 13A is a relaxation of the absolute no-no to overseas voting. I can see why the government is concerned with potential irresponsible voting by some overseas Singaporeans who have lived outside Singapore for years since these Singaporeans would not have to live with the consequences of their vote. However, by cutting the pie so narrowly such that only those who have lived 2 out of 5 years in Singapore or those employed by government or public agencies would end up alienating a sector of overseas Singaporeans like myself who feel they are being ostracized.

It is in my opinion that all qualified voters should be given the same convenience to vote. By allowing only selected voters to vote at overseas stations would skew the outcome of the election. Section 13A clearly favors government employees. It allows overseas employees of government agencies to vote with more convenience. As an analogy, it will be the same as allowing only government agency employees in Singapore to vote at the polling stations at their void decks while all others have to travel to city hall. Just as it would be inconceivable to favor or discriminate against a sector of the population by virtue of their race, language or religion with regards to voting, it would be wrong to discriminate against those who do not have certain affiliations (in this case with government or public agencies).

As a student, I would like to highlight how the rule affects voters who are also overseas students and how unfair the rule is.

1. Students on government scholarships have the convenience to vote overseas. Their counterparts with no scholarship or with private sector scholarships are not given that convenience.

2. Students in their first to third year of study qualify for the minimum 2 in 5 years residency and are allowed to vote overseas. Their seniors in their fourth and fifth year of study, senior students pursuing professional degrees such as medicine, architecture or law and senior students pursuing graduate studies after their first overseas degree are not allowed.

Section 13A not only affects students but also the working class. Singaporeans working overseas for more than 3 years will not be allowed to vote at overseas voting stations unless they work for a government agency. It appears that a Singaporean working or studying overseas for more that 3 years has less right to vote than one who has been away for 2 years. Similarly, a Singaporean working overseas in a government agency has more rights than an entrepreneur or one working with a private company.

Agencies like A*STAR are trying to attract unaffiliated overseas students back to work in Singapore and NUS alumni is trying to get overseas alumni to remain connected with the university and Singapore. But Section 13A totally alienates and discriminates against these groups of students mentioned above. They do not have the same rights as overseas Singaporean students sponsored by the government to vote at overseas polling centers.

As a male Singaporean who has completed national service, I would be expected to return to my homeland to carry arms and defend my nation, just like many others in my generation. However, in the coming election, I am alienated and discriminated against. The implication of this is enormous.

I would like to propose that Section 13A be abolished for the coming election or amended such that all qualified voters have equal rights, regardless of race, language, religion or affiliation, to vote at overseas polling centers.

Tan Juay Seng
Student in Vancouver, Canada

Also of interest are these two letters: here and here; and another two here (the second letter), and here (scroll down) with extended remarks by the Kway Teow Man. All very interesting, so knock yourselves out.

update: I've also asked a friend with access to ST archives to help check if there were any responses to JS Tan's letter around the time it was published by ST, and the reply was a "there appears no response to it, not even from the govt. hmmmm". That's a little surprising.

First Toronto-Singapore Short Film Festival

2006-01-14T10:19:00.000+08:00

See updated information here.

George Soros, the Open Society and Democracy in Singapore

2006-01-12T00:41:00.000+08:00

Hot on the heels of SDP saying that "foreign pressure is the main way to ship real democracy to Singapore", we have news reports of George Soros, billionaire financier, philanthropist founder and chairman of the Open Society Institute criticizing Singapore for lack of political freedom, and especially the PAP's practice of using libel lawsuits to crush opposition politicians. (Correlation need not imply causation, so no need to get too excited about any SDP-Soros connection.) In any case, ST (Jan 11) is reporting--from "Soros opens up on his new passion - democracy":

MR GEORGE Soros, philanthropist and financier extraordinaire, on Wednesday showed 2,000 young Singaporeans that he was not just a money man, but a political philosopher as well. The 75-year-old chairman and founder of Soros Fund Management, who earned fame in the 1990s for his market-moving currency bets, has been spending his fortune on a lifelong pet project - fostering open societies through his foundation, the Open Society Institute.

For the uninitiated, it's called the Open Society Institute in honor of one of Soros' teachers, the Austria born LSE philosopher of science, Karl Popper. More precisely, with reference to what is probably Popper's most famour book, the two volume The Open Society and its Enemies. The chief antagonist in the book is Plato, who Popper blames for being the grand ancestor of all (theoretical) enemies to the open society. For me, however, the book holds a different significance--a memorable example of how an otherwise intelligent man can get it so wrong about Plato, especially about the Republic, one of the most anti-political books ever. Short version: for all the bluster about philosopher kings, Socrates' claim that there will be no rest for political societies until philosophers rule or rulers philosophize is meant to imply that political societies are basically screwed. The best regime according to the light of reason is an impossibility. (For a more engaging--i.e., gossipy--introduction to Popper and other thinkers of his generation, see this book.)

Anyway, the ST report continues:

He explained to a packed forum organised by the Institute of South-east Asian Studies why he spends billions on civic causes from funding universities in Eastern Europe to fighting apartheid in South Africa. The Hungarian-born Jew survived the 1944 Nazi occupation by living under a false name and later escaped Soviet rule by emigrating to Britain. He professed support for the Democrats in the 2004 US presidential election, he said, and was against US President George W. Bush's handling of terrorism and the war on Iraq.

(Aside: I've actually met people (scholars) who have benefitted first hand from his largess. When in Berkeley, I met a Czech couple on fellowship. They told me stories about how even back in the dark days under communism, Soros' initiative would bring scholars from Britain, the US, etc., to give talks in Czechoslovakia, help finance students who want to meet up to read philosophy, etc. I have to confess that I found it all very exciting and romantic--meeting up to read some 'forbidden philosophy', say, The Open Society and its Enemies, while living under an unfree regime.)

Soros' opposition to Bush is well known; and so is his generous funding of Bush's opponents. The next thing reported, however, seems mildly in tension with other things he said:

'Some people believe that 'might is right'... I don't think that democracy can be imposed from the outside. And it certainly cannot be imposed by military force,' he said. He also said Singapore was 'obviously not an open society', and expressed hope for more political openness, adding that the Republic's prosperity put it in good stead to move in that direction.

No, not the point that Singapore is not an open society. That follows as a matter of a priori deduction in the universe of Soros' theoretical commitments (though it is possible that he's being a tad too stringent here given the original formulations of what an open society is). | update: the updated Jan 11 version of the ST article reports the somewhat expected response from the MICA spokesman: "If we were not an open society, George Soros would hardly be able to make the comments at an open forum in Singapore, and be reported in the Singapore media."

Nor am I talking about the slide from "might is right" to "imposing democracy from the outside by military force" (assuming that ST did not managed to edit that in a misleading way). At best (or worse, depending on your tastes), proponents of the latter are asking that might be in the service of right, which presupposes a distinction between might and right.

Nor am I referring to the ambiguity in the very notion of democracy. As far as I am concerned, the US is a democratic country--whether or not G.W. Bush is in the White House. Despite what some might think, there really isn't very much that Bush can do to change that fact--the framers made sure of that some 217 years ago. Soros' support for his favored causes in the US is very much the support of a particular spectrum within a democratic framework--and making full use of that very framework's provisions for political speech to boot. The work of the Initiative in Communist Eastern Europe, on the other hand, was an attempt to help in the very emergence of a democratic framework. The two are works are different enough. But I'll let that pass; only pendant like myself could possibly be interested in a point like this.

It's the point that democracy cannot be imposed from the outside. If democracy cannot be imposed from the outside by military force, can it be so imposed, or perhaps induced, by some generous financial assistance from the outside? Can one escape sliding from saying "yes" to the latter to admiting "yes" to the former, at least given a range of circumstances? Besides, is the sense of the "cannot" that of technical impossibility--just can't be done, won't be doable, attempts will be unsuccessful, counterproductive--or is it meant to be tinged with a touch of the deontic--it shouldn't be done, even if it can be done?

These are things that can and ought to be sorted out. | update: The Void Deck takes a first stab.

* * * * *

Even more things to be sorted out after reading Agagooga's on-scene report of Soros. There's a lot but this bit in particular caught my eye:

Assoc Prof Locknie Hsu next made some general remarks about disputing the veracity of accepted facts, but very importantly zeroed in on how Soros had not defined "democracy" and "open society". I think that lawyers sometimes are too zealous about definitions, resulting in the definitions of concepts almost everyone has an instinctive grasp of becoming more and more precise lose more and more accuracy, until one can have oral sex without this being covered by the legal definition of sex (as it applies to the case). This was a very important point, and I wondered why Soros had not tried to define these concepts in his opening remarks (or indeed Kesavapany in his Welcome Address - after all, the key phrase *did* appear in the title of the dialogue session).

Soros replied to the comment about his not defining his key terms by saying they had no definition, and that people had to define these concepts for themselves. He did conceded, though, that the rule of law was important in an open society, and so you need some legal definitions. I would note that the problem with being so iffy is that definitions can be hijacked in pursuit of political agendas (some would argue that trying to promote civil society in a country is in itself a political agenda, but I have much more faith in the noble intentions of NGOs without vested interests trying to improve the lot of a country's citizens than the motives of repressive governments trying to stifle and control their citizens), and governments, with the aid of co-opted intellectuals, could find all sorts of excuses, including "Western Imperialism", "National Sovereignty", the people not being ready and "Asian Values" to disenfranchise their peoples.

Why should it be important to define terms? (This subject has come up again and again with respect to discussions of the "elite" and "elitism" on this blog.) Because some terms are such that different people have different instinctive grasp of them; and unless the terms are defined, it's really "chicken and duck talk" to discuss things using them. Unlike "oral sex"--"democracy", "open society", and for that matter, "freedom" are contested concepts, mostly because of their emotive appeal. In fact, I get the sense that the warm, fuzzy, positive feel of both is just about the only thing concerning these things of which almost everyone today has an instinctive grasp. In other words, we all sort of agree that it's a good and wonderful thing for us to have freedom, for a country to be democractic, and to live in an open society. But unless we have a more precise grasp of just what does it mean to have freedom, for a country to be democratic, or to live in an open society, judgments using these terms are not much more informative than "hurrah!". And it doesn't mean that we must settle for exactly one definition for each of these terms either. If, after discussion, we discover that by "the freedom to do X", I mean (e.g.) "the absence of legal constrain against doing X" while you meant "the ability to do X", we discover something important: that "freedom" is ambiguous, and the path is now opened for us to ask which "freedom" is it we think the possession of which is good, in what circumstances, etc.

It is surprising that Soros, being a student of Popper, should be so dodgy about defintion "open society"--pulling out a copy of The Open Society and its Enemies and reading a few lines would have settled the matter. At the very least, he owes us an elaboration of what he means by Singapore not being an open society beyond the--all too obvious--point that Singapore somehow is not quite where it should be in the department of "freedom" and "democracy", etc., in other words, "Singapore? Boo!". But surely one doesn't have to be a George Soros to say that.

I must confess to not understanding Agagooga's point about "definitions can be hijacked in pursuit of political agendas"--how does one do such a thing? Perhaps along these lines--a manifestly unjust regime applies a novel definition of a normally positive term, say, "democracy", and under that novel definition, the regime turns out to be "democratic". But this is no argument against the usefulness of definitions--when such things happen, all the more do we become aware of the defectiveness of the unjust regime's novel definition.

And obviously, one would have "much more faith in the noble intentions of NGOs without vested interests trying to improve the lot of a country's citizens than the motives of repressive governments trying to stifle and control their citizens" (emphasis mine). But it doesn't say very much, does it? The question is not whether one ought to have more faith in the good guys as opposed to the bad guys, whoever they are, but just who are the good and who are the bad guys. Personally, neither NGOs nor governments should get a free pass. The noblest intentions can be the direct cause of the worst evils, while the basest motives may yet be the engine that actually make the world work.

Many apologies for sounding grumpy but this is what happens when you are mostly buried in work.

Voting for Singaporeans overseas

2006-01-11T00:58:00.000+08:00

(update: Good stuff in the comments section.)

Wayne Soon has a piece about the issue in Today (Jan 10):

Currently, only eight embassies or consulate generals are designated as voting centres in five countries. A Singaporean living in San Francisco would have to fly eight hours to Washington DC to vote at the Singapore embassy there. Similarly, a young Singaporean who studies in Murdoch University in Perth would have to fly more than four hours to Canberra to cast his ballot at the Singapore Embassy. In short, the average overseas Singaporean would find it inconvenient to vote, as many reside far from the designed voting areas. If this situation persists, many overseas Singaporeans may not even bother to register ahead of future elections. It is vital that Singapore, being only a small nation, be able to extend overseas voting to as many of its citizens abroad as is practically possible...

So, while we have taken the first, significant step of opening up the ballot to our citizens overseas, we also need to take the next - of making overseas voting as accessible as possible. Singapore's consulate-generals, which are in areas such as San Francisco, Osaka, Xiamen and Chicago, where many Singaporeans reside, could also be designated overseas voting centres. Other places where many Singaporeans reside, including Perth, should also have appointed ballot centres.

Read the whole thing.

This Ministry of Home Affairs press release (Apr 19, 2004) is also relevant. It is basically a transcript of a parliamentary speech by Wong Kan Seng in which he goes through the paces on several issues pertaining to voting--overseas voting, electronic voting, recount margin, etc. Useful bit of statistic:

Overseas Singaporeans are spread out in many countries. The number is not large, compared to the total Singapore population. Based on 1997 General Elections statistics, the Elections Department estimates that in a fully contested election, about 43,000 electors, or slightly more than 2% of the electorate, are likely to be resident abroad. Our sense is that the number of overseas Singaporeans of voting age is probably higher, as some of them may not have restored their names on the register over the years, and some came home to vote. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has estimated that the current number of Singaporeans overseas is about 100,000.

Interesting... (See also this earlier news item on the subject.)

* * * * *

Talking about elections: here in Toronto, Canadians are going to the polls in a few days time after incumbent PM Paul Martin lost a no-confidence vote in November 2004 over a series of scandals in which senior Liberal Party members were caught for being involved in the misppropriation of millions of taxpayers' dollars. The Conservatives are presently enjoying a 10 point lead over the Liberals. They are promising tax cuts, inviting the Liberals to make dire warnings of deficits ahead if the Conservatives are elected. The Liberal promise, on the other hand, is to spend billions of (tax) dollars if they are elected. (Something about monkeys and the numbers "three" and "four" comes to mind.) In the meantime, this columnist attempts to stir up some excitement: "There is a new reality show in Canada called "House of Commons Survivor." You need to get your vote in by January 23rd!" Can't say I blame her. Maybe it's just me but things did seem so much more exciting around here during the US elections season last year...

Autographed Freakonomics bookplate

2006-01-10T13:43:00.000+08:00

Received this in the mail today with nothing else in the envelope (US postmark, from somewhere in NY), and it took me all of 3 minutes to figured out that Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner have such bad handwriting... Later, I went to their blog, only to discover that I wasn't the only one having this reaction. There's something about the "next round of bookplates" being "specially printed...replete with the apple/orange thingy"--now I'm confused. Are they sending out a second batch to all who asked (including moi), or am I stuck with the thing in the pict to the left?

George Soros predicting US Recession in 2007

2006-01-10T10:26:00.000+08:00

From Reuters (Jan 9, 2006):

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Billionaire investor George Soros said Monday the Federal Reserve might overshoot in its bid to tighten monetary policy, deflating housing prices and tipping the economy into recession in 2007. A collapse in U.S. housing prices could be associated with a dollar decline, scuppering the Fed's attempt to engineer a "soft-landing" for the economy, Soros told an audience at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs.

Soros -- best known for his famous bet against sterling as Britain was forced to pull its currency out of the European currency grid in 1992 -- said he expected the federal funds rate, now at 4.25 percent, to peak at 4.75 percent. Nevertheless, the Fed could be late in estimating when to stop raising rates, he said, creating a "reasonably significant chance" of a "hard-landing. If housing continues to cool while rates are slowing then it could turn into a hard landing," Soros said. "That's why I expect a recession to happen in 2007, not 2006."

I'm no economist, but as far as I know, what the US Federal Reserve can raise or lower is the "federal funds rate"--the rate banks charge other banks for overnight loans--which influences the market for shorter-term securities. (For a fuller account, see e.g., this.) Unpacked, what Soros is saying is that, at some point in 2007, the Feds will fail to stop raising the interest rates that banks charge other banks for overnight loans fast enough, such that the American housing market will go bust, causing a recession.

Count me naive but do the Feds really have this kind of power over the US economy?

This other bit is even more puzzling (emphasis mine):

The 75-year-old investor turned philanthropist said the world economy faced two other significant risks -- the U.S.-led war on terror and global warming.

He argued the war on terror that followed the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States in 2001 and the war in Iraq had turned global opinion against the world's most powerful country. "The biggest blunder was declaring war against terror. Today, most Americans realize that the Bush administration has led us astray," he said.

Soros said global warming threatened humankind and should be tackled by penalizing carbon emissions, instead of the current system of rewarding companies that reduce pollution. "Our civilization is at stake," he said.

Soros, like everyone else, is entitled to his opinion on the GWOT. And, exactly as he (and many many other people) said, global opinion is not exactly cosy for the US. But how do we get from here to the US or world economy? (To take one indicator, world economic growth (IMF figures) for 2004, one year after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, was 5.1%--a record high in 30 years--and the forecast for 2005 is a respectable 4.3% (source)...

Secondly, I've always thought that an important obstacle (from one point of view, anyway) to doing something about the environment is precisely that countries such as the US, not to mention China (edit: Australia is a better example), are unwilling to sacrifice economic growth so as to, say, take Soros' beloved Kyoto Treaty more seriously...

coda: This guy is much more blunt.

From a Singapore Angle on ST Digital Life

2006-01-10T08:55:00.000+08:00

I'm quite honored that From a Singapore Angle was picked by the Melissa Lwee of ST Digital Life ("Blogosphere", Jan 10) as one of the local blogs "to watch out for in 2006", with the tag line: "One of the best local weblogs in the blogosphere for timely news analysis" and a quotation of the first two paragraphs of this earlier post.

Well, I'm really not very timely nowadays. And as for "news analysis", let's just say that this is a strictly amateur affair over here. Since neither Olorin nor I would actually pay to read any news analysis coming out of this site, we don't expect anyone else would. So take us with a pinch of salt, always.

Anyway, my only little notpick is that in the STInteractive version of the report, the second paragraph is not idented or otherwise marked as a quotation--which it is, and is so marked in my own post (its from Francis Fukuyama's piece on the WSJ Opinion Journal). I really hope no one gets the wrong impression that I wrote that, or that I was trying to pass it off as my own writing.

Dialects

2006-01-10T08:33:00.000+08:00

Was reading this: "Cantonese Is Losing Its Voice" by David Pierson (LATimes), via Language Hat and Amida (do their comments).

As I said in a comment at Amida's--sometimes, I wonder if the putative contrast is not really between the languages/dialects, but between the manners of the speakers who employ them, and the corresponding sorts of conversations. There is a big difference between the stuff you get when scolded by a HK shopkeeper for taking too long to browse her wares, and listening to Tang poetry--even when both are in Cantonese.

In this regard, it is interesting that the Hokkien (Fujianhua or Minnanhua) spoken in Singapore-Malaysia tends to sound a lot more uncultivated (more 'cackling', shall we say) when compared to equivalents on the mainland or Taiwan (Taiyu is a close relation)--but that's most likely a legacy of the fact that most early Hokkien speakers in the area were coolies and such like who came to the South Seas to seek their fortune; hardly mandarins or literati. In any case, that seems to be the standard explanation and it does make a lot of sense.

I once heard a Christian preacher from the mainland give a message in most eloquent mandarin, which was interpreted on the go into Hokkien (for the sake of the older audience). At one point, he told an anecdote about a scientist's friend who, upon seeing the scientist's beautifully constructed model of the solar system, asked, "who made that?" The scientist replied, "no one; it evolved from the dust in my office over a very long time." The friend was flummoxed: "how can that be?" --这怎么可能呢?

But only the (South Seas) Hokkien translation expressed the friend's shear irritation: ma na wu koleng eh daichi?!

I almost burst out laughing there and then.

Quickstops (Jan 6, 2006)

2006-01-07T16:27:00.000+08:00

Itchin' fer a bit a' bloggin' after hours banging away on the thesis. So here goes:

- A couple of new-ish blogs to watch: The Kway Teow Man, the author of which--appropriately enough--claims to be "a Char Kway Teow Man in Ang Mo Kio by day, political correspondent wannabe by night"; and Quiescente Queste, half of which est en français. | update: also turns out that the Kway Teow Man has a brother who claims to be in the Mee Pok business, and who says "cooking and selling mee pok makes me happy". I like him already.

- Simon's World has an interesting take on the Heritage Foundation's 2006 Index of Economic Freedom (Hong Kong ranks #1, Singapore #2--if you must know). By the way, that's economic, not political freedom. I'm sure the writer knows much more about HK than I do, but, really, the mere fact that 85% of Singapore's population live in public housing does not qualify us to be "achieving communism in the classic Marxist sense", not even close (though this is not to deny the social-democratic leanings of the PAP's founders).

- Since we are talking about different kinds of freedom, this gentlemen has some harsh words on the lack of liberty (i.e., civic and political) in Singapore (Part 1, 2), for instance, "With the world's second busiest port, first world shopping malls, and top-notch public services, one might be tempted to think that Singapore is a bastion of capitalism and freedom. However, upon closer scrutiny, one can see that Singapore more closely resembles Hitler's Germany overflowing with its Brown Shirt regiment." (Note that much of the article, however, consists of citations from Sue Ann Tellman's "Happy-face facism".) I was still half amused and wondering about the somewhat over-the-top descriptions when the last three paragraphs (in part 2) gave it away: something about "the Bush administration's quasi-fascist policy of mandatory fingerprinting at the border", "Patriot Act", "Homeland Security", "illegal wiretappings" and other "anti-freedom policies in America-like the real property expropriations inspired by the Kelo decision, the so-called War on Drugs, and the RICO statutes," etc. The article is only tangentially about us; it's always been for domestic consumption. (Related earlier post; especially this comment.) | update: some thoughts from Ivan Chew: "At first I decided what Dr. Cobin...wrote must be true. Especially the part about the Brown Shirts. But I looked out my HDB home to check for Brown Shirts..." | more comments here and here.

- "Economists are gradually shifting the way we think about the determinants of economic well-being. Traditionally, the focus was on resources. Increasingly, we appear to be moving toward a focus on beliefs", says Arnold Kling, reporting an the new study from the World Bank called Where is the Wealth of Nations? (.pdf file) You might be interested to know that according to the report, Singapore's per capital "wealth estimate" using 2000 numbers is a tidy 79,011 under "produced capital + urban land" plus 173,595 under "intangible capital" giving a total of 252,607 (USD, presumably), with 0 under "subsoil assets", "timber resources", "non-timber forest resources", "protected areas", "cropland", "pastureland" and "natural capital" (hmm, why isn't our geographical location and natural harbour counted?). For comparison, Switzerland leads with 648,241 and the US reports 512,612.

- On a lighter note, how to watch Revenge of the Sith saving 35 minutes and 39 seconds. Just for the record, I did eventually watch it, and did find it better than TPM and AOTC. But really, that's not a high bar to cross. Also stumbled across this earlier piece "On the Implausibility of the Death Star's Trash Compactor".

Time to catch some sleep.

McDonald's Rice Burgers

2006-01-07T07:28:00.000+08:00

(Picture from www.taipeitimes.com)

McDonald's rice burgers coming to Singapore! From Food Business Review Online: "In a bid to appeal to local palates, fast-food heavyweight McDonald's has added rice burgers - fried beef served between two rice cakes - to its menu in Singapore following the successful rollout of the product in Taiwan." McDonalds Taiwan "sold 5 million rice burgers in the first six months since adding them to the menu in February last year".

About time too--looks like Mos Burger is going to face some competition on this front. But it should have been more or less a no-brainer: as far as I recall, previous attempts at a more local flavor, e.g., the McPepper and the Rendang burger had all enjoyed some degree of success.

Since I'm on the subject, do you know that one of McDonald's success stories is...France?! --That's at least for the past couple of years (Jan 2003, Apr 2004); more recent numbers are less exciting.

(Digressing a little, I made chicken salad sandwiches for our trip from SF back to Toronto--since food is no longer served for mere economy class travellers on US/Canada domestic flights. Due to a slight oversight, I marinaded the chicken in soy sauce and sesame oil before cooking--which, coupled with the mayo and other stuff that goes into a more traditional chicken salad, made for an interesting, if somewhat heretical taste. Mental note to self: should investigate the combination further.)

The Protestant Deformation

2006-01-07T06:51:00.000+08:00

Found this on the Winter 2005 edition of The American Interest: "The Protestant Deformation", by James Kurth. (Unfortunately, it's subscription only; which also means that I shouldn't reproduce the whole article here.) The article is about the remote religious sources of US Foreign Policy--and I'm sure others more learned about that will have more to say. One bit that caught my eye is Kurth's account of the Protestant Reformation as a rebellion against hierarchy and community in the matter of salvation, and the devolution of the Protestant Reformation into the Protestant Deformation in six stages, which I reproduce below for the interested reader.

Hierarchy and Community

Protestantism was in its origins a protest against the form that the Christian religion had taken in the Roman Catholicism of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. The Reformation was an effort to return the Christian religion to the original faith expressed in the New Covenant, or New Testament, of the Bible. Protestant reformers objected to numerous features of the Roman Catholic Church, including such familiar ones as the authority of the Pope, the role of the Virgin Mary, and the meaning and practice of indulgences. But the really central, fundamental issues involved the way the Christian believer reached a state of salvation, and the roles that the priestly hierarchy and the parish community played in the process. The Roman Catholic Church taught that the believer reached salvation through the mediation of the priestly hierarchy and participation in the parish community's sacraments and rituals. In combination, these yielded the surest path to salvation.

The Protestant reformers rebelled against the idea that the believer achieves salvation through a hierarchy or a community, or even the two in combination. Although many Protestant reformers accepted hierarchy and community for certain purposes, such as church governance and other collective undertakings, they rejected them as a means of reaching the state of salvation. Rather, they asserted that the believer receives salvation through an act of grace by God. This grace produces in its recipient the faith in God and in salvation that converts him into a believer.

The believer can achieve greater knowledge of God, however, through his reading of the Holy Scriptures. The Protestant reformers placed great emphasis on the Word, but they held that interpreting the Bible did not necessarily require the intercession of a hierarchy or a community. Indeed, these might actually impede the individual believer in reaching the right interpretation.

All religions are unique, but Protestantism is more unique than all the others. No other major religion is so critical of hierarchy and community or of the traditions and customs that go with them. Indeed, most other religions are based upon hierarchy or community: in addition to Roman Catholicism, also Eastern Orthodoxy, Islam, Hinduism, Confucianism and even, to a degree, Buddhism. At its doctrinal base, however, Protestantism-essentially a rejection of Roman Catholicism-is anti-hierarchy and anti-community. The early Protestant reformers sought to remove hierarchy and community so that the individual Christian believer could have a direct relationship with God-more accurately and subtly, a relationship with God directly through the second person of the Holy Trinity, Jesus Christ, and so that he could receive salvation from God directly through the third person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit.

The removal of hierarchy and community, traditions and customs - of any earthly intermediaries between the individual and God - strips away, at least for the most important purposes, any local, parochial, cultural or national characteristics of the believer. In principle, grace, faith and salvation can be received by anyone in the world; they are truly universal, or catholic (in the original sense of that term). The Protestant reformers thus saw the vast array of cultures and nations through a perspective that was, in effect, even more universal than that of the Roman Catholic Church.

In the three centuries after the Reformation, the Protestant rejection of hierarchy and community in regard to salvation spread to other domains of life as well. Some Protestant churches came to reject hierarchy and community in church governance and other collective undertakings. This was especially the case in the new United States, where the conjunction of the open frontier and the disestablishment of state churches enabled the flourishing of new, unstructured and unconstraining denominations.

By the beginning of the 19th century, the Protestant rejection of hierarchy and community had also spread to important arenas of temporal or secular life. Again, this was especially the case in the United States. In the economic arena, the elimination of hierarchy (monopoly or oligopoly) and community (guilds or trade restrictions) meant the establishment of the free market. In the political arena, the elimination of hierarchy (monarchy or aristocracy) and community (traditions and customs) meant the establishment of liberal democracy.

However, the free market could not be so free, nor liberal democracy so liberal, that they became anarchic. Although economic and political life could no longer be ordered by hierarchy and community, by tradition and custom, they had to be ordered by something. That something came to reflect the Protestant emphasis on written words and arose in the form of written covenants between individual Protestant believers. In the economic arena, this was the written contract; in the political arena, it was the written constitution.

The Protestant Reformation was thus giving birth to what by the early 20th century would become the American Creed. The fundamental elements of that secular creed - liberal democracy, free markets, constitutionalism and the rule of law - were already fully in place in the United States in the early 19th century. This spread of the Protestant rejection of hierarchy and community from the arena of salvation to the arenas of economics and politics was driven by a particular inner dynamic, or rather decline, within the Protestant faith itself. Today, almost half a millennium after the beginning of the Protestant Reformation in 1517, we can discern six stages of what may be called the Protestant declension.

The Protestant Declension

Stage 1: Salvation by grace. At the personal level, the original Protestant (and, as the reformers saw it, the original Christian) experience is that of a direct, loving and saving relationship between the believer and God. This direct relationship and state of salvation are brought about by God, through his sovereign grace, and not by the person through his own works. This is the experience of being "born again" into a new life.

Obviously, any intermediaries, traditions or customs that could stand in the way of this direct relationship must be swept aside. The original Protestant and born-again Christian experiences his new life as a tabula rasa that enables him to release previously constrained energies and to focus them intensely on new undertakings. This in part explains the great energy and efficacy of many newly Christian persons. When the number of such persons is greatly multiplied, as it was at the time of the Reformation, it also in part explains the great energy and efficacy of some newly-Protestant nations (think of the Netherlands, England and Sweden in the 16th and 17th centuries).

Stage 2: Grace evidenced through work. A serious problem soon arises; indeed, it arises within the very next generation. The children of the original born-again Protestants are born into a Protestant family and church, but they themselves may not be born-again Protestants who have personally experienced the direct relationship with God and the state of salvation that grace brings. As Max Weber famously discussed in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, this can give rise to great anxiety about the spiritual state of second-generation Protestants.

For some in Protestant churches, especially the Anglican and Lutheran state churches of Europe but even the Episcopal and Lutheran churches in America, there was a solution close at hand. These churches had remained hierarchical (with the Pope replaced by the state monarch) and even somewhat communal. Perhaps, in some way that was not theologically clear but that was psychologically reassuring, the state of salvation could be reached by participation in the rituals and works of the church. In these churches, therefore, the focus upon grace gradually shifted in practice to a focus upon works, as had been the case in the Roman Catholic Church before the Protestant Reformation.

However, for persons in other Protestant churches, especially those known as the Reformed churches - the Calvinist churches of Europe as well as the Presbyterian and Congregational churches in America - the solution to the dilemma of Protestants who were "born in" but not "born again" had to be a different one. The stricter Reformed theology of these churches did not easily permit a diminished emphasis on the necessity of grace. Further, their relative absence of hierarchical and communal features meant that they had a less developed structure for the exercise of rituals and works. And yet, without the personal experience of grace, what evidence was there that second-generation, or birth-right, Protestants had received it?

As Weber discussed, the evidence for grace became a particular and peculiar kind of works: not the performance of works in the church, but the success of work in the world. This was how the Protestant ethic became the capitalist spirit. Because the Reformed churches had reformed away the legitimacy of hierarchy, community, tradition and custom, work in the world could be unconstrained by these obstacles. Thus, the second- and later-generation Reformed Protestants could experience worldly life and worldly work as a tabula rasa. This experience enabled these generations also to experience a release of previously constrained energies and to focus intently on new undertakings.

Indeed, this version of Protestantism in its worldly work was so focused that it became methodical and systematic in previously unseen ways. This experience in part explains the great energy and efficacy of some second- and later-generation Reformed Protestants. Again, when the number of such persons was large, it also in part explains the great energy and efficacy of established Protestant nations, not just for the second generation, but for several generations thereafter (for example, the Netherlands and Sweden until the 18th century; England, Scotland and America until the late 19th century).

Stage 3: Salvation by works. After several generations of this kind of Reformed Protestantism, a certain Protestant culture even with traditions and customs, developed. The number of Protestants who had experienced the culture but not the grace greatly increased. Even in the Reformed churches (Calvinist, Presbyterian, Congregational) the idea of the necessity of grace began to fade. Work in the world was no longer seen as a sign of grace but as a good in itself. Works as a good became a new version of good works.

Stage 4: The unitarian transformation. As the focus on grace faded, so too did the focus upon the agencies of grace, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Thus Reformed Protestantism, with its highly articulated trinitarian doctrine, turned into unitarianism, with its abstract concept of a Supreme Being or Divine Providence. Unitarianism was an actual denomination, of course, complete with its own churches, but it was also a more widely held theology and philosophy. This was the stage in the Protestant declension that some of the American political elite, including some of the Founding Fathers, had reached by the end of the 18th century. Thus the public documents of that time frequently made reference to the Supreme Being or Divine Providence and rarely to Jesus Christ or the Holy Spirit.

Stage 5: The American Creed. The fifth stage in the Protestant declension was reached when the abstract and remote God, the Supreme Being or Divine Providence, disappeared altogether. Now the various Protestant creeds were replaced by the American Creed, which reached its fullest articulation in the first half of the 20th century. The elements of the American Creed were free markets and equal opportunity, free elections and liberal democracy, constitutionalism and the rule of law. The American Creed definitely did not include as elements hierarchy, community, tradition and custom. Although the American Creed was not itself Protestant, it was clearly the product of a Protestant culture - a sort of secularized version of Protestantism as it had come down through its fourth declension.

Stage 6: Universal human rights. The sixth and final stage in the Protestant declension was reached only in the 1970s, essentially in the last two generations. Now the American Creed was replaced by the universal conception of human rights. More accurately, the elements of the American Creed were generalized into universal goods. Then in the 1990s, with the collapse of the Soviet Union and communist ideology, and with the stagnation of the German "social market" and Japanese "organized capitalism", every familiar alternative to American economic and political conceptions seemed discredited. America had thus brought the world to "the End of History."

Just a forum letter that caught my eye

2006-01-05T14:44:00.000+08:00

("SingTel yet to offer cheap directory help" by Chew Chee Meng, ST Jan 5, 2005)

The long and short is that SingTel's charge of 60 cents on IDD service line 104 for general inquiries requiring operator assistance is too much. The writer is willing to concede the fact that such services may be expensive to provide because they are labor intensive. The solution?

If SingTel is unable to find a good and feasible alternative for its directory assistance services, it should consider relocating its call centres to countries in the region with cheaper labour costs, and pass on its savings to subscribers... Many large firms like Motorola, Dell and Jetstar Asia have their call centres in Malaysia. Why not SingTel?

Why not indeed...

Yes, I'm back in Toronto. But expect light blogging as I continue with my work.

Tsunami relief, one year later

2005-12-29T16:48:00.000+08:00

My internet connection is on the slow side. So just a couple of links for now. Not happy ones, I am sad to say.

- New York Times: "All told, the tsunami generated a record $13.6 billion in aid pledges, according to the United Nations. Just as rare, donor countries kept their promises. The United Nations Office of the Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery says 75 percent of the $10.5 billion pledged for reconstruction of tsunami-affected countries has been secured...The progress report on relief and reconstruction is, however, mixed."

- The Washington Times is more brutal: "How come no one is interested in what happened to those billions of dollars? Within 24 hours of Hurricane Katrina making landfall, the media demanded investigations into what, by historical standards, was a better-than-average federal performance. With the tsunami, who cares? The glow of moral virtue in chipping in your donation is so bright the fact that it accomplishes nothing is unimportant."

- But it's not all bad: the relatively small story of how baby Heru is doing well gladdens the heart. (Earlier mention of Heru here, and links thereof.)

add: Earlier posts on relief operations can be linked from this index.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

2005-12-25T04:31:00.000+08:00

From Berkeley, CA.

As always, the fat critters of Grinnell Nature Park (inside the UC Berkeley Campus) are out to play. And this time, I have a camera with a video function.

UC Berkeley is still officially "absolutely the best place for a squirrel session".

Quickstops (Dec 19, 2005)

2005-12-20T07:12:00.000+08:00

- Dana Dillon and John J. Tkacik Jr., "China's Quest for Asia", Policy Review (Dec 2005-Jan 2006). There is a whole section on Singapore.

- On the F-15SGs in Flight International, and on Strategypage.com.

- On iPods, Creative and other stuff: Singapore on the edge of tomorrow.

- On a different note, I'll be off on a 2-week trip to Berkeley. As previously mentioned, not expecting to blog much until January 2006.

People's war--or not.

2005-12-08T13:59:00.000+08:00

From The American Thinker, by J. R. Dunn:

Zarqawi’s problem is that, as a religious fanatic, he has no regard for the political dimension. Anything existing outside of Islam can be disregarded – all nonbelievers, or even Muslim sectarians, are scarcely human, hardly worth the cost of the bullet used to dispatch them. Mao’s three rules and eight points would be incomprehensible to such a mindset.

Read the whole thing.

Meanwhile, I wil probably be too busy to blog much from this point until January. Happy holidays!

Quickstops (Dec 3, 2005)

2005-12-04T13:22:00.000+08:00

- Wayne Arnold on what Nguyen's execution shows: the friction between Australia and Southeast Asia. Other Australians on deathrow in Asia.

- Health Minister Khaw Boon Wan on corporate governance at the NKF. From another ST interview with Khaw: "This is not your own company, your own family business. Even if it is your own family business, and you have minority shareholders, you have to be accountable. No organisation can leave just one man to make decisions. Like in old China, when the emperor says this, and that's it, things are done. I'm curious about how the board of directors allowed itself to be almost completely captured by the former CEO."

- Mark Lilla on liberal education in America: "Genuine liberal education is, of necessity, an un-American activity." The piece reads like Allan "Closing of the American Mind" Bloom, lite. (The relevance to us is, of course, limited, since what has not been opened cannot be closed, or so some says.)

Singapore, the misunderstood child

2005-12-02T02:17:00.000+08:00

I cannot help but feel that this person grok something about Singapore--at least the Singapore that I know and call home:

At the end of the day, its not my home country and my feelings of loyalty are, at best, stretched. But I can’t help but feel that Singapore is misunderstood. Singapore is the quiet girl in the class who gets straight As in the exams, but is never really popular in school because she is such a prude. Yet she tries really really hard to be the cool-kid. Her parents tell her that she should “seriously” have fun! Yet, they tell her that grades are all that really matters. The poor prude girl is really confused. Could anyone have known that beneath the pristine doll-like image, there is a silently troubled child, with a complicated and sullied inside, every bit as human as anyone can be.

People don’t see the real Singapore - the real Singapore doesn’t exist in the tall financial centers or the huge malls or the parliament buildings, where they make us believe democracy has some role to play. Singapore is not limited to the yuppies who aspire to buy the latest Porsche or the Armani-aspiring corporate mogul-wanna-be who couldn’t care less about what happens around them, as long as they get their 5 (or is it more now?) Cs. Thats just what is presented to the outside world. In fact, even many Singaporeans see themselves through those tinted shades.

If you want to see the heart and soul of Singapore, wander not through Millenia walk or Suntec city, but through the narrow roads of China Town or Little India or Arab street, or even the little parks around Bishan or Ang Mo Kio. The fat lady who sells you the Char Kway Teow or the little girl who brings you the ice kacang at the hawker centers, has a story to tell, if only if you had the time to listen. Singapore is not a land of boring, law-abiding people who don’t think and who work and walk like machines - its a place with as much life and emotion as any other, if only you would look beyond the surface.

(Dictionary.com entry for "grok", if you need it.)

coda:

Some of you might remember Singapore Classics--well, he is now blogging again, but at a new location, entitled "Little Boy from the Heartlands". The reason why I'm putting the notice here is because his second post about a certain Mr. Tan from the heartlands...it belongs here.

update: This one from Double Yellow belongs here as well, though for a different reason.

Slashdot: A Recipe for Newspaper Survival in the Internet Age

2005-12-01T05:54:00.000+08:00

A really excellent read. Quite relevant to Singapore--if certain people are willing to listen--because we are small enough for even our national newspapers to be local:

Welcome to the Internet age, local newspaper (and TV) people. I can and do get my national and international news from the New York Times, The Washington Post, BBC, Al Jazeera, Fox News, CNN, and other online media that cover faraway events better and faster than you ever will. I turn to you for local news. You tell me more about last week's home invasion robbery on 11th Street East than they ever will.

It's time for local newspapers to become truly local; to feature local news on the front pages of both their Web sites and print editions, with only a few out-of-the-area stories up front, augmented by an above-the-fold story list that tells readers where to find national and international news on their inside pages.

Add readers' stories and comments to the mix and you suddenly have a local online community, not just a newspaper. This will not take work away from professional reporters, photographers, and editors, who will still be the foundation of local news-gathering. In fact, increased interaction with local community members will probably give them more work than ever, because they will find themselves inundated with news tips and story suggestions they never would have found on their own. Some of these story ideas will be dreck and some will be invaluable. It will be up to the newspaper's editors to find the (rare) nuggets in the huge pile of dross they will need to sort through every day, and up to the newspaper's reporters to follow up on them.

There's a lot in there, so do read the whole thing.

update: (Dec 2, 2020 -0500) Found on the venerable beep (hat tip: Ria):

Blogs reflect power of the pen: The continuing growth of blogging has changed the way journalists think about their work, argues technology analyst Bill Thompson. And it is for the better.

So much so that the students of Bill Thompson at his online journalism class at City University are all asked to blog:

And of course having to write a blog entry as part of their coursework forces students to read the papers, look around websites and generally take an interest in what is happening with new media, something I want to encourage.

But the real point of getting a journalist blogging at this early stage in his or her career is that the bloggers, in all their variety, with all their different skills and abilities and interests and biases, are reshaping the world in which professional journalists operate just as much as the telephone shook up the profession in the first half of the 20th Century.

He has a lot more to say--about fact checking, about engaging with the readers, about getting used to being harshly criticised and dissected by those who disagree, about Flickr and other photo sharing sites, and so on. But the last part is especially telling:

The growth of internet use and the emergence of easy-to-use publishing tools could well be the best thing that has happened to journalism since radio and then television offered new ways to reach people, but that requires a certain degree of modesty and a great willingness to learn on the part of a profession that is not noted for either attribute.

Read the whole thing.

Quickstops (Nov 30, 2005): mostly Nguyen again

2005-11-30T13:27:00.000+08:00

- I can't help but wonder if this is calculated to fail: "It is up to the members of the Singapore Cabinet to decide that the death penalty is inappropriate for Van, and it is inappropriate for every person convicted of serious crime in Singapore," --said Tim Goodwin of Amnesty International. (See next item, under "Peter N".)

- Probably only if you are an insomnaic; but look especially for the comments (there are three at last count) by one "Peter N", otherwise, prepare for some thunder and lightning along the way.

- Joseph K. H. Koh, Singapore high commissioner in Australia, and mythology. Koh has since protested the title.

- Singapore's chief executioner has threatened to sue his Government for unfair dismissal if he is sacked from the job. More of the same.

- Something about Myanmar in all of this; but see also an earlier article. (Links to earlier posts about Myanmar-Singapore and Myanmar-ASEAN here.)

update: Australian poll: 47%--"hang", 46%--"don't hang", 7--"don't know". More online feedback.

Earlier related posts: here, here, here and here.

New Blog: Vacant Lot

2005-11-28T12:30:00.000+08:00

Dasani (who, I assume, is the same as someone who used to guest blog somewhere) has started her own blog "The Vacant Lot"; and it looks promising.

Quickstops (Nov 27, 2005): mostly Nguyen

2005-11-28T08:05:00.000+08:00

- Was reading this and the comments thereof. Somewhat amused (but for the gravity of the issue). Incidentally: sure there might be plenty of arguments against the formulation of the Misuse of Drugs Act, against the death penalty, against the mandatory death penalty, and against either of them for drug trafficking; but whether or not Nguyen was under the jurisdiction of Singapore's laws when he was caught with the stuff in Changi airport is a total non-issue.

- Meanwhile, John Howard has warned Singapore it faces lasting public resentment in Australia if the hanging execution of Melbourne man Tuong Van Nguyen goes ahead. This is only to be expected, given some are already saying that trade sanctions may be the way to go. The Australian government has so far ruled that out; some agreed. Meanwhile, another defends Howard from the flak he is taking.

- Trade sanctions? *Shrug* Sure it will hurt both Singapore and Australia, but it's their country, their call, not ours. The strange thing is that Singapore's insistence on not granting clemency has a touch of the unpragmatic (something in the region of "principled; to a fault") about it. How difficult can it be to come up with some useful fiction to get Nguyen off the hook--ignoring the laws, of course. Over the past days, my mind was drawn again and again to a passage in Thucydides:

[Diodotus:] However, I have not come forward either to oppose or to accuse in the matter of Mitylene; indeed, the question before us as sensible men is not their guilt, but our interests. Though I prove them ever so guilty, I shall not, therefore, advise their death, unless it be expedient; nor though they should have claims to indulgence, shall I recommend it, unless it be dearly for the good of the country. I consider that we are deliberating for the future more than for the present; and where Cleon is so positive as to the useful deterrent effects that will follow from making rebellion capital, I, who consider the interests of the future quite as much as he, as positively maintain the contrary. And I require you not to reject my useful considerations for his specious ones: his speech may have the attraction of seeming the more just in your present temper against Mitylene; but we are not in a court of justice, but in a political assembly; and the question is not justice, but how to make the Mitylenians useful to Athens.
- Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, III.9 (Richard Crawley trans.)

The legal is not always the politic, the politic is not always the legal.

- Quetelet points to an article about life and art in Singapore.

more: - Victoria's Vietnamese community is divided over the fight to save Melbourne drug smuggler Tuong Van Nguyen from the gallows; more from Subhas Anandan on how the Australian government should have acted if they had wanted to get Nguyen out alive, two years ago; a minute of silence on Friday? Absolutely not! says this piece; on how Singapore-Australia relations could be affected; on one hangman, and another who wants to be.

- You know where and how to find the rest of the news. With that, I take my leave for now.

coda: "I accept responsibility for my actions," wrote Nguyen.

GHS on Slashdot

2005-11-27T13:53:00.000+08:00

Somehow, certain topics just have a tendency to generate certain forms of responses (see the comments).

Video scandal in Malaysia, et varia

2005-11-26T07:35:00.000+08:00

First, it was the pig's head drawn on the breakfast vouchers for Chinese tourists to distinguish them from nonpork-eating Muslims. The latest (from the BBC, Nov 25):

Malaysia has launched an inquiry after a video emerged which apparently shows a police officer humiliating an ethnic Chinese woman. The clip, apparently filmed on a mobile phone, purportedly shows the naked woman being forced to squat as she is watched by a woman in uniform. Deputy Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak said the incident was a severe blow to Malaysia's image. It follows a number of complaints against police by Chinese tourists.

Coming fast on the heels of a large-scale operation (NST, Nov 22) to "track down the 50,000 overstaying Chinese tourists", this can't be good news. In another report of the video incicent, the vernerable beeb quotes Malaysian blogger Jeff Ooi.

* * * * *

Meanwhile, in unrelated news, the Taipei Times (Nov 24). "in the spirit of cross-strait reconciliation," offers some advice to fellow countrymen about how not to generate more misunderstandings:

...there are a number of phrases which should not be employed when speaking to tourists from China. Failure to not say these things will only exacerbate the mutual misunderstanding and cultural rift that exists between the two countries.

Therefore, do not -- under any circumstances -- say any of the following 10 phrases to Chinese tourists: One, noodles, paper, gunpowder. What have you done for us lately? Two, one-child policy plus patriarchal society equals no women. Three, 5,000 years of civilization, and all you have to offer us is pandas? Four, welcome to Taiwan. Please don't spit. Five, Simplified characters for simple people. Six, Mr. Hu, tear down that wall! Seven, our opposition leaders get to have dinner with your president, but your opposition leaders get shot. Eight, our Chinese culture is better than yours. Nine, my dad owns the factory your dad works in. Or finally: We were going to "retake the mainland," until we went there.

Heh...

Elsewhere, Thailand and Singapore agreed Wednesday (Nov 23) "to jointly attract 1 million Chinese tourists to their two shores by 2008 while doubling bilateral trade and investment by 2010."

update: more about the video scandal from cookie-cutter comments, Cowboy Caleb (thanks Han), and extended ruminations over at Brand New Malaysia.

update 2: more from Jeff Ooi.

Quickstops (Nov 24, 2005)

2005-11-25T10:02:00.000+08:00

- Mentioned in Andy Ho's ST (Nov 25) op-ed about criminal justice in Singapore: Cheng Tai Heng, The Central Case Approach to Human Rights: Its Universal Application and the Singapore Example. Ho quoted some from the article; but what he didn't quote is just as interesting, if not more so. | update: noself reminds me that Michael Hor's paper (linked earlier is also relevant (he has more on the Ho-Cheng-Hor nexus). | update: Wannabe Lawyer has a detailed critique of Andy Ho, who is turning out to be everybody's favorite columnist...

- Nguyen. The view from Australians--to be more precise, the readers of news.com.au. Meanwhile, some unpopular opinion from James Morrow, editor of Investigate magazine. Elsewhere, the lawyer of another foreigner who did managed to escape the gallows has some words. |update: Guofeng forwards more unpopular opinions, one dated 18 Nov, and a couple from 23 Nov; this one 26 Nov is not so much 'unpopular' as just sober.

- Max Boot: "when it comes to the future of Iraq, there is a deep disconnect between those who have firsthand knowledge of the situation — Iraqis and U.S. soldiers serving in Iraq — and those whose impressions are shaped by doomsday press coverage and the imperatives of domestic politics."

- The drive for "green energy" in the developed world is having the perverse effect of encouraging the destruction of tropical rainforests. How's that for "unintended consequences"?

Quickstops (Nov 20, 2005)

2005-11-21T08:46:00.000+08:00

- What's the difference between this and this? update: Mr. Miyagi responds to his "favouritest newspaper in the whole wide world".

- Abu Musab al-Zarqawi...possibly dead? US authorities: possibly not. Meanwhile, his family "sever links with him until doomsday".

- Two stem cell researchers chose 32-degrees-celcius-all-year-round-Singapore over Stanford.

- Scanning for plastic, the exploding kind.

- A blast from the recent past: Antonin Scalia on God’s justice and ours.

Back and Forth 2

2005-11-21T07:05:00.000+08:00

continuing from here:

The statement put out by Philip Alston is singularly brief as far as the argument for his contention that Singapore's mandatory death penalty is inconsistent with customary international law (note: we are talking about law, not morality) beyond the bare assertion:

In the Nguyen case, the Singapore Court of Appeal considered a range of cases decided by the Privy Council. But, according to Alston, "it failed to examine the most relevant case of all" (Boyce and Joseph v. The Queen, decided in 2004). In that case four of the Law Lords endorsed the statement that "No international human rights tribunal anywhere in the world has ever found a mandatory death penalty regime compatible with international human rights norms."

On the face of it, this doesn't really get us very far, not especially when the very line quoted by Alston is from the dissenting Law Lords, rather than the ruling proper (the subject of my earlier post). So I became curious as to whether Alston has more substantial things to say. Unfortunately, the online sources don't seem to get me far (any help would be greatly appreciated). But I did find an interview in which he says this:

I don't think that it [the Singapore court] has worked through, in the systematic way that it should have, the decisions which emanate from the Privy Council. It's acknowledged that it's going to take full account of those decisions. It quotes some of them, but it doesn't draw what I would consider to be the clear inference that emerges from those decisions which is that the mandatory death penalty is a violation of international law [emphasis mine].

In a sense, this is still about as helpful as the previous. (To begin with, it sounds as he's implying: anyone who doesn't draw what Professor Philip Alston would consider to be the clear inference of the Privy Council decisions must therefore have failed to worked through, in the systematic way that they should have, those decisions; which is not an argument.)

Not being a lawyer, I wouldn't give two cents to any inference I would care to draw from Privy Council decisions--and neither should you. What I want to do now is to present, in as compact a fashion as possible, something in Boyce & Joesph v. The Queen that apparently complicates MFA's rebuttal against Alston--because on a second and closer reading, the ruling does contain a twist.

To recap: the ruling was that the mandatory death penalty is consistent with the Constitition of Barbados; but the situation with respect to international law is different, and that's the twist. To quote from a summarizing paragraph that came early (para. 6):

6. ...although the existence of the mandatory death penalty will not be consistent with a current interpretation of section 15(1) [of the Constitition of Barbados], it is prevented by section 26 from being unconstitutional. It will likewise not be consistent with the current interpretation of various human rights treaties to which Barbados is a party...It follows that the decision as to whether to abolish the mandatory death penalty must be, as the constitution intended it to be, a matter for the Parliament of Barbados.

Let's spell out the different points:

(1) The ruling of the Privy Council is that the mandatory death sentence is consistent with the Constitition of Barbados.

(2) Given (1), the Constitition of Barbados is inconsistent with the current interpretation of "various human rights treaties to which Barbados is a party"--and in that specific sense, is inconsistent with international law.

(3) How the inconsistency cited in (2) is to be resolved is a matter for the Parliament of Barbados.

(1) is argued for in the bulk of the ruling itself (para. 27-conclusion in para. 69-71). Not as interesting to us. The more interesting issues concern (2) and (3).

We need to be clearer about (2), especially about the "various human rights treaties to which Barbados is a party", and what's with "current" interpretation. The relevant text is para. 16-26 of the ruling, entitled, "International Law". From it, we can see the following:

16. In 1967 [Barbados] became a member of the Organisation of American States (OAS). Membership involves adherence to the OAS Charter, which includes an obligation in very general terms to respect the fundamental rights of the individual. These were elaborated in 1948 by the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man, similar in its terms to the Universal Declaration...The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an organ of the OAS, has expressed the view that all member states are bound by the American Declaration.

17. In 1973 Barbados acceded to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR)...

19. Barbados ratified the ACHR [American Convention on Human Rights] in 1982. The organ which interprets the treaty is the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and in 2000 Barbados accepted its compulsory jurisdiction.

This is the background--these are the relevant treaties and declarations and whatnot to which Barbados is a party. They thus constitute the context of "International Law" to which Barbados owes obligation given that it signed on the dotted line on the mentioned documents. If they are inconsistent with something in the Constitution, why would Barbados ratify these treaties? -you might ask. Turns out that it wasn't always so:

20. At the times when Barbados adhered to these treaties, it is unlikely that many people would have thought that the mandatory death penalty for murder involved a breach of any of their obligations. ...The notion that the objectionable element lay in it being mandatory for all cases of murder only gained currency as a result of the decisions of the United States Supreme Court in Woodson v North Carolina (1976) 428 US 280 and Roberts v Louisiana (1977) 431 US 633...

22. ... Edwards v The Bahamas (2001) Report No. 48/01 the Inter-American Commission decided that the mandatory death penalty for murder was inconsistent with the American Declaration of Human Rights. In Hilaire, Constantine and Benjamin (2002) (Ser.C) No. 94 the Inter-American Court of Human Rights decided that it was inconsistent with the American Convention on Human Rights. And in Kennedy v Trinidad and Tobago (2002) CCPR/C/67/D/845/1999 the Human Rights Committee of the United Nations decided that it was inconsistent with the ICCPR.

And so the new situation came about in which Barbados found itself with treaty obligations which are inconsistent with its own constitution. And in this specific sense, the mandatory death penalty--provided by the Constitution of Barbados--is inconsistent with international law (2).

How then, to proceed from this point? This is where (3) comes it. The ruling of the Privy Council is that it is something that Barbados has to work out on its own:

25. ...the mandatory death penalty is inconsistent with the international obligations of Barbados under the various instruments to which reference has been made. This does not of course have any direct effect upon the domestic law of Barbados. The rights of the people of Barbados in domestic law derive solely from the Constitution...

And again, as the earlier para. 6 puts it:

6. ...the decision as to whether to abolish the mandatory death penalty must be, as the constitution intended it to be, a matter for the Parliament of Barbados.

The ruling doesn't say so, but we might imagine the two (logically) possible ways out: junk the treaties, or change the constitution.

My layman's view of things: it is now clearer to me why Alston made such a big deal of Boyce. Though the ruling was that the mandatory death penalty is consistent with the Constitution of Barbados, it is also the considered judgment of the Law Lords (and mind you, not the minority opinion for this one) that the same Constitution is therefore inconsistent with the treaty obligations of Barbados, and in this specific sense, inconsistent with international law. I keep stressing "in this specific sense" because as far as I can tell, the Law Lords did not concern themselves with relatively nebulous concerns of "international standards" or "customary international law" and such like, but the specific treaty obligations entered into by Barbados. This point must be kept in mind. And as far as I can tell, the dissenting Law Lords worked from the same page. They too, were not talking on the basis of customary international law, but again, specific treaty obligations. Both the majority and minority agree that the Constitution of Barbados--with its mandatory death sentence--is inconsistent with its treaty obligations. (The disagreement is over whether there is a reading of the same constitution that renders the mandatory death sentence unconstitutional. The majority says "no", the minority says, "yes".)

Here is where I don't quite get Alston--in claiming that the mandatory death sentence in Singapore is inconsistent with international law, is he talking about our treaty obligations? If he is not talking about our treaty obligations, then perhaps Boyce is not as relevant for our case as he seems to suggest. If he is talking about our treaty obligations, then which specific treaties? The Law Lords were quite specific; I had wished that Alston would be as well. As far as I can tell, Singapore is not part of the OAS, or party to the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man, or the American Convention on Human Rights. The last I heard, we still have not ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), but I am not sure (anyone knows? see update). One might think that this is not an ideal state of affairs, that Singapore ought to ratify the relevant treaties. Again, there may be good moral and pragmatic arguments about such things, but until they are ratified, Singapore is not bound by them, and cannot be accused of violating them--that is, the specific sense of "inconsistent with international law" at stake in Boyce does not apply to the discussion at hand.

More importantly, even if it turns out to be the case that Singapore's mandatory death penalty is inconsistent with our treaty obligations--to be more precise, the current interpretations of those obligations--is he also willing to say, as the Law Lords did, that this is a matter that must be left to the Singapore Parliament?

update: Singapore might have sign on to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) after all; at least this seems implied by this news report. But as the same report points out, we never signed the relevant "second optional protocol", so it's hard to say whether what we did sign will give us treaty obligations to abolish the mandatory death penalty. corrected: according to Ivan (thanks!), we have not sign the ICCPR after all (as I suspected).

update 2: talking about treaty obligations and customary international law, the following quotes are relevant (in illustrating the position of the Singapore court). From Nguyen v. PP:

106. The [Universal Declaration of Human Rights] is not an international treaty or convention and there is no consensus that it is a statement or codification of customary international law...

108. Even if there is ...a customary rule [concerning something, e.g., the death penalty], it would not apply if it is inconsistent with the domestic law. As Lord Atkin explained in Chung Chi Cheung v The King [1939] AC 160 at 167-168:
[S]o far, at any rate, as the Courts of this country are concerned, international law has no validity save in so far as its principles are accepted and adopted by our own domestic law. There is no external power that imposes its rules upon our own code of substantive law or procedure. The Courts acknowledge the existence of a body of rules which nations accept amongst themselves. On any judicial issue they seek to ascertain what the relevant rule is, and, having found it, they will treat it as incorporated into the domestic law, so far as it is not inconsistent with rules enacted by statutes or finally declared by their tribunals.
And in Collco Dealings Ltd v Inland Revenue Commissioners [1962] AC 1, the House of Lords affirmed the proposition that if a statute is unambiguous, its provisions must be followed even if they are contrary to international law.

From the Appeal:

88. The common law of Singapore has to be developed by our Judiciary for the common good. We should make it abundantly clear that under the Constitution of our legal system, Parliament as the duly elected Legislature enacts the laws in accordance and consistent with the Constitution of Singapore. If there is any repugnancy between any legislation and the Constitution, the legislation shall be declared by the Judiciary to be invalid to the extent of the repugnancy. Any customary international law rule must be clearly and firmly established before its adoption by the courts. The Judiciary has the responsibility and duty to consider and give effect to any rule necessarily concomitant with the civil and civilised society which every citizen of Singapore must endeavour to preserve and protect.

94. We agree with the trial judge’s reasoning on the effect of a conflict between a customary international law rule and a domestic statute. The trial judge held that even if there was a customary international law rule prohibiting execution by hanging, the domestic statute providing for such punishment, viz, the MDA, would prevail in the event of inconsistency. The trial judge cited Chung Chi Cheung v The King [1939] AC 160 and Collco Dealings Ltd v Inland Revenue Commissioners [1962] AC 1 in support of this proposition.

1939? The King?! That was like, a long time ago... But more seriously, it is not obvious that even the Privy Council of 2004 would simply disagree, given Boyce.

"Bloggers Beware: The Five Commandments for Bloggers" - article in Law Gazette

2005-11-20T21:30:00.000+08:00

From the November 2005 issue of the Law Gazette:

There is a need for Singapore bloggers to be aware of legal issues arising from their online diaries, particularly in the light of the recent cases involving seditious remarks made online by bloggers that resulted in jail terms and fines; and earlier in the year, a dispute arose over allegedly defamatory speeches made by a blogger about A*STAR’s Chairman, Philip Yeo, which was resolved amicably, but not without an apology. The threats of legal repercussions in the form of civil lawsuits and criminal charges serve as reminders of the potential legal problems that can arise from blogging, and indeed from any online activity, such as chat rooms, that involves the expression of opinions and views. Most bloggers treat their blogs as merely an online version of their personal diaries or journals. However, they often forget that the private-public distinction between keeping a written diary and one that is open to public viewing, can give rise to civil and criminal liability. This paper will consider some of the potential legal issues that may arise. Its aim is to create awareness and care, as well as to highlight sensitivities, but not to the extent that it may impact, to any significant extent, the greater freedom of expression that so many of us take for granted when navigating cyberspace.

Read the whole thing.

Back and forth

2005-11-19T11:20:00.000+08:00

note: there is now a Part 2.

First, the Statement by Philip Alston, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (November 16/17, 2005). The money quote:

The principal problem...is the mandatory nature of the death penalty...In the Nguyen case, the Singapore Court of Appeal considered a range of cases decided by the Privy Council. But, according to Alston, "it failed to examine the most relevant case of all" (Boyce and Joseph v. The Queen, decided in 2004). In that case four of the Law Lords endorsed the statement that "No international human rights tribunal anywhere in the world has ever found a mandatory death penalty regime compatible with international human rights norms."

MFA responds: November 16, 18. The main gist:

- Mr Alston grossly misrepresented the facts in claiming that the Singapore Court of Appeal "considered a range of cases decided by the Privy Council ... [but] ... failed to examine the most relevant case of all" i.e. Boyce and Joseph v. The Queen. That case was in fact cited by Mr Nguyen's lawyers in their written arguments and the Court of Appeal dealt with it in its judgment.

- Mr Alston did not disclose that he cited the minority judgment in Boyce and that the majority in the Privy Council upheld the constitutionality of the mandatory death penalty in Barbados.

- Mr Alston is the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions. Mr Nguyen was tried and convicted in an entirely open, fair and transparent manner, according to due process of law, as has been acknowledged by the Australian Government. Therefore this case does not fall within his mandate.

Ok, last one first. So what exactly does a "Special Rapporteur" do? What is his mandate? Check out the UN website. (Sidenote: apparently part of his mandate is "To apply a gender perspective in his/her work".)

But what's with Boyce and Joseph v. The Queen? Turns out the case was mentioned during the appeal. Nguyen Tuong Van v Public Prosecutor (October 6, 2004), see para. 62, and especially 83:

83. We do not propose to examine each decision in detail. However, in both Watson v The Queen and Reyes v The Queen, the mandatory death penalty in respect of certain classes of murder was ruled unconstitutional as a violation of the prohibition against cruel or inhuman treatment or punishment. In Matthew v The State and Boyce v The Queen, the Privy Council would have ruled the same way but for certain "saving provisions" in the relevant national Constitutions which preserved pre-existing national laws.

And fortunately, Privy Council judgments are actually available online. So: Lennox Ricardo Boyce and Jeffrey Joseph v. The Queen (July 7, 2004) (.rtf file). It's long, but this is from the judgment itself (para. 69-71):

69. ...In Barbados...the mandatory death penalty is, as their Lordships have decided, preserved by section 26 of the Constitution. And the exercise of the power of commutation in death sentence cases is expressly codified in section 78. Both mandatory sentence and executive clemency are in accordance with the Constitution.

70. ...All that matters is whether the mandatory death penalty and executive clemency are in accordance with the Constitution of Barbados. In their Lordships' opinion, they are.

71. Their Lordships will therefore humbly advise Her Majesty that the appeal ought to be dismissed.

So this must have been the "saving provisions" mentioned in the judgment for Nguyen's appeal. After that comes the dissenting (i.e., "minority") opinions of four of the Law Lords, the ones mentioned by Philip Alston.

coda: (scroll down to see "important note") To be clearer about my sense of the back and forth. Indeed, the Privy Council no longer has the sort of say in our courts they used to have. If Alston's point is simply that we ought to pay attention to Boyce just because it's the Privy Council, then he is barking up the wrong tree. But I take it that his point is that the mandatory death penalty is contrary to customary international law and that Boyce supports his point. In addition, I take it that the local courts are at least willing to consider such things, even if they are not determinative in any straightforward way (see Nguyen appeal para. 94).

The problem is that Alston was citing the minority, dissenting opinion rather than the actual judgment in Boyce, which weakens his case considerably. (To compound his problem, he fails to even admit that. When will critics of the Singapore government ever learn to do their jobs properly...) So we have four Law Lords who basically say that "No international human rights tribunal anywhere in the world has ever found a mandatory death penalty regime compatible with international human rights norms", which does sound like saying that mandatory death penalty is incompatible with CIL. But given that the actual ruling goes in the other direction, the least that can be said is that Boyce as a whole hardly counts unequivocally in favor of Alston's point. The best that Alston can make of the case is that there are some Law Lords out there who agrees with him. So we are pretty much back to square one: there is no clear CIL against either the death penalty or even the mandatory death penalty.

There may be moral, perhaps even pragmatic reasons against the mandatory death penalty, but I am not convinced that it's contrary to present CIL in any obvious way--at least not on the basis of Boyce. If this is Alston's strongest argument (according to him, this is supposed to be "the most relevant case of all"), then it seems, on the face of it, an incredibly weak one.

important note: I have a lot more on this in Part 2 that will qualify or correct I posted above in the "coda".

more on Alston's mandate: As MFA's statement put is (again):

Mr Alston is the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions. Mr Nguyen was tried and convicted in an entirely open, fair and transparent manner, according to due process of law, as has been acknowledged by the Australian Government. Therefore this case does not fall within his mandate.

To see if MFA has a point, we need to get clearer about the mandate of the Special Rapporteur. This brings us to the relevant section of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Website, especially the pages about "Principles on the Effective Prevention and Investigation of Extra-legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions" and "International Standards" (regarding "extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions"), the last of which has this to say:

The situations of extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions that the Special Rapporteur is requested to investigate comprise a variety of cases. All acts and omissions of state representatives that constitute a violation of the general recognition of the right to life embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (article 3) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (article 6 and, also, articles 2, 4, para. 2, 26 and, in particular with regard to the death penalty, articles 14 and 15), as well as a number of other treaties, resolutions, conventions and declarations adopted by competent United Nations bodies, fall within his mandate.

So looks like it's going to be long and complicated. So you will have to look up the Declaration and the Covenant yourselves.

But really, the title--assuming that it is properly given--is not to Alston's advantage: "Extra-legal [i.e., by individuals acting outside of a country's laws], Arbitrary and Summary Executions". Whatever one might think about the decision of Nguyen Tuong Van v PP, it doesn't appear to be a case of extra-legal, arbitrary or summary execution. So we are still back to the moral and pragmatic arguments--and how those considerations bear on the law.

continue on to Part 2.

Book Voucher for Sale

2005-11-18T03:39:00.000+08:00

I recently did some small work for McGraw-Hill Education (Asia) and they gave me the above. Because the voucher is redeemable only at their office at 60 Tuas Basin Link and only from 1 Dec 2005 to 31 Mar 2006 (I'm not in Singapore and won't be in Singapore for the period), I'm willing to part with it for S$250 (including cost of normal airmail). Anyone interested may email me at philoyhc@gmail.com. Click on the graphic to see a larger version so as to read the "terms and conditions" (yes, the "sample" is photoshopped in by me). You should be able to look up the catelogues from the McGraw-Hill (Asia) website itself.

update: ebay.com.sg entry.

"Freedom of the press a non-issue" says letter to ST Forum (Nov 14)

2005-11-14T09:30:00.000+08:00

The basic idea is a simple one: "While a muzzled press may restrict the flow of information in countries where the reach of the Internet is still embryonic, for an IT-savvy nation like Singapore, the press is no longer the sole source of information." Then why all the fuss about the freedom of the press and the supposed connection it has with democracy? The writer, Paul Wee Kian Nghee, posits a difference between the (pre-internet) past and present:

In today's lightning-speed communications with which a newsworthy murmur can be relayed globally in an instant, such talk of press freedom is silly because one cannot stop the flow. Unlike in the past, when sources of information could be snuffed out easily even before newspapers hit the street, cyberspace today is just too big to police - and so it will remain at large.

In other words: "while press freedom was once a coveted element of democracy," it is no longer in itself relevant for Singapore "because one does not need the local press to be kept informed."

Interesting.

One assumption is that the authorities here do not resort to using technology to block external sites (and as far as I know, they don't , at least not in a way that would make a difference). My sense is that this will remain constant, and to that extent, Singaporeans potentially have fairly unbridled access to information on the web.

A second assumption is that the press is primarily a source of information for citizens in a democracy. This is actually less than what more classically minded freedom of the press advocates might have in mind, especially when they are thinking of the "fourth estate". On this conception, a free press is not just a unbiased source of information, but also a source of advocacy and even a framer of public discourse. Now needless to say, the PAP rejects this conception of what the press should be allowed to do in Singapore.

But frankly speaking, as a denizen of the post-Memogate world, I am not sure they are simply wrong to think so. It is not obvious that a free press on the "fourth estate" conception is necessarily or always in the best interest of democracy, as it often is in the service of either advertisers or the cultural elite, the interests and values of both of which can diverge from those of the people at large. Not that their interests always diverge, but that they could diverge. At the end of the day, it is possible for the "source of unbiased information" and "public advocacy" aspects to come apart and they often do come apart.

And remember that we live in a small country, a place that can probably not support more than a couple of big English dailies. Is it really much better to be at the mercy of whoever runs and writes the newspapers, 'independent and free' though they may be, than the government? If I can't even trust my elected officials, why should I trust mere journalists to look out for my interests?

What about the press as a forum for participatory democracy, for civic discourse and national debates? Well, assuming that we have these things and think that we ought to have these things in Singapore, are they really better served by a more robust free press? That is--not just the debate framed and participated in by a cultural elites, but by ordinary Joes (or in our case, Tans, say). And given another decade of increasing internet penetration and the continued maturity of the local blogosphere, will it matter? But if we think that freedom of the press doesn't matter because of the internet, are we simply presupposing a degree of freedom--of information, of citizen advocacy, of debate, etc.--there?

Questions, more questions.

update: at the urging of Random, let me say a few words about another letter on the same topic. This one is entitled "What's most important is a stable, secure environment" by Siow Jia Rui. Now the main line of thought that runs throughout is roughly this:

The challenges Singapore faces in maintaining social cohesion in a small multi-ethnic and multi-religious society cannot be overstated. As a small country, the Government's primary task is the 'bread- and-butter' concerns of the people. Investors will always pick a country that can guarantee a stable environment and efficient system rather than one ranked top in the press freedom index but with little else to offer...

We know what our interests are and we have compelling reasons for our laws and regulations. In this regard, we should not change just to please Western-influenced liberals who apply their notion of freedom of the press unthinkingly to Singapore, without the slightest effort to comprehend the rationale behind our policies. I want to continue to see Singaporeans live in a stable, secure and prosperous environment. To this end, I will gladly accept a top ranking for choice of location by investors rather than see us sit atop the press freedom index any day.

Not being a dogmatic liberal-democrat myself, I am willing to entertain the possibility that we might have "compelling reasons" for abridging freedoms. And knowing something about Singapore history, I can consider that the task of "maintaining social cohesion in a small multi-ethnic and multi-religious society" is no cake walk and might involve tough and even unpopular choices. These are serious issues that people who are not already prejudiced about the answer ought to think through. But all this just so that we will remain a "top ranking for choice of location by investors"? What a let down!

The twist to the argument, however, is the citation of negative examples from other countries:

At least we are not hypocrites about where we stand with regard to press freedom. We make it clear that issues such as race and religion must be handled with great sensitivity, unlike countries which curb press freedom when it is politically expedient. Let me highlight two examples.

In Australia, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is government funded. During the war in Iraq, ABC was under continuous attack by the Australian government for its critical reporting of Australian involvement in Iraq, characterised by 'one-sided and tendentious commentary by programme presenters and reporters'. The government gave it an ultimatum to change its coverage, or it would cut its funding.

More recently, British Prime Minister Tony Blair censured the British Broadcasting Corporation for its negative approach to the Bush administration in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. He denounced its coverage as 'full of hatred of America' and 'gloating at the country's plight'.

Now both BBC and ABC are at least partly government-funded institutions. So what's so strange about the people paying the bills showing up to say a few strong words about how they expect their funds to be spent? What's important is that BBC and ABC do not the British and Australian press make. The British government, for example, have no automatic sway over the Times, the Independent, the Guardian, the Telegraph, and so on. To call the actions described "curbing press freedom" is a real stretch: real examples of the British government really "curbed press freedom" occurred during periods in WW2, when Churchill perceived compelling reasons to do so. The difference with Singapore is not so much that liberal democracies have no appreciation of "compelling reasons", but that we seem to be in the grip of such reasons all the time.

update 2: Ted points to this, which is interesting:

From what I understood of US constitution, Thomas Jefferson and others designed the American Constitution specifically with the assumption that power corrupts. Thus it is designed specifically to check the government. In short, the people must be protected from the government.

This assumption leads to many implications. It explains why Americans have a right to hold guns, it serves as a kind of "check" on the govt. The Press is also meant to be the check on the government.

In Singapore, we work under the assumption that the PAP government is a benevolent one and thus, conversely, it must be protected from the people. It was probably Cherian George who first mentioned this.

That is why we rave and rave, until the cows come home, about the importance of a responsible press. That also justifies all the restrictions on freedom of speech and assembly.

For the American case--think of it as rooted in the very foundation of the nation itself as a rebellion against the excessive use of power on the part of the English Crown. The slogan was "no taxation without representation"--or more generally, no government except by the citizen's leave. The part about "power" is further developed in the Federalist Papers, about parts of which I blogged before (e.g., here).

The official story for Singapore, however, I believe, is not so much that the government must be protected from the people as the people needs the government to protect them against themselves and against each other; and only a strong government--a Leviathan--can do that. The alternative is a war of every man against every man:

In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain: and consequently no culture of the earth; no navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by sea; no commodious building; no instruments of moving and removing such things as require much force; no knowledge of the face of the earth; no account of time; no arts; no letters; no society; and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death; and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. (Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, XIII)

It's not just that without Leviathan, people (in our context, the races) will fight; but also that without Leviathan, so too will "commodious living" depart.

Puzzled...

2005-11-12T02:52:00.000+08:00

From the ClusterMaps (most recent map update: 2005-11-11 04:47:50 GMT) for this site:

Is that Alice Springs?

Random thoughts about happiness

2005-11-12T01:01:00.000+08:00

Warning: the post does not actually "go" anywhere--hence "random thoughts". So don't get too excited. (note: 2105 Nov 11 -0500 I've added slightly to the post for the sake of improving clarity.)

'Been thinking about certain recent meditations on "whether money buys happiness" by Mr. Wang (and also this) responding to Stardom Dreamer. This post is not about that question and such issues as whether materialism is evil and so on; rather, I would like to take a couple of steps back to ask: What is "happiness"? But again, the question I have in mind may not be the same as the one you are thinking about. So let me explain.

A quote from Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1.4 to get things started. The Philosopher is considering the question--given that "all knowledge and every pursuit aims at some good"--what then, "is the highest of all goods achievable by action". The ultimate goal of human life, as it were? This is how he begins his investigation into the issue:

Verbally there is very general agreement; for both the general run of men and people of superior refinement say that it is happiness, and identify living well and doing well with being happy; but with regard to what happiness is they differ, and the many do not give the same account as the wise. For the former think it is some plain and obvious thing, like pleasure, wealth, or honour; they differ, however, from one another, and often even the same man identifies it with different things, with health when he is ill, with wealth when he is poor; but, conscious of their ignorance, they admire those who proclaim some great ideal that is above their comprehension.

(I'm bracketing issues to do with whether eudaimonia is properly translated "happiness" except to say (hand waving) that this translation will have to do. In any case, the same ambiguities I want to explore with "happiness" occur with eudaimonia as well.)

Notice the following things: Everybody agrees that "happiness" is "living well and doing well" and "the highest of all goods achievable by action". But wait, don't they also disagree "with regard to what happiness is"? Yes they do--some say it is pleasure, wealth, etc., etc., and eventually, Arisotle will himself conclude that "happiness is activity in accordance with excellence (or virtue)". What's going on then?

There are actually two ways to look at the question: "What is happiness?" --we could be asking for the formal sense of the term, or we could be asking for something more substantive. The formal sense of the term is simply "living well, doing well" and I might add, "making a smashing success of life". But this definition does not in any way tell us what makes for "living well, doing well" or "making a smashing success of life"--whether it is a life of pleasure, wealth, honor, or some other thing. In fact, I would also add that so defined, "happiness" is (by definition) what everyone ultimately pursues or wants to pursue--whatever makes for it.

The differing substantive answers to the question "What is happiness?", on the other hand, are competing attempts to give content to what makes for "living well, doing well", "making a smashing success of life", "that which everyone ultimately pursues or wants to pursue". The thing is that if the various competing attempts are genuinely competing attempts at answering the same question, then they all have to presuppose at some point the same formal sense of happiness; for other wise, they would be like saying

A is X
B is Y
C is Z

Which are hardly competing accounts of the same thing. Rather, they have to be more like:

H is X
H is Y
H is Z

(I will use "H" to stand for Happiness, formally defined) One complication is that in ordinary (English) discourse, "happiness" is usually associated with a cluster of substantive notions--that is, we normally assume a particular set of stuff that goes into the X/Y/Z slot in using that term. What stuff? Here, I believe that it's actually in the region of what some psychologists call "Subjective Well-being" (SWB):

Subjective well-being (SWB) refers to how people evaluate their lives, and includes variables such as life satisfaction and marital satisfaction, lack of depression and anxiety, and positive moods and emotions...A person's evaluation of his or her life may be in the form of cognitions (e.g., when a person gives conscious evaluative judgments about his or her satisfaction with life as a whole, or evaluative judgments about specific aspects of his or life such as recreation). However, an evaluation of one's life also may be in the form of affect (people experiencing unpleasant or pleasant moods and emotions in reaction to their lives). Thus, a person is said to have high SWB if she or he experiences life satisfaction and frequent joy, and only infrequently experience unpleasant emotions such as sadness and anger. Contrariwise, a person is said to have low SWB if he or she is dissatisfied with life, experiences little joy and affection, and frequently feels negative emotions such as anger or anxiety. The cognitive and affective components of SWB are highly interrelated...

I'm not saying that ordinary users of the word "happiness" has such an involved definition in mind when using the term; all I am saying is that as ordinarily used, the term takes a sense that is in the region of "having a positive cognitive evaluation of one's life and experiencing satisfaction." In other words, "feeling great", "contentment", "positively evaluating one's life", "flow", etc. The important thing to note is that this is actually a substantive, not formal take on what is "happiness"--one particular (though popular) take.

(Incidentally, this is also in the region of what Nietzsche meant by "happiness" when he said: "Man does not strive after happiness; only the Englishman does that." If the formal sense is meant, then he would not have made much sense, since H just is, by definition, what man seeks after. What he is saying is that only the English--read, bourgeois--seeks after SWB. Real men seek after other stuff. Anyway, that's another story for another time.)

In any case, an important consequence of this ordinary use of "happiness" is that issues are now often raised at the level of "What makes for SWB?"--even though officially, the question is "What makes for happiness?" In other words, people who says that materialism, wealth, etc., do or do not make people happy are often not best understood as saying that:

H is/is not "a life enjoying material wealth..."

But

"A life enjoying material wealth..." makes for/does not make for SWB

The fact is that the two are actually quite different issues and one could, in principle, go in different ways for them.

But let me get back to the sorts of stuff that might go into the X/Y/Z slot. Here, we can divide them between objective and subjective accounts. One way to think of the difference is to ask the questions: can an individual be wrong about whether he or she is happy? Does his or her judgment about his own happiness answer to facts that are in some sense independent of his contingent beliefs, desires and feelings?

If you think that (for instance) happiness is a life enjoying honor among men and power over other men, that's presumably an objective acount of happiness. Whether one has power over others and whether one has honor among them is not up to my subjective beliefs. I might believe that I am a tyrant ruling over a city but the facts may be otherwise--and when they are otherwise, I am wrong. Or take Aristotle's "activity in accordance with excellence (or virtue)"--that would be an objective account too. SWB, on the other hand, is in the subjective camp. In fact, it is an umbrella that covers most of the possibilities in that camp.

Sometimes, a formulation may be ambiguous, or admits of an objective and a subjective reading. Consider the following--a parent says: (part of) happiness is to have my children doing well in life. Now imagine that the children at issue are captured and tortured by terrorists but the parent does not know, believing that they are safe and well. If we take the formulation to be subjective, then we should conclude that the parent's happiness has not changed. If we take it to be objective, then it has changed--even though he does not know it.

And an account could also insist that there is both an objective and a subjective dimension to happiness. To use my last example again: the parent (given his own partial definition of happiness) must both believe that his children are well, and it also be the case that they are well in order for him to be genuinely happy.

The example of the parent brings up another way to divide the potential X/Y/Zs--an account of happiness could be individualistic or not. An individualistic account would make an essential reference to the person himself and no other. For example, "happiness is the enjoyment of (my) bodily pleasure". The objective version of the parent's (partial) account of happiness cited above, however, makes an essential reference to his children, it is thus not individualistic. On the subjective version, however, all that he needs for his happiness is his belief that his children are well, so there is no essential reference to his children. Unless I am mistaken, all subjective accounts would be individualistic , but not all objective accounts need be non-individualistic. Incidentally, it is also possible to have (non-individualistic) accounts that make essential reference to, say, God, or the Divine.

Another way to cut the X/Y/Zs is to make a second formal vs. substantive split (not the same as the first). To see what a formal definition of happiness at this level might look like, consider the following two examples from the history of philosophy:

To which end we are to consider that the felicity [=happiness] of this life consisteth not in the repose of a mind satisfied. For there is no such finis ultimus (utmost aim) nor summum bonum (greatest good) as is spoken of in the books of the old moral philosophers. Nor can a man any more live whose desires are at an end than he whose senses and imaginations are at a stand. Felicity is a continual progress of the desire from one object to another, the attaining of the former being still but the way to the latter. (Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, XI)

And:

In what, then, consists human wisdom or the road of true happiness? It is not precisely in diminishing our desires, for if they were beneath our power, a part of our faculties would remain idle, and we would not enjoy our whole being. Neither is it in extending our faculties, for if, proportionate to them, our desires were more extended, we would as a result only become unhappier. But it is in diminishing the excess of the desires over the faculties and putting power and will in perfect equality. It is only then that, with all the powers in action, the soul will nevertheless remain peaceful and that man will be well ordered. (Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, Bk. 2)

Notice that both Hobbes and Rousseau do not posit an actual something--some state, process or activity the being, doing or enjoying of which constitutes happiness. Rather, one says that happiness is the continued satisfaction of one desire after another--whatever those desires are, while the other says that happiness is the perfect equilibrium between one's desires and powers--again, whatever those desires are. Such accounts are also "formal". Some ways of elaborating SWB can also be seen as formal in this sense: after all, it isn't as if the precise contents of the "positive cognitive evaluations and affections" are stated; they just have to be positive, whatever they are.

coda:

Is there any practical implication to the above? Sort of. I think that much debates about "the nature of happiness", or what "truly conduces to happiness", etc., potentially fall prey to a degree of conceptual confusion about the level at which we talking (though I am not saying that anyone is particular did fall prey to this confusion--so take this as a reminder to myself not to so fall prey).

Take the cliche "money doesn't buy happiness". One question is: what exactly does the "happiness" part of the saying refer to--what exactly is the X that money can or cannot buy? So for example:

Is the saying making a point about what should or should not go into the X/Y/Z slot, i.e., the issue of what the substantive nature of happiness (H) consists in? --i.e., that H does not consist in "money"? If this is the reading, then in agreeing with the saying, we would be saying that something else apart from "money" should go into the X/Y/Z slot, perhaps something like SWB? Or perhaps SWB is not enough? (The issue at this level concerns what truly is worth pursuing in some ultimate sense.)

Or is the saying about what best conduces toward SWB? That is, the question already presupposes a specific answer to the prior question: "what is happiness"--happiness is SWB, and then goes on to make a claim about what does and does not conduce toward our enjoying SWB. (The issue at this level concerns what we should do given that we want SWB.)

And I've not even begun to talk about the massive ambiguity for the "money" part of the adage--does it mean the possess of money, or the spending of money, or the accumulation of money, etc., and in what sort of contexts?

"Philosophy is not afraid of anything! Nothing!" thundered the job applicant

2005-11-11T13:16:00.000+08:00

I just had to post this--after I stop laughing. M. Garrett Bauman, "But Can You Teach", The Chronicle of Higher Education (Oct 28; via. ALDaily). It's about the antics of university job applicants (the writer is in a hiring committee for the English and Philosophy department). Often enough, the candidates are asked to do a teaching demo:

One man illustrated proper logic with this syllogism:
All men are mortal.
Socrates is mortal.
Therefore, Socrates is a man.*
I raised my hand. "Birds are mortal too, aren't they?" I asked, hoping he would correct his error.

"Yes," our teacher agreed.

"So Socrates could be a bird?"

He smiled benignly. "No. Socrates doesn't have feathers."

(...jaws dropped...) The next one is on the...bizarre side:

My favorite self-destructive candidate was a young philosophy graduate who delivered his opening-day introduction to the course. Several rivals had handed out syllabi and lectured on course rules. Yawn. But he began, "I am ... " - then clenched his face and grimaced while uttering his name. "And this is ... " - he sighed as if about to reveal the Ark of the Covenant - "Philosophy 101."

Scorning preliminary definitions or rules, he drew Plato's cave on the board, complete with men, sun, shadows, and perhaps mice and lollipops, then announced, "This is a lesson in symbols. To study philosophy is to recognize the cave. Philosophy is not afraid of anything! Nothing!" He groaned like Prometheus having his liver pecked out by the eagle. "So how does learning happen?"

He turned toward the board as though to write, then spun back with wild eyes and cried, "I don't know!" His eight "students" jerked back as if Beelzebub had sprung at us. "What's going on here? I don't know!" He stared at his notes, then brushed them to the floor. "We will wrestle with the important questions. We will be afraid of nothing!" His passion swelled and deflated six times a minute as anguish and chaos battled for his soul.

I really hope I didn't come across like that to my students.

*Note: if you really need to know, yes, despite having true premises and a true conclusion, the 'syllogism' is faulty.

Crime fighting observations

2005-11-10T23:11:00.000+08:00

From NYT (Nov 10):

This is one of the most interesting experiments in crime we've ever seen," Mr. Scharf said. "Without effective courts, corrections or rehabilitation, we have reduced the crime rate by 100 percent." Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Scharf continued, "was one of the greatest crime-control tools ever deployed against a high-crime city.

Somehow, I still think it will cause less of a furor than a certain earlier observation:

BENNETT: ...one of the arguments in this book Freakonomics that they make is that the declining crime rate, you know, they deal with this hypothesis, that one of the reasons crime is down is that abortion is up. Well—

CALLER: Well, I don’t think that statistic is accurate.

BENNETT: Well, I don’t think it is either, I don’t think it is either, because first of all, there is just too much that you don’t know. But I do know that it’s true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could—if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down. So these far-out, these far-reaching, extensive extrapolations are, I think, tricky.

See this for a more philosophical take.

White elephant t-shirts

2005-11-10T10:45:00.000+08:00

And they say our youths are apathetic. I say they have a sense of humor. Received in the mail today:

From: proj.white.elephant@gmail.com

Hi: We're a bunch of 16 year old girls who started this white elephant t-shirt project in response to the Buangkok incident. We thought you guys might be interested. Attached is some information about what we're doing. Any support is greatly appreciated.

The girls are from class 415 of Raffles Girls School (Secondary) and they have already made it to Zaobao (click to enlarge). See also the T-Shirt design:

update: Mr. Wang comments on the legal dimension, while Agagooga also has T-Shirts to sell; Tomorrow'ed; The Void Deck has more comments | just a quick note--in case you are wondering about the proceeds of the sale, the girls are raising funds for Youth Guidance, "a charity organization which works with the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Police in mentoring and reaching out to youths at risk" (see info sheet below). | somewhat related: just read in ST (Nov 11): "TWO years of lobbying by grassroots leaders in Punggol South may finally have paid off, with plans underway to open Buangkok MRT station in January." (add: Stardom Dreamer has the story)

Stuff from their attached infosheet:

HOW IT ALL STARTED

There was a recent incident in which eight white elephants made out of cardboard were placed at the Buangkok MRT station on the North-East Line by some residents to convey their views on how the station is still as yet closed. This issue sparked off a huge debate amongst Singaporeans, not to mention provoked much interest in the closure of the station, the subsequent acts taken by the government, and expressing the views of Singaporeans in general.

Our class has always taken a strong interest in current affairs and this in particular caught our attention. We are not embarking on this project to judge the act in any way; rather we feel that it brought a very important issue - effective, reasonable ways of airing one's views - to prominence. Thus we were inspired to spontaneously start this initiative in an effort to promote active participation in citizenship, which we believe would eventually lead to a more open, participative society.

I really like that last sentence. There's more from the infosheet...

OUR BELIEFS

- The capacity to which our society can grow is immeasurable
- Increased communication between the government and the people is essential for society to improve and progress as a whole, and lead to a more participative and united society
- Citizens should bear in mind the responsibility of keeping to legal boundaries while expressing their views
- Political maturity is essential to the concept of active citizenship

OUR AIMS FOR THIS PROJECT

- To push for the concept of a more open, participative society in which people can discuss and air their views in an intellectual and insightful manner, bearing in mind the need to adhere to the law while doing so.
- Galvanize the youths of today to rise up from the apathy they are stereotyped with and take an active role in airing their views, as well as participate actively in the molding of our society
- To raise funds for Youth Guidance, a charity organization which works with the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Police in mentoring and reaching out to youths at risk. For more information on the organization, please see the section titled "About Youth Guidance" below.
- To ultimately help create a more participative, united society where everyone has a part to play in active citizenship

THE CONTEXT OF THE "WHITE ELEPHANT" IN OUR PROJECT

We would like to remind the public that even though the White Elephant has become our mascot and symbol for the project, we are in no way attempting to judge or condone the Buangkok MRT incident. Rather, we are using the accidental fame of the elephants to spark interest in our project; they also serve as a reminder that legal boundaries are important and should be adhered to even while expressing one's views and opinions about political issues.

Paris burning

2005-11-08T22:38:00.000+08:00

The riots in Paris has now entered its 12th night. It was particularly sobering for me reading the news because only a few weeks ago, I heard Francis Fukuyama talk about the festering immigration problem that is Europe and how that, and not the middle east, is the powder keg of the 21st century. An important part of his thesis was that a conscious policy of "multiculturalism" has over the years contributed to problems rather than solve them. That is, the policy of having a "cultural mosaic" of separate ethnic groups; rather than a "melting pot" that mixes them. This policy, when coupled with certain economic policies and other background national-cultural facts makes for an unstable mix destined to cause trouble down the road:

Contemporary Europeans downplay national identity in favor of an open, tolerant, "post-national" Europeanness. But the Dutch, Germans, French and others all retain a strong sense of their national identity, and, to differing degrees, it is one that is not accessible to people coming from Turkey, Morocco or Pakistan. Integration is further inhibited by the fact that rigid European labor laws have made low-skill jobs hard to find for recent immigrants or their children. A significant proportion of immigrants are on welfare, meaning that they do not have the dignity of contributing through their labor to the surrounding society. They and their children understand themselves as outsiders.

His prescription:

The real challenge for democracy lies in Europe, where the problem is an internal one of integrating large numbers of angry young Muslims and doing so in a way that does not provoke an even angrier backlash from right-wing populists. Two things need to happen: First, countries like Holland and Britain need to reverse the counterproductive multiculturalist policies that sheltered radicalism, and crack down on extremists. But second, they also need to reformulate their definitions of national identity to be more accepting of people from non-Western backgrounds.

The underlying analysis rings true. While American identity is very largely a matter of allegiance to a set of political ideas (laid out in the Constitution), the identities of the various European countries are constituted in a much thicker fashion. It seems that one doesn't become French, or German, or Dutch just by speaking the language or living in the country for generations or swearing allegiance to the tri-color. The rioters in Paris are mostly children of immigrants from North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa--they have no other viable identity apart from being French; but neither do they feel particularly accepted as French by the society in which they live. Now add to this the additional complication of religion: as the Spiegel article puts it:

Jihad may not be what's inspiring the rioters, but Islam is undeniably an inseparable component of their self-identity. Islam strengthens their sense of solidarity, gives them the appearance of legitimacy and draws an unmistakable line between them and the others, the "French."

But there is a caveat: 'outsider' groups had successfully integrated before: the Jews in pre-Nazi Germany, Austria and elsewhere in Europe being an excellent example. Many were thoroughly assimilated and contributed to no small degree to the high culture of their adopted countries--think Popper, Wittgenstein, Freud, Mahler, Mendelssohn, Schoenberg, two Strausses. It shouldn't be difficult to see what the caveat to the caveat is.

Other related stuff (still compiling):

- "The Barbarians at the Gates of Paris" by Theodore Dalrymple (City Journal, Autumn 2002).

- "Islamist Violence and Immigration Policy" by Richard Posner, comments by Gary Becker, and more follow on responses by Posner and Becker (July-August 2005).

- "'Red Belt' Riots" by Stephen Schwartz (Techcentralstation, Nov 7, 2005) -

- "Bonfire of the Vanities" by Theodore Dalrymple (WSJ, Nov 7, 2005) - "No one should gloat over riots in other countries, since such Schadenfreude is usually soon punished by riots nearer home. After what happened recently in New Orleans or in Birmingham, who would dare to assert that what is happening in the suburbs of Paris could never happen chez les Anglo-Saxons? But at the very least, the events in the suburbs of Paris should puncture French complacency that they have developed a model of society vastly superior and more humane to that of supposedly savage economic liberalism."

update: Wandie gives a timely reminder not to go overboard; the view from the ground is not as drastic as some makes it out to be. This bit from the second link caught my eye:

...There was a lot of coverage in various places. Most of it showed shocked and uncomprehending populations in these cités, half "white" and half "dark". They showed how the whole cité and the teachers came to clean up the school that was burnt overnight, and which will thus be open again tomorrow. They showed groups of citizens that occupy their local infrastructure (unarmed) simply to create a presence and show that it is valued. They showed some youth saying that they were sick to death of not finding jobs because the don't have the right name, and expressing their anger at Sarkozy's words; there was an interview of inhabitants (again, half white and half brown) of one cité complaining about the racism and provocation of the police.

In 20 minutes, there was not a single mention of religion. Again, these events are not motivated by religion, they are motivated by economics, and by the (correct) feeling of these youth that they are excluded from "normal" society. all they want is a job, a car and decent housing, to live their lifes normally. Now a significant proportion of this underclass is indeed of Arab or African origins, and thus Muslim, but they are all French by nationality.

A final word: I am not trying to downplay the significance of these events, but I do think they need to be put in perspective, and the shrillness of the English language press made me want to give another view. Burning cars are not a good thing, but htey are not the end of the world either, and no sign of any Intifada (or the USA and the UK would be in one as well). The violence unleashed in the past two days will not be tolerated much longer, neither by the inhabitants of the cités nor by the State, and a combination of both actions will prevail.

Now the open question is what the political fallout will be. Will the right use it to push tough law and order policies (to shoot the messenger, effectively), or will France take a hard look at its social model and decide that it is high time to do something for these kids and these cités? On this I must admit that I am not so optimistic.

Bernard-Henri Levy has a WSJ column (Nov 9). Some highlights:

This is not war. Contrary to what those individuals in France who have an intellectual investment in the discourse of war would like to persuade us (roughly: the far right, the far left, the Islamic fundamentalists), this is not, thank heaven, a matter of an Intifada wearing French colors...

And, without even speaking of the inevitable and complete re-examination of our entire urban policy, let alone that famous "French model of integration" we used to be so proud of that's now shattering into pieces, it is clear that the government of the Republic has some urgent, immediate tasks, beginning with those of the police, that is to say protecting property and people -- a task, by the way, that I think, at the time of this writing, it is carrying out rather less poorly than the sermonizers are saying....

All the more so since what's really needed now is arbitration and talk. Oh! Not political talk in the usual sense of the term... No. The other kind of talk. The kind those young people are waiting for, the ones who don't want to hear themselves treated like children of immigrants anymore, because they're simply French. Talk that will express, not rancor and mistrust, but equality, citizenship, consideration, and, as they say, respect. The kind that, to put it another way, can express in one single voice, in one single breath, both mourning for Zyed and Bouna, the ones who were burned alive by the transformer in Clichy-sous-Bois, and for Jean-Claude Irvoas, beaten to death in front of his wife and his daughter because he was photographing a lamppost... That is the necessary condition if there is to be renewed, in the lost lands of the Republic, something that will one day resemble a social bond. The other alternative is clear. We have had, in these past few days, a foretaste of it, and, for a secular country, it would be an avowal of ultimate failure: transferring the task of maintaining order and preaching peace to the authorities of the mosques.

Read the whole thing.

another update: There is a bunch of op-eds in ST today (Nov 10) that are quite interesting, some also having an additional "Singapore angle". I'll see if I can find alternative sources for them (for obvious reasons).

Quickstops (Nov 2, 2005)

2005-11-03T10:06:00.000+08:00

- Radical Islamism poses the greatest threat not in the Middle East, but in Europe, says Francis Fukuyama (incidentally, the article is more or less a part of a talk Fukuyama recently gave at the University of Toronto).

- In the same ballpark: the suicide bombers in the midst of British society.

- A professor of Islamic studies, asked to write an introduction "for the first-ever English translation of the major declarations of Osama bin Laden", oblidges with some insights drawn from actually reading the man's words.

- Shifting gears: "And with the Davids getting more powerful, it's no surprise that the Goliaths are depressed", says Glenn Reynolds.

- A student got booted from class for citing Freakonomics while an employee got fired for just having the book.

- Elsewhere, Singapore Ink meditates on the freedom of the press; while Dasani is unhappy reading about the situation of women in early Rome.

From which Singapore Angle?

2005-10-31T13:03:00.000+08:00

Hi everyone,

In the spirit of re-thinking, re-framing, re-looking and re-visualising perspectives, I just thought we might take the agenda of Singapore Angle a little further... so let's have some fun.

Attached is a picture taken in Singapore. Huichieh would probably never guess it because I think this place was recently done up the way it is since he left for Berkeley/Toronto. But for those of you FASA readers out there still based in Singapore, any takers on where this picture might have been taken? [Needless to say, those of you I have discussed this picture with do not qualify for this little game]

I might drop clues every now and then depending on how the situation develops! Oh, and click on the picture if you want to see a larger (800x600) version of it.

Guess away!!!

Knock yourselves out...

2005-10-30T14:40:00.000+08:00

Just some links for the insomnaic, otherwise ich habe kein Kommentar...

- Official: link, link (the site looks to be useful).

- Unpopular opinions: link, link, link, link.

- You should know where to find the not unpopular ones.

coda: this looks to be interesting for the academically inclined with access to a library--Michael Hor, "Singapore''s Innovations to Due Process", Criminal Law Forum 12.1 (Mar 2001). Knowledgable and critical. update: lystyl helpfully points to a link (.pdf) of the paper.

update: (Nov 2, 2005)

- Remember the hangman who wants out? Someone wants his job.

- Elsewhere, The Void Deck gets philosophical.

Calling all Singaporean bloggers in North America

2005-10-28T04:45:00.000+08:00

Add yourselves to http://www.frappr.com/singaporebloggers, pass the word, let us do our part to fill the earth with our virtual stickies--from sea to shiny sea! (arrow from Kevin of Will Blog for Comments)

Iraq Constitution

2005-10-28T02:49:00.000+08:00

From Globe And Mail (Oct 26):

Despite stiff Sunni opposition, a majority of Iraqis voted for the draft constitution, a triumph in the fragile, nation-building process and a rare victory for the American president struggling to shore up slumping public support for his wars to topple tyrants and install democracies. Official results released yesterday showed that 79 per cent of voters backed the charter while 21 per cent, mostly Sunnis, rejected it.

Bush would have given a limb for such numbers.

Not surprisingly, reactions from the region's press is "a mixture of satisfaction and scepticism" (BBC, Oct 26). Reactions from the world at large is favorable (Xihua, Oct 25), though the polarization shown by the polls is worrying (ReliefWeb, Oct 25). With this in mind, it is thus heartening to read this (IHT, Oct 27):

Leaders of three Sunni political parties joined together Wednesday to compete in the Dec. 15th parliamentary elections, in a sign suggesting that the country's embittered Sunni minority might play a more active role in the democratic process.

The slow march to democracy in Iraq takes another step, and it's going to depend on getting all parties on board in the political process, to compete at the polls (and when defeated there, prepare to compete at the next poll) rather than fight.

Meanwhile, a fascinating commentary on Iraq and Vietnam from Melvin R. Laird, Secretary of Defense from 1969 to 1973, Counselor to the President for Domestic Affairs from 1973 to 1974, and a member of the House of Representatives from 1952 to 1969. One bit relevant to the above caught my eye:

Those who call the new Iraqi government Washington's "puppet" don't know what a real puppet government is. The Iraqis are as eager to be on their own as we are to have them succeed. In Vietnam, an American, Ambassador Philip Habib, wrote the constitution in 1967. Elections were choreographed by the United States to empower corrupt, selfish men who were no more than dictators in the garb of statesmen.

Little wonder that the passionate nationalists in the North came off as the group with something to offer. I do not personally believe the Saigon government was fated to fall apart someday through lack of integrity, and apparently the Soviet Union didn't think so either or it would not have pursued the war. But it is true that the U.S. administrations at the time severely underestimated the need for a legitimate government in South Vietnam and instead assumed that a shadow government and military force could win the day. In Iraq, a legitimate government, not window-dressing, must be the primary goal. The factious process of writing the Iraqi constitution has been painful to watch, and the varying factions must be kept on track. But the process is healthy and, more important, homegrown.

Read the whole thing: "Iraq: Learning the Lessons of Vietnam", Foreign Affairs (November/December 2005).

Quick update on the third blogger charged under the Sedition Act

2005-10-26T23:42:00.000+08:00

According to the ST "latest news", he will likely be placed under probation (and thus escape a jail term) on account of his age and clean record. He was convicted on two counts under the Sedition Act, with five other similar charges taken into consideration.

update: Mr Wang has much more, including the ST report about mitigation. The nutshell:

...Gan's deep-seated ill feeling towards the Malay community stemmed from the traumatic death of his baby brother 10 years ago, which Gan blamed on a Malay couple. The couple had refused to give up a taxi they had hailed when his mother was trying to rush the infant to hospital.

I don't feel particular competent to judge if this is a valid defense (the judge's job), whether the incident, assuming that it's true, is a plausible explanation for his feelings (the psychologist and counsellors' job). I too, consider the death of Gan's brother tragic --all the more so since it appears avoidable.

I do want to point out something that would have to be presupposed by both a putative justification and an explanation. (Note: the following is about Gan in particular.)

Let's assume that the incident really did happen as recounted, in particular, that the couple was Malay. In order for the object of Gan's subsequent "deep-seated ill feeling" to be "the Malay community", the underlying thought would have to be more than "these two Malays are to be blamed for my baby brother's death". It would have to be something like "these two Malays are to be blamed for my baby brother's death--and their doing what they did that resulted in my baby brother's death has something to do with their being Malay." (In other words, had the couple been Chinese, then Gan would have been led to harbor ill feeling towards "the Chinese community" rather than just the couple in particular.)

That was the more 'essentialist' reading. Alternatively, the last part could also be 'contrastive': "...with their being Malay while I am Chinese", i.e., they did what they did because they perceived that we are from different races.

Either way, I would suggest that the underlying mode of thinking is at the root of racism: people do what they do because belong to a particular race; or people do what they do to me because they are of a different race from me. This is also a more prevalent mode of thinking that we often care to admit.

update: (Nov 23, 2005) The boy escape a jail term after all. The judge placed him on probation for two years, and also slapped hours of community service on him. He will work with Malay welfare organisations such as the Jamiyah Home for the Aged, Pertapis Children's Home and Muhammadiyah Health and Day Care centre for the Aged. A fitting sentence, it seems.

Corporate social responsibility, and two freaky arguments

2005-10-24T12:11:00.000+08:00

Reading: "Rethinking the Social Responsibility of Business--A Reason debate featuring Milton Friedman, Whole Foods' John Mackey, and Cypress Semiconductor's T.J. Rodgers", Reason (October 2005). [The background: Milton Friedman, "The Social Responsibility of Business is to Increase its Profits", The New York Times Magazine (September 13, 1970).]

There's a lot in there. Just one point about "responsibility" and then the "two arguments" referred to in the title (scroll down).

I am not convinced that Mackey and Friedman are completely at odds--both would presumably agree that it would be a mistake to make "corporate social responsibility" a matter of legislation, especially if Mackey is serious about his libertarianism. Consider what he says:

I believe the entrepreneurs, not the current investors in a company's stock, have the right and responsibility to define the purpose of the company. It is the entrepreneurs who create a company, who bring all the factors of production together and coordinate it into viable business. It is the entrepreneurs who set the company strategy and who negotiate the terms of trade with all of the voluntarily cooperating stakeholders-including the investors. At Whole Foods we "hired" our original investors. They didn't hire us...The shareholders of a public company own their stock voluntarily. If they don't agree with the philosophy of the business, they can always sell their investment, just as the customers and employees can exit their relationships with the company if they don't like the terms of trade. If that is unacceptable to them, they always have the legal right to submit a resolution at our annual shareholders meeting to change the company's philanthropic philosophy...

Later on, he will respond to Friedman's response by saying that Friedman has failed to address this "important argument". Actually, Friedman has sort of addressed this argument beforehand--in his 1970 article:

In a free-enterprise, private-property system, a corporate executive is an employee of the owners of the business. He has direct responsibility to his employers. That responsibility is to conduct the business in accordance with their desires, which generally will be to make as much money as possible while conforming to the basic rules of the society, both those embodied in law and those embodied in ethical custom. Of course, in some cases his employers may have a different objective. A group of persons might establish a corporation for an eleemosynary purpose-for example, a hospital or a school. The manager of such a corporation will not have money profit as his objective but the rendering of certain services. In either case, the key point is that, in his capacity as a corporate executive, the manager is the agent of the individuals who own the corporation or establish the eleemosynary institution, and his primary responsibility is to them.

[Note: "eleemosynary" means "relating to charity"] Or put another way, Friedman wouldn't--shouldn't--have a problem with Aravind--despite the fact that the organisation obviously does not have profit maximizing as its sole aim.

But we can push the issue slightly further. In what exact sense is the sort of stuff Mackey is talking about a matter of "responsibility"? In fact, he does spell this out a bit:

That doesn't answer the question of why we give money to the community stakeholder. For that, you should turn to one of the fathers of free-market economics, Adam Smith. The Wealth of Nations was a tremendous achievement, but economists would be well served to read Smith's other great book, The Theory of Moral Sentiments. There he explains that human nature isn't just about self-interest. It also includes sympathy, empathy, friendship, love, and the desire for social approval. As motives for human behavior, these are at least as important as self-interest. For many people, they are more important.

When we are small children we are egocentric, concerned only about our own needs and desires. As we mature, most people grow beyond this egocentrism and begin to care about others-their families, friends, communities, and countries. Our capacity to love can expand even further: to loving people from different races, religions, and countries-potentially to unlimited love for all people and even for other sentient creatures. This is our potential as human beings, to take joy in the flourishing of people everywhere. Whole Foods gives money to our communities because we care about them and feel a responsibility to help them flourish as well as possible.

If I take all this seriously, what Mackey is saying is that he and his company do the things they do (e.g., engage in "socially responsible" practices) because they feel like it--and it is only human nature that they should. Ok, that explains the actions of Mackey and his people. But what about T.J. Rodgers and his people? Mackey has this to say about them:

I will concede that many other businesses, such as T.J. Rodgers' Cypress Semiconductor, have been created by entrepreneurs whose sole purpose for the business is to maximize profits for their investors. Does Cypress therefore have any social responsibility besides maximizing profits if it follows the laws of society? No, it doesn't.

Are they somehow defective? Or is human nature more capricious than suggested by Mackey? Either way, it is interesting that Mackey does not have an in principle objection to T.J. Rodgers' Cypress Semiconductor opting out. He doesn't quite say that Rodgers and co. are being irresponsible; less than visionary, imaginative, etc. perhaps. If this is all the "responsibility" that Mackey is talking about--elective responsibility--then it is doubtful that either Friedman or Rodgers need agree over the principle of it (as opposed to the means).

I'm inclined to agree with Friedman that "The differences between John Mackey and [him] regarding the social responsibility of business are for the most part rhetorical. Strip off the camouflage, and it turns out [they] are in essential agreement."

Now for the two freaky arguments.

One is old--Friedman quotes Adam Smith (the original "Freakonomist"):

By pursuing his own interest [an individual] frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it. I have never known much good done by those who affected to trade for the public good.

In other words, if we really care about the public good, then given suitable conditions, it may turn out that we should pursue each our own interest rather than the public good because that's actually the best way to bring about the public good.

The other one--from Mackey--is not that new either, but I'm seeing it in the business context for the first time:

In my marriage, my wife's happiness is an end in itself, not merely a means to my own happiness; love leads me to put my wife's happiness first, but in doing so I also make myself happier. Similarly, the most successful businesses put the customer first, ahead of the investors. In the profit-centered business, customer happiness is merely a means to an end: maximizing profits. In the customer-centered business, customer happiness is an end in itself, and will be pursued with greater interest, passion, and empathy than the profit-centered business is capable of.

This is actually a version of the "paradox of egoism": if the egoist is really serious about maximizing his self-interest, then given suitable conditions, it may turn out that he should pursue some non-egoistic goals (as compared to pursing only purely self-interested goals) because that's actually the best way to bring about his own happiness. [For example, assuming that friendship and marriage are goods, then the egoist--if he is serious about enjoying such goods--is better served furthering his egoistic goal by forgetting his egoism and actually enter into a friendship and actually loving his spouse.]

The question is: how exactly do the two freaky arguments interact? Do they supplement or cancel out each other? add note: It would be less interesting if, say, either arguments are unsound. But let's say that conditions in the world are such that both arguments are sound. That is, on the one hand, the public good (within limits) is best achieved through the operations of the invisible hand by private individuals and enterprises pursuing each their own interests--but--it is also the case that the pursuit of one's own interest is best achieved by not caring only and exclusively about one's own interest...what happens then?

Quickstops (Oct 22, 2005)

2005-10-23T10:37:00.000+08:00

- Michael Yon reports in detail about the elections in Iraq, from the ground.

- John Mackey, the founder and CEO of Whole Foods, squares off with Milton Friedman on corporate social responsibility, with T.J. Rodgers, the founder and CEO of Cypress Semiconductor chipping in. update: more thoughts in a new post.

- Negative vs. positive freedom meet jam and jelly and camel milk cheese.

- Chinese tourists have an image problem--in the illustrious tradition of the Romans, Britons in the Victorian era, Americans post WW2, Japanese with cameras, and ugly Singaporeans...

- Asia Times gives Singapore's health system a clean bill of health.

- Warwick is concerned, Singapore responds: "not insightful". Since we are in the neighborhood: speculation about the real author behind the bard's plays takes another turn. update: ringisei has more.

- At 4 by 3 nanometers, the smallest car in the world.

- Penny on her tummy:

What Patricia Herbold actually said

2005-10-19T14:17:00.000+08:00

First, the outgoing US ambassador Frank Lavin was said to have "slapped" or "slammed" the Singapore Government--when frankly, what he did was to offered some frank advise as a friend. Then there's been talk about how the incoming ambassador Patricia Herbold has been suggesting that "the Bush administration might be preparing to take a tougher line on Singapore's human rights record." Well, I just took a closer look at what she actually said today and what I can find is:

On the political side, we share an interest in strengthening regional institutions, in particular the role of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum (APEC), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). These organizations, in addition to building regional stability, also support trade and investment liberalization. The United States and Singapore believe that future cooperation among countries in the region should be open, transparent, and inclusive.

Singapore, due to its port and strategic location, can also play a constructive role in issues of national security concern: non-proliferation, immigration, customs, trafficking in persons, money laundering, terrorist finance, and piracy.

Also on the political side, we maintain a dialogue with the Singapore government concerning the openness and structure of Singapore society and its political system. If confirmed, I look forward to highlighting the advantages of free expression and assembly for continued political and economic development.

If confirmed, I believe I could play an important role in promoting our interests and our values...

Now that's "tough" alright... And this is after a whole chunk about the strong "security relationship" between Singapore and the US.

We tend to see what we want to see...

update: (Oct 21, 2005) this is even more bizzare. I cracks me up that both the detractors and defenders of the regime are taking Mr. Lavin's comment...oh so seriously.

Homemade Gongbao Chicken

2005-10-18T08:16:00.000+08:00

Still busy, so I don't really expect to post anything heavy duty, not especially after spending the last half hour blogging about what I cooked for dinner tonight:

In the meantime, a discussion is slowly brewing on topics that are close to heart.

No blogging...

2005-10-14T07:41:00.000+08:00

...so as to get some work done.

Quickstops (Oct 12, 2005)

2005-10-13T05:21:00.000+08:00

- Some words about Singapore from Frank Lavin, outgoing United States Ambassador (via Wayne Soon). As to Wayne's comment--I think Mr. Lavin was being more polite (i.e., diplomatic) than genuinely surprised. update: the full text of Mr. Lavin's speech is available here; more analysis from ringisei. Incidentally, all this talk about "slapping" (Financial Times) and "slamming"; (Reuters) seems rather excessive, considering what Mr. Lavin actually said:

As part of Singapore’s success is its strong international links, it is surprising to find constraints on discussions here. In my view, governments will pay an increasing price for not allowing full participation of their citizens.

which is immediately followed by

I know Singapore will sort through these challenges, for Singaporeans are not known for resting on their laurels.

And this is set in the much larger context of a very warm appraisal of US-Singapore relations. No one need be offended by the frankness of a friend--the man ended his speech with "Majulah Singapura"! Rather, it should be an occasion for reflection and improvement. more: reflections from Singapore Classics (who claims that he doesn't see the connection) and lzydata at Singapore Ink (who agrees with Mr. Lavin about the "clash of civilisation"--or lack thereof).

- Chris Choo is pleasantly surprised about ST offering more free content. I'm definitely in the "knowing smile" group, though I paid for my STI subscription.

- Agagooga wonders if the 369 gang might have an interest in the "offence principle", and my (partial) response: there are difference senses to "offence" and not all of them are relevant to a sane formulation of the "offence principle".

- The Void Deck and Singapore Watch talk about the CPF. Elsewhere, Singapore Classics considers the arguments for and against Age Discrimination Legislation.

- Wows of Singapore Ink meditates on gullibility, critical compassion and the role that blogs can play in all that. But of course, he can't be right--after all, blogs still "a medium in search of a role" (Mr. Wang).

- Discussions of the exchange between Dr. Cherian George and the PMO; with some musings on the mandate of Heaven thrown in. (Sigh: haven't really had the chance to get into this one...) update: Dr. George has a response in today's ST (Oct 13), "Govt shouldn't equate analysis with advocacy". Highlight:

However, I am saddened that the Government has chosen to cast my article in partisan terms. Worse, it claims that I 'commended' the strategy of civil disobedience. This is not just a misrepresentation of my views. It is also a serious accusation, as it suggests that I was inciting readers to break the law.

I did not. I tried to explain Dr Chee Soon Juan's strategy, not champion it. Unfortunately, Mr Chen has chosen to equate analysis with advocacy. By this token, a historian who studies the rise of communism must be a communist himself. The terrorism expert who explains the motivations of Al-Qaeda operatives must be siding with terrorists. And a sociologist analysing Stefanie Sun's international appeal must be a groupie. Such labelling would make much academic research untenable.

Indeed. By the way, you do know that he blogs, right? And he has started another one: New Media, Politics and the Law. update: the PM's press sec has replied to Dr. George's reply in today's (Oct 14) forum page entitled, "Don wasn't non-partisan in his analysis".

- And in the broader region, Taiwanese democracy at work, complete with MPs in Taekwando gear on one side, and others in rented military garb in other, and the mandatory bleeding assembly man carried out by paramedics. ESWN has the lowdown and many photos.

- A blogging professor's own words came back to haunt him (thanks Tym for pointing this one to me). Earlier related post.

- Fascinating: An intercepted letter from al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al-Zawahiri, to Iraqi insurgent leader Abu Musab Zarqawi, dated July 9, 2005. Analysis from the Timesonline. update: looks like al Qaeda has denied the authenticity of the letter (Reuters). Here's the problem: Do we know if the rejection is authentic? How did Reuters know that this is really from "al Qaeda's wing in Iraq"? Assuming that the rejection is authentic--it is nevertheless consistent both with the authenticity and the inauthenticity of the original letter--in the former case, as damage control, in the latter case, as damage control.

A bevy of Forum Page letters on l'affair sedition

2005-10-12T11:54:00.000+08:00

Related previous posts: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

All from the Oct 12 edition of the ST.

1. Some bloggers are wont to talk about "big brother keeping tabs on the blogosphere" and "policing the internet". For some, only tongue in cheek; while others have visions of men in white lab coats monitoring the ebb and flow of cyberspace from secured underground bunkers equiped with giant computer screens (perhaps like the one in MIB). But today, I discover that among my fellow countrymen are those who think that this is a good idea--from "Why didn't the authorities detect racist remarks?" by Retnam Thillainathan. He first refers to Kalin as a "brave, concerned citizen", saying that "we need more people like her." He then continues:

The whole outrageous saga started when a reader wrote to this Forum about an uncaged dog being transported in a taxi, and that Muslims were forbidden to touch the saliva of a dog. I understand pets are not allowed on public transport. Has the rule been relaxed? If not, why was the taxi driver not traced? He is the culprit who started the chain of events.

Now, as far as I know, while pets are not allowed on the MRT or Buses are allowed on taxis. In fact, the (linked) dog owner's website says that under LTA Rules & Regulations, "Taxis Driver cannot refuse to carry a passenger with a dog unless with good reasonable reason"--for example, "if it is a fierce and unmuzzled dog or ("A fine of $500 can be impose on us regardless if the pet is crated or not") due to religious objection." Nevertheless, the dog owners are urged to be sensitive, i.e., it is suggested that they book Taxis in advance and inform the driver beforehand about one's canine companion--which appears eminently sensible. In any case, Retnam may need to find out more about the rules. It is refreshing, however, to see him point a finger at someone else other than the seditious duo (or Mdm Zuraiman, whose modest letter to ST only inquired about whether whether dogs are allowed on taxis. Now, her inquiry was surely motivated by religious concerns, but the fact remains that she did not actually voiced those concerns, nor did she make demands about allowing or not allowing dogs on taxis. So far as I can tell, the entire "saga" only snowballed because of the heated exchange in the forum). Finger pointing, that most Singaporean of past times. Anyway, Retnam continues:

The authorities did not act fast enough to nab the taxi driver, to drive home the point that it is illegal to transport pets using public transport. The authorities were also not vigilant enough to detect the bloggers' racist remarks. I urge the authorities to be more vigilant.

The first point is moot, since the taxi driver, if he did ferry a pet, was not doing so illegally. The second point, however, brings me full circle to where I began...and I shall leave it to the readers to draw his or her own conclusions.

2. As far as I can tell, the most important reason for charging and convicting the seditious duo ultimately has to do with the perceived fraility of racial and religious harmony in Singapore. Not that the races are openly at odds in Singapore, but that we should never take what harmony we have achieved for granted. That's been the consistent message. And the argument goes by way of history: it has happened in the past before, therefore, we should always be vigilent. Now I personally happened to take this message quite seriously, which is partly why the following letter raised a small chuckle, and a sigh--"Focus on how we are alike instead" by Rhazaly Noentil:

I feel sad seeing two young men go to jail, even for a day. I dare say that they are the product of our education system. Unless and until we take a good look at our system, the cherished dream of having 'One people, one nation, one Singapore' is hard to come by. In my good old kampung days, I did not even know that I had Chinese or Indian friends. They were all my friends. And mind you, some came from purely Chinese schools. We played and fought, but we never identified ourselves by the colour of our skin and the religion we belonged to. The generation which I belong to is asking: 'Where has this nation gone wrong?'

"Good old kampung days". Would that be the time when the British modus operandi of "divide and rule" still applied, or perhaps the generation that gave us the May 13 incident? Make no mistake, the entire point of the national education message is precisely that there were no good old kampund days--none that was for real, none that did not harbor the potential for violent inter-racial conflict. And I happened to take this quite seriously. And don't just take my word for it. The very next forum page letter I am considering (below) has this to say: "Singapore has a history of ethnic riots which put a premium on order and strong government."

Otherwise, I am deeply sympathetic to the sentiment of the letter's conclusion: "We are living in trying times. Instead of always focusing on what makes us so different, we should concentrate on how we are alike."

3. The longest one of the lot, "Take united stand against irresponsible individuals" by Chong Yew Mun. His main concern--with regards to the jailing of the seditious duo--is whether "there is a larger problem that has yet to be addressed by more than just fines and jail terms":

Singapore has a history of ethnic riots which put a premium on order and strong government. This being so, there was a need for laws to be drafted in order to prevent people from making discriminatory remarks which would damage our social fabric. Our social stability is built on our ability to respect other races and religions, without which we would not be able to enjoy the peace and security we take for granted.

Singapore's education system emphasises the importance of racial harmony in our multiracial context, drawing on history to further bring home this point. Most Singaporeans, if not all, can therefore tell why racial harmony is so important. Yet if it is so important to us, what are we doing to preserve this harmony? We have laws to prevent people from making seditious remarks. Besides this safety net, are there other means of punishing individuals who harbour such opinions?

Just a small nitpick--the focus on "punishing" rather than "educating" seems rather at odds with the tenor of the letter as a whole. After all, the the contrast is supposed to be between the "safety net" of law and regulation, and something else. In any case, the balance of the letter is mostly about "educating":

...does imposing deterrent sentences simply prohibit people from airing their feelings and thoughts, without addressing why they would have these thoughts in the first place? Moreover, if such remarks can damage the fabric of our society, shouldn't we as Singaporeans feel a collective responsibility to take a united stand against these irresponsible individuals? Shouldn't readers of the highly inflammatory remarks posted on Benjamin Koh's blog feel offended and warn him against doing so? Shouldn't users of the forum feel offended as well and expel him from the forum, if necessary?

I feel that our education system needs not only to educate young Singaporeans on the importance of racial harmony but also compel them to act when they feel that the fabric of our society is threatened by a few 'callous, reckless' individuals. While suppression has helped in the past to maintain law and order in our multiracial society, Singaporeans need to be civic-conscious and proactive in preserving our racial harmony.

These appear to be good points. The questions about the reader's of Koh's blog and the users and administrators of the forum that Lim frequented are cogent. I reckon that there must have been much in the 200+ comments left on Koh's blog that took serious umbrage at his remarks, and that there must have been many forumners who spoke out against Lim. Nevertheless, the objecting commenters obviously failed to persuade Koh and Lim to desist. But that aside, I wonder now if the earlier use of the word "punishing" was not a mistake after all...

Quickstops (Oct 10, 2005)

2005-10-11T10:44:00.000+08:00

- Continuing from this; the AP reports: "The quake shook the border region of
Afghanistan and Pakistan, where bin Laden is believed to be hiding. However, authorities at this point have no information indicating he's been injured or killed, said a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the information's sensitivity." (Olorin)

- Continuing on a theme: "But an endeavor as ambitious as ending African poverty demands a little humility in the face of the task. We must recognize history, and understand the continent as it is, not as we wish it to be. To worry about corruption and misrule is to amplify the concerns of Africans I've met all over the continent, whose greatest anger is inevitably reserved for those leaders who have misspent so much in their names. Their voices should be heard, too, over the din of the rock concerts" (The Nation).

- Related: an earlier piece critiquing the "Make Poverty History" campaign: "Click, click, click. If only saving half the world from poverty were so simple--This campaign is so misguided you might think Kate Moss had thought it up herself" (Timesonline).

- The death toll for Pakistan may be as high as 40,000 (Guardian), with the number of deaths among young people could rise to 15,000 (Telegraph).

- From their website: "The Singapore Red Cross' emergency medical relief team have left for Islamabad this afternoon with the C-130 from the Paya Lebar Airbase. The 3-men assessment and medical relief team comprise of 1 Singapore Red Cross staff and 2 volunteers from the Raffles Medical Group. They will arrive in Islamabad tomorrow, together with the Singapore Civil Defence Force's 44-men DART team, who were also on the same flight." There is also an appeal for donation.

- Elsewhere, reconstruction continues in Aceh.

More details about l'affair sedition from ST

2005-10-09T08:50:00.000+08:00

Related previous posts: 1, 2, 3, 4.

And here am I still chewing on the harm principle and the offence principle in relation to Judge Magnus's ruling (scroll down). This sort of thing take time--thinking about how I might articulate my misgivings about the offence principle. (Meanwhile, Singapore Classics "vents his apparent frustration".) But new information has just been made available by The Sunday Times (Oct 9; which also sort of gave me a clue as to a possible motivation to the the "offence" angle in the court ruling).

First, "POLICE are investigating another blogger for promoting hostility and ill-will among different races on his blog." A quick search using blogsearch.google reveals that there are two blogs by one "Chinapore": one called "China Pork", the other "Gan Huai Shi". The former is now returning a blank. As for the latter:

The site reproduces posts by 17-year-old private school student Gan Huai Shi, who was the third person after Koh and Lim to be charged with making seditious comments on his blog, The Second Holocaust. Although Gan has since shut down his blog, Chinapore said he decided to re-post Gan's articles 'for others to express themselves here'.

More interestingly, there is an interview with the concerned citizen--alias "Kalin"--whose complaint to the police first started the investigations into Benjamin Koh and Nicholas Lim Yew ("Why should I keep quiet about it?" by Ben Nadarajan). It was also Kalin who brought the police's attention to Chinapore.

Kalin first came across Koh's blog (via links from her friends' blogs) "at 3AM one Sunday morning in June". It was an encounter that "jolted her out of her seat." The 21-year old was so angry after reading Koh's blog (which also linked to Lim's forum postings) that she was unable to sleep that night.

She picked up her phone and called the police on 999. That call led to two men being jailed on Friday for making seditious comments on the Internet - the first time in almost 40 years that this law has been used.

Apparently, she did not quite anticipate that the case will conclude the way it did. She told ST that when she first made the policy report, she was asked what she wanted the outcome of her complaint to be:

'I said I thought the bloggers would get a stern warning. I had no idea that the two men would be charged and even jailed.' She does not regret what she has done though.

The next bit is intriguing:

[Though angry after reading Koh's posts] she did not do what others might have done - post a reply to his message - which was what some 200 others who had seen his comments did. 'I felt it was childish to post any reply. What he said was very disturbing and I could feel the hatred emanating from his post and the replies to it,' the media executive said. 'I didn't want to add to the hatred. Otherwise, I would just be like one of them.' A subsequent message by Koh saying he wasn't scared of making those comments spurred her to make the call.

Though I was aware of the hoohah back then (it was tomorrow'ed, no?) I've never actually visited Koh's blog or seen Lim's forum postings. But judging from previous experience, it is not hard to imagine that in the 200+ comments generated, there will be much that is...shall we say...nasty. Nevertheless, I am a little ambivalent about how Kalin proceeded. For the first time, a netizen called 999 instead of leaving an objecting comment, or email, or for that matter, a threat to call 999 unless the blogger retracts. I am not saying that Kalin did wrong--I just don't know enough to make that kind of call, and what I have seen before on the internet forums and comments sections inclines me to give her the benefit of doubt. (In fact, since the court did find the duo guilty of breaking the law, she must have done something right!) Nevertheless, it is striking that, one, the police report should be the first resort; and two, that Kalin should find the entire notion of posting objecting comments "childish". Responding to hatred with hatred is one thing. But what happened to the reasoned response? Is that hatred too? Or necessarily childish? Or is the very notion of a reasoned response to unreason such a rare flower in the jungle of the internet? --destined only to be trampled by hatred on one side, and criminal sanction on the other? But I digress.

While Koh and Lim are the first two to be convicted of making seditious remarks online, it seemed as if it was also the first time the police operator had received a call reporting a blog. With a chuckle, Kalin said: 'I told the officer I wanted to report a blog. He asked me which block I was at and if there was a fight going on there. 'It took me about a minute to explain to him that I meant a blog and not a block.'

Bloggers sometimes talk about the government cracking down on freedom of expression on the internet (just for the record, I don't quite buy this line of thinking); but that's really too simplistic. It was a bottom-up affair from the beginning (exactly as was the case with the CZ affair).

The article also said a bit more about Kalin's background. Apparently she has her encounters with racism before, even from lecturers in class (one "muttered that Malays were 'slow' and 'stupid'" when Kalin asked her a question). And this is apparently not the first time she dialed 999--"Earlier this year, she had also called the cops about a website which mocked and ridiculed Indians.":

Kalin said: 'It's like seeing someone rob another person. Of course we need to report it to the police and not keep quiet about it. Otherwise, society will suffer. 'If the person was taking away someone's dignity, why should I keep quiet about it?'

The last bits drew a sigh:

She told her parents, both retirees, what she had done only after the two men were charged last month. She is the youngest of six children. 'My father was very worried for me,' she said. 'He was scared that those who were not happy with what I had done would hurt me.' For now, only her family members know. She has not told even her close friends. 'After some time, when all the hoo-ha over this case is over, maybe I'll tell them,' she said.

She is glad she made that call to the police though. 'Now bloggers know there is a limit to what they can say on their blogs,' she said. 'Those who complain about restrictions on freedom of speech are missing the point and the bigger issue - that racism has no place in our society.'

Indeed--racism has not place in our society. But the question is not quite that. The question has always been how best it might be dealt with.

With that, I will now return to my meditation on the two principles limiting the freedom of speech.

coda: A further thought about harm and offence--I think that what motivated Kalin to call 999 was probably her being greatly offended by what she read on Koh's blog. But what eventually led the relevant authorities to file charges under the Sedition Act would more likely be considerations of potential harm. I don't think that 'mere offence' would have driven the case to this particular conclusion (and especially the form of the ruling). The connecting link is not difficult to imagine as well: what was posted was perceived to have a tendency to deeply offend a certain segment of the population to such a degree as to harbor a potential for inter-racial distrust. (add: Singapore Classics left some very cogent comments on this issue.)

while I'm at it: This is from the conclusion of an article I'm reading:

The need to accommodate diverse and sometimes inconsistent styles of life, which may depend for their success on being socially accepted, militates in favor of a "thick skin" approach to the regulation of expressive acts, even where those acts are offensive to others. Friction is a characteristic of social interaction, at least in a pluralistic society. Such societies require of their members a certain robustness of sensibility, so that incivility is sometimes tolerated for the sake of social discourse. But this, it seems to us, is no bad thing.

This is from A.P. Simester and Andrew von Hirsch, "Rethinking the Offense Principle", Legal Theory, 8 (2002), 269–295. The classic formulation of the offence principle is still Joel Feinberg, Offense to Others: The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985).

international press reactions: Reuters, AP, AFP, Xinhua.

finally: Singapore Classics explains in detail why both the Sedition Act and Judge Magnus's ruling must be basied on the "harm principle"--and only that principle (and not the "offence principle"). This is something with which I agree--but he has the legal training to explain how exactly so. He does warn, however, that this being a very long post, you should read only if you are really interested.

Earthquake in Pakistan

2005-10-09T06:47:00.000+08:00

From the New York Times (Oct 8):

A powerful earthquake centered in the Hindu Kush mountains of Pakistan on Saturday morning sent tremors across South Asia, flattening villages in remote northern Pakistan, killing hundreds across both sides of disputed Kashmir and shaking houses and high-rises throughout the region.

No firm numbers of casualties were available, but the Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz of Pakistan said that the death toll "could cross 1,000." Details are not expected to emerge until the military reaches the far-flung villages in the North West Frontier Province, where the quake was centered. Three schools collapsed in the province, killing an estimated 650 children.

Olorin asked an interesting question (which I'm sure he won't mind me repeating here): "Wondering if all that quake affected Al-Qaeda operations and hideouts..."

Along came a spider

2005-10-08T13:25:00.000+08:00

First sighted on MilitaryNuts: "Singapore Technologies Kinetics' (ST Kinetics) Spider Light Strike Vehicle (LSV) has been named one of 23 finalists selected for the prestigious US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Grand Challenge." The Grand Challenge:

Build a car that can drive itself across 175 miles of desert with unpaved roads, ditches, berms, sandy ground, standing water, rocks and boulders, narrow underpasses, construction equipment, concrete safety rails, power line towers, barbed wire fences, cattle guards and maybe even tank traps.

The ST Kinetics/Spider connection:

Cornell is entering the competition for the first time this year and has been selected as one of 43 semifinalists based on its technical specifications and a site visit...

The Cornell team started with one of the most rugged off-road vehicles available, a Spider Light Strike Vehicle, manufactured and donated by Singapore Technologies. The all-terrain vehicle is built to military specifications and tested in combat, so it is much better able to cope with off-road conditions than an ordinary SUV or truck. The team figures that even if their sophisticated control system can't avoid an obstacle, the Spider might just be able to drive over it.

(Apart from the Spider Vehicle, "Team Cornell also relied on a TSC-750M ruggedised laptop from ST Kinetics' sister company, VT Miltope, to develop algorithms under high shock and vibration conditions in the field.") There's some serious equipment on this critter:

The vehicle navigates using an on-board Global Positioning System (GPS) unit accurate to within 10 centimeters, inertial and attitude sensors, stereoscopic vision and three LIDAR (light detection and ranging) sensors. They all feed into an elaborate artificial intelligence (AI) decision system that creates a small map of the immediate area around the vehicle, decides what path to follow and relays commands to controllers operating the engine, transmission and brakes. The AI not only can avoid obstacles, but also executes three-point turns and finds its way out of dead ends. The AI incorporates several different decision-making algorithms for different situations, ranging from high-speed driving over open country to careful navigation around obstacles.

In order to complete the course in 10 hours, the vehicle will have to average 17.5 mph. But since it may spend part of its journey moving very slowly over rough terrain, it will sometimes have to hit 35 to 40 mph. Thanks to powerful AMD Opteron server computers, also donated, the AI can think faster than the vehicle can move. It also monitors vehicle health with sensors reporting engine and transmission temperatures and can detect failure of any of the vehicle's sensors.

Read full article on the team here. Team Cornell has its own blog as well.

From the Grand Challenge's official website, under "NQE Results", Team Cornell is running a very close second in the National Qualification Event, just behind Team Stanford (fielding a modified Diese-powered Volkswagen Touareq R5): 50 gates and 4 obstacles cleared, 10m 38s vs. 49 gates and 4 obstacles cleared, 10m 41s (the team coming in third clocked 49 gates and 4 obstancles cleared, 21m 3s).

update: Sigh... I think Team Cornell got eliminated. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it's not because of the Spider. The three that successfully completed the race are: Stanford Racing Team (8h 48m; based on a Volkswagen Touareg R5), Red Team Too (8h 46m; based on a 1991 H1 Hummer) and Red Team (8 h 53m; based on a 1986 HMMWV).

more from the Popular Mechanics blog.

Two jailed for racist remarks online

2005-10-08T00:25:00.000+08:00

The background: part 1, 2, 3. ST "latest news" (Oct 7) has the outcome: Koh was sentenced to jail for a month, and Lim was sentenced to jail for a day and fined S$5,000. (The max either could have gotten is up to three years jail and and a fine of $5,000.) Also from ST:

During sentencing, senior district judge Richard Magnus said Koh's comments, which contained vulgarities, were 'particularly vile'. He said it was necessary for the court 'to make it clear that such an offense will be met, upon conviction, with a sentence of general deterrence.'

Warning young Singaporeans about the dangers of such comments, the judge said: 'Racial and religious hostility feeds on itself. Young Singaporeans ... must realise that callous and reckless remarks on racial or religious subjects have the potential to cause social disorder, in whatever medium or forum they are expressed.'

Reuters has also picked up the story; and so has Global Voices Online.

More analysis from Mr. Wang, who notes that though neither got anywhere near the max, "there is considerable disparity between Koh's and Lim's respective sentences"--indicating that although they committed similar offences, one "made much more extreme remarks and therefore received a heavier sentence." On the racist remarks themselves:

The Straits Times did not tell us what Koh and Lim actually wrote. In a way, this is a pity, because if bloggers knew what Koh and Lim actually wrote, then bloggers themselves would know what they should not write. As it is, these two cases will produce some unnecessary "chilling effect" on bloggers erring grossly on the side of caution. On the other hand, the Straits Times probably made a considered decision not to report the specifics of Koh's and Lim's remarks, as these remarks are offensive to begin with, and probably contain words not generally considered polite enought to be printed in a newspaper.

Elsewhere, Libertas doesn't think much of the deterent effect of a one day jail sentence:

...jailing person for a single day would seems to have little or no deterrent effect on the individual. If he had the temerity to post such racist remarks online, would spending one day in a cell force a mindset change? "Sentence of general deterence"? The government should work on why he would say such things rather than view this as an open and shut case. Its definitely symptomatic of a larger problem, one which will go undetected until it tears the very fabric of our multireligous multiracial society.

Perhaps. But if he does it again, there will at least be grounds for imposing a harsher punishment for a repeat offence. (update: This is what the judge said in his ruling: "The quantum of sentence on each of the accused persons, therefore, varies according to their level of blameworthiness. The court will not hesitate to impose appropriate salutary and stiffer sentences in future cases.'")

Interestingly, Shaun, who thinks that the "best way to deal with the problem is not through the criminal system", something "that should only reserved for advocation of violence" is calling for extending the use of the Sedition Act:

I figure maybe it's better to go with the flow and propose the following legislative change instead. So I propose we extend the protection of the court to other minority groups and use it to protect society from the potential of social discord. Since women have the Women's Charter and maids have s. 73 of the penal code (basically increases the penalty by 1.5 times), I say we use the Sedition Act against homophobes.

...as they come in...

update: More links available from tomorrow.sg. Meanwhile, everyone's favorite mainstream newspaper also has more stuff out today (ST Oct 8), including a "feel good" one ("Bloggers say they have many Muslim friends", by Ben Nadarajan) that recounts how Benjamin Koh and Nicholas Lim have Muslim friends who are forgiving. Just one bit:

Lim submitted his own letter to the court, apologising for his conduct... [He] said he has many close Muslim friends and had the 'privilege of enjoying their hospitality during festive and family occasions'.

He said he realises his actions have hurt these friends' feelings. 'I have asked, and have been fortunate to receive, their understanding and forgiveness since.'

Lim also recounted a conversation he had with a friend, who asked if he felt even more prejudiced towards Muslims after he was charged. 'I was taken aback at first, but after some soul searching, I realised I harbour none of such feelings at all,' he wrote. 'If anything, this episode has shown me the true depth of understanding, acceptance and capacity for forgiveness that the Islam faith and all other good religions practise.'

They call this a "teachable moment". (TODAY has a similar report; see also Libertas.)

More importantly: ST also reproduced District Judge Richard Magnus's "landmark ruling", which contains an explanation as to "why the Act was used, for the first time in nearly 40 years". Mr. Wang has the lowdown (a must read); and he highlights the significant fact that the principle of offence was rather explicitly invoked in the ruling:

The right to propagate an opinion on the Internet is not, and cannot be, an unfettered right. The right of one person's freedom of expression must always be balanced by the right of another's freedom from offence, and tampered by wider public interest considerations.

This recalls an earlier (but brief) discussion we had (see this, scroll down; and also in the comments). In brief, there are two recognized limitations to freedom of expression--to prevent harm, or to prevent offence (for a full discussion of the "harm principle" and "offence principle" in the context of the freedom of speech, see this), with the latter being more controversial than the former.

When the three were first charged, I was under the impression--given the pronouncements of various ministers who commented--that it is primarily the potential for causing harm, i.e., the possibility of stirring inter-racial hatred, creating distrust and animosity between the races, inciting conflict and hostility, etc., that motivated the charges against the plantiffs. I was thus mildly surprised at the explicit mentioning of "offence" as a factor. Not that the issue of harm is not present--in fact, it is quite prominent in the ruling. Consider what the Judge said (I've highlighted the parts that relate more to issues of "harm" in red, and those that related more to issues of offence in black):

Young Singaporeans, like the accused persons before this court, may have short memories that race and religion are sensitive issues. They must realise that callous and reckless remarks on racial or religious subjects have the potential to cause social disorder, in whatever medium or forum they are expressed...

The right to propagate an opinion on the Internet is not, and cannot be, an unfettered right. The right of one person's freedom of expression must always be balanced by the right of another's freedom from offence, and tampered by wider public interest considerations.

It is only appropriate social behaviour, independent of any legal duty, of every Singapore citizen and resident to respect the other races in view of our multiracial society.

Each individual living here, irrespective of his racial origin, owes it to himself and to the country to see that nothing is said or done which might incite the people and plunge the country into racial strife and violence. These are basic ground rules...the Sedition Act delineates this red line on the ground. The two accused persons have crossed the red line by wantonly breaching these ground rules.

Looking at the whole passage, it does seem to be me that harm is still the more important driving factor. The wording of the ruling suggests that "offence" is meant to relate specifically to peculiar conditions in "our multiracial society" in which "race and religion are sensitive issues". In particular, the mentioning of the plantiffs' "short memories" appears to be a way of saying: do keep in mind that people have shed blood in this country over race and religion before--and in that specific sense, these are "sensitive issues". I am no lawyer--so any correction would be most welcomed--but it does seem to me that the ruling need not be read as endorsing a full fledge "principle of offence" as a limitation of the freedom of speech; rather, we are in the region of something that is quite historical-context sensitive here (see also the comments section).

Ex-RSAF Skyhawks given to four tertiary institutions

2005-10-06T01:13:00.000+08:00

Read this under "latest news" in ST (Oct 5). The RSAF has some 20 decommissioned A-4SU Super Skyhawk fighter jets and they are giving them to institutions of learning. One has already go to Singapore Polytechnic, while three others are slated to go to Temasek Polytechnic, Ngee Ann Polytechnic and Nanyang Technological University (NTU). According to the report, "the planes will be used to help teach the aeronautical engineering courses and lecturers from the schools say students would undoubtedly gain from having a real plane to look at." Cool. Now let's hope I'll get to see one on the NUS campus eventually as well--given that MINDEF "has not ruled out giving more to other universities and polytechnics."

Related: "The Singapore Skyhawk Story" by Mike Yeo of Horizon ModelTech; on the last flight of the Skyhawks.

The Blogosphere as a Carnival of Ideas

2005-10-05T10:27:00.000+08:00

Good article recommended by Elia Diodati.

Sciences and humanities, one harder than the other?

2005-10-04T11:02:00.000+08:00

Wayne Soon has a piece in CNA (originally TODAY) in which he discusses the ongoing efforts to "create a 'thinking school, learning nation'" (I've always disliked that slogan, but whatever...)--focusing on "the 'software' of the education system, especially at the secondary school and pre-university levels." He proposes a "two-pronged approach to facilitate critical thinking skills among young Singaporeans": (1) remove "arbitrary barriers to curriculum choices"; and (2) "introduce subjects that inherently encourage and teach thinking skills"--including social science and humanities subjects such as sociology, religion, politics and economics.

Now I'll leave the readers to make his or her own judgments about these proposals, but in arguing for the first proposals Wayne made some interesting points that bear highlighting. Focusing on the existing "grade criteria for students who want to take a subject combination known as "triple science" in secondary school or who intend to enter the science stream in junior college", Wayne asks three questions:

(a) Is there statistical evidence to prove that higher pre-qualifications are needed to succeed in a "science" stream as compared to in an "arts" stream?

(b) Does this reinforce innate biases that students who study the sciences are "smarter" than those who study the humanities and social sciences? / Does such a policy create the perception among students and parents that those interested in such subjects as history, geography and literature are "less intelligent" as their counterparts taking "hard" sciences?

(c) Ultimately, are subjects such as literature - deemed by many Singaporeans as "fluffy" - easier compared to the hard science of, say, biology?

It would be interesting to see if anyone has any thoughts on these questions. For myself, I don't really have any data on the basis of which (a) can be attacked on any meaningful basis. For (b) and (c), on the other hand, I have to say that there are definitely humanities and social science subjects that are widely considered in some way "less practical" or "useful" than the hard sciences, but nevertheless hard to do well in. I've ran into my share of science or engineering students who confessed that they find the argumentative essays required in arts and humanities courses a considerable challenge to write ("show me an equation; but to argue in words?..."). This might suggest that the perception and bias angle may not be as one sided as might be suggested. But this is mostly at the undergraduate level. Even back in JC days, I though the folks in both the triple sciences and in the hard core humanities were pretty cool (I doubt that you would guess what I took then, unless you knew me).

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

update: just came back from choir practice to notice the extensive comments--thank you everyone for dropping by. In fact, the discussion has so moved Singapore Classics that he "cannot fall asleep", prompting him to blog in response.

I should be clear about something though. I think the original questions as posed by Wayne were meant to be applied to the study of the various subjects at the, say, JC level (I added the university level as well). In other words, the question is whether it is harder to read science as opposed to arts/humanities subjects (at roughly the 'A' levels) and to do well (i.e., get good grades) in them. The discussion seems to have become broader--e.g., the "sciences" or "the arts" in general. Not that I mind, but the difference should be kept in mind. I should have more later but it will be in the comments section. See you there.

Teachers

2005-10-04T07:55:00.000+08:00

"Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment" (James 3:1).

This discussion is somewhat related (see especially the comments).

more related stuff from ST Forum Page (a continuation of this). Some highlights. First, an earlier one (Sep 30), by one Ben Leong Wing Lup:

I believe that it is good for students to learn that they can and should have an opinion. Some youngsters may have wrong or misguided opinions, but a wrong opinion is better than none at all. If a teacher should feel that her students are wrong in believing that she is a prude, then perhaps she should figure out why she's being labelled a prude and work on it. Talk to the students. Yes, talk, not berate.

Students will not be won over by being suspended from school. Suspending the students seems more punitive than rehabilitative, and is aimed more at appeasing an irate teacher. It may be asking for a wee bit too much, but I hope that teachers can learn to 'take the heat'.

Predictably, that last will eventually call forth a rejoiner, which came today (Oct 5). Writing in support of the schools approach in dealing with the problem, Siow Jia Rui says:

As these are not isolated incidents, I believe that a deterrent approach must be taken to nip the problem in the bud.

It is simply bad taste to justify such offensive remarks as a way of 'learning that they can and should have an opinion'. There are surely more constructive ways to encourage our students to become more opinionated, instead of doing it at a teacher's expense.

I question the students' intentions in posting such remarks on their blogs. More often than not, students' hurtful remarks centre on a teacher's looks, dressing or the way he/she carries himself/herself, and not the way he/she conducts a class. It is ludicrous to justify these as constructive feedback that requires the teacher to 'work on it'.

Why go behind the teacher's back to post remarks on student blogs where everybody gets to read them? To me, this smacks of a certain maliciousness on the students' part. If a student is sincere about providing constructive feedback to a teacher, a more direct and effective route would be to approach the teacher personally and articulate his/her opinions clearly.

This method is just as effective in helping students to form opinions about the things they encounter around them and to articulate these opinions clearly and responsibly.

I think not many are really interested in defending the substance of the students' blog--even legitimate criticisms can be voiced in better and worse ways. But I think the unhappiness is over the threat of lawsuits, and perhaps, to a lesser degree, suspending the students.

The next one, however, goes to the heart of the discussion over at Mr. Wang's (above). Tan Juanhe, a secondary school student writes that he has while he has "witnessed many instances of rude behaviour towards teachers, directly and behind their backs", neverthelesless, "such conduct is usually not without reason". In a nutshell (to anticipate somewhat):

This is the root of the problem of decreasing respect in schools. On one hand, students are overly critical of what their teachers say, nitpicking every minute fault, while on the other hand, teachers aren't exactly helping matters by setting double standards for themselves and the students.

There is an example of what is meant by the last bit:

A good example would be queue-cutting in the canteen, especially during recess and lunchtime. Teachers are usually given priority, jumping straight to the front of the queue to purchase their food, regardless of how many students are waiting in line for their turn. This phenomenon can be observed in most schools, and most students are unhappy about this, viewing it as abuse of power.

Certainly, teachers do have a higher status than students, but does this allow them to openly flout what I believe is a school rule in many schools? After all, in our society, people in authority are expected to set a good example and abide by rules. What makes a school any different? Besides, teachers tend to have more free periods than students during which they could buy their food. Why contend with hungry students?

Good questions, actually--though I am not familiar with the practices in the schools (anyone has comments?). Now while I am still undecided as to whether this is really a legitimate grouse (is there such a rule?), Juanhe's underlying point is clear enough. The fact is, the days when "students treated teachers with unwavering deference"--not just in terms of "absorbing uncritically whatever they were told"--but also in terms of how they relate to each other outside the classroom (the formal greetings and bows, treating teachers as one might one's elders and parents, etc.) are long gone. Whether or not this deference is (or was) a good thing, it can't seriously be revitalised in any easy way. Nor is its value really all that unambiguous--to say the least, its excesses are definitely contrary to the cultivation of a mature and free democratic citizenry.

The question today is nothing as exalted as whether traditional deference is a good thing, but the simpler one of how we are to make do with the hand we are dealt. Juanhe proposes two things that "must be done":

Firstly, the conceptual line on how much basic respect all students ought to have for their teachers must be redefined clearly. Teachers devote their lives to imparting essential knowledge to students, and in return we should treat them with a certain amount of gratitude. Just how much the minimum should be in today's society, so vastly different from the past, is an issue, but it must be dealt with so that students would understand the basic expectations of them.

Secondly, teachers have a part to play too. They must work on their image and not do anything that might harm it, since this diminishes students' respect for them. There must be a standardised guideline that all teachers follow, so that students can finally look up to them as their role models. After all, respect must be earned.

Again, I should emphasise: I wouldn't be too quick to 'take the side of the students against the teachers'. Juanhe's comments are cogent, well articulated and deserve serious consideration. But it is hardly obvious to me that every case of disrespect toward the teacher is explainable in the terms proposed; nor is it obvious that even if explainable, they are also justifiable. In any case, it is possible that some could well be immature enough to "flame" their teachers for no good reasons at all--and what Juanhe's observations contribute will be no more than casuistry in their case. Furthermore, not all respect is a matter of earning. Respect--in the sense of civil behavior and speech--is always called for simply in virtue of the fact that we are or at least aspire to be civilised people who are able to deal with each other in a civil manner--no matter what one might think of the other's abilities or even morals.

More thoughts from the Cap'n Intrepid, who is more direct than I have been.

update: Terz left some excellent comments in response to Tan Juanhe's letter which should be read in full.

related post by lzydata at Singapore Ink.

Quickstops (Oct 2, 2005)

2005-10-03T09:36:00.000+08:00

- Three of the four protesters at the CPF Building filed a motion in the High Court against the Home Affairs Minister and Commissioner of Police (analysis by Mr. Wang).

- The Philippines decommissions the last of its 40-year-old F-5 fighter jets, leaving the country without any aerial defence aircraft (AFP via Militarynuts.com).

- On how the politicians and media combined to create a disastrous coverage of Katrina (The San Diego Union-Tribune).

- The ideal place to be writing about imperial Rome is in New York (Village Voice).

- A freakonomical style solution to the management of doggy-poo (NYTimes).

- Interesting read recommended by a reader: on the emotional dog and its rational tail--an interview with Social and moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt (The Believer); the more technical paper is also available from his own website (.pdf).

- On the growing bond between the US and Iraqi soldiers and the sports competitions that are adding to it (NYTimes).

- A blast from the past (2004): The USS Clueless answers a letter from Singapore; contains much that is relevant to more recent events.

No peace in our time: Bali bombed again

2005-10-02T07:31:00.000+08:00

Link. More analyses from the Counterterrorism Blog. More from ringisei and Singapore Classics.

It's official now: blogs are worse than porn

2005-09-28T13:17:00.000+08:00

I'm neither a die hard fan nor critic of the Straits Times. But now and then, one of their columnists will manage to produce something that makes me wonder if my subscription to STI is really worth it. I'm talking about the piece: "Porn? No, blogs bug me more" by Carl Skadian (Sept 28, 2005). It's supposed to be about the worries that parents have concerning "children and the Internet", but quickly descends into a rather unconcealed diatribe about--you guessed it--blogs:

As far as I'm concerned, blogs are possibly the worst things about the Internet. Sure, pornography and other stuff rightly furrow the brows of parents, but the things some bloggers say go far beyond the pale.

Blogs are worse than porn. I don't even know where to begin... Anyway, Many of the concerns raised were mentioned earlier by Sumiko Tan; but without her restraint, or class. Since I'm turning in now, I will have to get back to this tomorrow. In the meantime, see reactions from Jeff Yen and Mr. Wang.

reactions coming in fast:

I wake up in the morning to see that--as expected--reactions to the ST piece are mushrooming everywhere in the local blogosphere. There is also a tomorrow.sg entry. Some of the more colorful ones:

- Xenoboy steps out of his post-structuralist mantle to write an Op-Ed: "PAP? No, ST Bugs Me More--with morally righteous and pro-establishment articles on the ST, how do we keep kids from believing everything they read?". As one of the commenters said: "Awesome!"

- Molly Meek died a second time: "If you condition them to believe everything in their National Education classes, in the ST, in Channel NewsAsia, etc, then they will inevitably tend to believe everything an inflammatory, venomous, seditious, subversive blogger has to say since you have effaced their critical abilities. On the other hand, if you want them to critically receive blogs, then you have to be prepared to let them receive their National Education classes, the ST, the CAN etc with trucks and trucks of salt. Find a way out of this catch-22 and you will create your utopia!"

- Singapore Classics sacrificed his "nice warm Grande Mocha" over lunch to respond: "Basically he is declaring war. Throwing one big splat of red paintball on all bloggers. Bad choice." He has quite a bit to say taking Skadian's piece apart, but this one part jumped out. He was talking about the existence of less than objective and in fact openly virulent blogs--"I am sometimes surprised, me being quite silly, that Singaporean enjoy such blogs (my explanation is because there are no mainstream tabloids)." I have to say the explanation has the ring of truth to it.

- lzydata of Singapore Ink also has quite a bit to say but the opening captured my sentiments exactly: "You know, some things are just beyond reason and beyond parody."

On a different note, I have followed with some interest the rather uneven coverage of blogs by ST, ranging from the objective and at least not hostile, to just plain bad. From the archives of this blog:

- "The Mainstream Media does not get blogs" (Apr 24); title self explanatory.
- "Factchecking ST" (Apr 29); about a detail in ST's coverage of the CZ affair.
- "Mainstream media, blogs and other matters" (May 13); on the accusation of bull----.
- "Reading the ST (May 15)"; where I coined the term "xiaxue doctrine", referring to ST's misquoting of Mr. Brown and Mr. Miyagi.
- "ST on the blogosphere (May 24)"; on three ST articles about blogs that are neither here nor there.
- "ST gets serious about blogs", Part 2, Part 3 (May 27-28); probably the most objective coverage of the blogs ever attained by ST to date, and it is revealing that they were penned by comparatively younger journalists (my age and younger).
- "ST on Bloggers.sg 2005" (July 17); on the less than stellar coverage of the convention.
- "Sumiko Tan on cyberspace's "bile and vile"" (Aug 1); on hindsight, a tamer and more classy precursor to Skadian's piece.
add: - lzydata commented that Andy Ho's "Blogging’s catching on, but beware of the pitfalls" (Sep 19) should count as "plain bad" (Tym disagrees: she thinks that Andy Ho's writing in general should count as "plain bad"). Strangely enough, I don't recall that piece--probably missed it (or only took a quick glance) because I was busy at that time. But it was the piece that Jonathan Au was responding to. I have no particular reason to disagree with either lzydata or Tym.

How will this saga continue?

add: Tym has more on the ST headlines: "Since the results of the interschool blogging competition were announced to polite applause on September 9, the headlines have taken a far more tumultuous turn." Indeed. There's a lot more, but you should read it for yourself.

latest: Elia Diodati has a detailed--and very cool--response in an "open letter to Skadian":

Pointing an accusing finger can be easy to do, but one seldom remembers that there are three finger pointing back at oneself. Hopefully your exhortation to "better start putting the brain before the mouse" can also be applied to journalists and bloggers alike.

I'll say amen to that.

cool: 《海峽時報》這場風波竟然受到某台灣博客關注，而本blog也因此有了個中文譯名﹕『新加坡視角』。有意思。(也學到blog在台灣叫『部落格』而blogosphere譯為『部落格圈』。)

update: (Sep 29 2130 -0400)

More reactions from Kevin Lim (something about a chickenpox outbreak) and Wowbagger (something about giant sotongs). Elsewhere, Simon and Global Voices Online take notice.

Quickstops (Sep 27, 2005)

2005-09-28T08:03:00.000+08:00

- Continuing on a theme previously blogged (here and here), William Easterly takes utopian thinking to task in the realm of development and aid in his article, "The Utopian Nightmare" (Foreign Policy, Sep/Oct 2005):

Indeed, we have seen the failure of what was already a “big push” of foreign aid to Africa. After 43 years and $568 billion (in 2003 dollars) in foreign aid to the continent, Africa remains trapped in economic stagnation. Moreover, after $568 billion, donor officials apparently still have not gotten around to furnishing those 12-cent medicines to children to prevent half of all malaria deaths.

With all the political and popular support for such ambitious programs, why then do comprehensive packages almost always fail to accomplish much good, much less attain Utopia? They get the political and economic incentives all wrong. The biggest problem is that the rich people paying the bills do not share the same goals as the poor people they are trying to help. The wealthy have weak incentives to get the right amount of the right thing to those who need it; the poor are in no position to complain if they don’t. A more subtle problem is that if all of us are collectively responsible for a big world goal, then no single agency or politician is held accountable if the goal is not met. Collective responsibility for world goals works about as well as collective farms in agriculture, and for the same reason.

When everyone is responsible for X, no one is responsible for X (someone tell Peter Singer).

- A "must read" according to Simon, with Eaglespeak concurring--"China must wait for democracy", by Spengler (Asia Times, Sep 27):

Democracy requires an act of faith, or rather a whole set of acts of faith. The individual citizen must believe that a representative sitting far away in the capital will listen to his views, and know how to band together with other citizens to make their views known. That is why so-called civil society, the capillary network of associations that manage the ordinary affairs of life, is so essential to democracy. Americans elect their local school boards, create volunteer fire brigades and raise and spend tax dollars at the local level to provide parks or sewers. But the most important sort of faith required for democracy to succeed is the willingness to lose. Governments decide upon issues that affect the lives and livelihoods of their citizens - wars, taxation, health care and so forth. A majority of Americans appears to believe that the Bush Administration has bungled the Iraq War, but only a handful of fanatics question the president's authority to conduct the war according to his best judgment. Even when the American government does things that most citizens oppose, the sanctity of elected authority outweighs the particular issue at hand. That is, Americans have faith that good sense will prevail over time and that a majority of their fellow citizens eventually will come to the right conclusion and elect better leaders.

The faith that underlies constitutional politics as it originated in the Anglo-Saxon world stemmed from a religious faith. America did not assign democratic rights to its citizens because it aspired for a more efficient market for public goods, but rather because Americans believed in a God who championed the poor and downtrodden, who could not help but hear the cry of the widowed and fatherless. It is possible that an enlightened but non-religious view of the rights of man, on the French model, might produce the same political result, but no sane person would want to repeat the political experience of France.

I do not propose that the Chinese must become Congregationalists before they can practice democracy. But political faith presumes a deeper sort of faith in the inherent worth of the humblest of one's fellow-citizens.

See also these earlier posts on related themes.

Both to plead guilty to making racist remarks

2005-09-28T05:11:00.000+08:00

Just read this on STI "Latest News". But for heaven's sake, one of them is not a blogger. Anyway, they are not going to claim trial, and one of the defense lawyers is reported as saying "The prosecutors are probably going to press for jail for the two of them". (Background)

Chastened for blogging...about one's teachers

2005-09-26T10:59:00.000+08:00

Freshly selected by the ST Editor, I assume. This one is called "Schools need balanced view on student blogs" by Jonathan Au Yong Kok Kong. It's supposed to be a reaction to Andy Ho's earlier piece "Blogging's catching on, but beware of the pitfalls" (ST, Sept 19) which was itself a commentary on l'affair sedition. But Mr. Au Yong's letter goes in a related but different direction. Let me begin with a minor contradiction that mars the page (emphasis mine):

I agree with many bloggers out there that blogs are private space, like a personal diary, where one is free to express one's innermost emotions. I, for one, am an avid blogger and find blogging a cathartic and near-spiritual experience, an activity that grants me the opportunity to rewind and reflect. However, like any publication made available to the public, there are certain parameters the published content must stay within. I believe this should apply to published content on weblogs. While I do not advocate a curtailing of bloggers' freedom of expression, I must admit each blogger has to assume a certain sense of responsibility for his published work. The recent arrests are thus a wake-up call to bloggers to be more responsible about what they publish.

There is a reason why "publish" is cognate with "public", you know. "Studying in a prestigious all-boys school in the Bishan-Ang Mo Kio area", one would expect the writer to be a tad more careful--and the editor to be more discerning with his scalpel. Anyway, the next bit is quite interesting actually:

...I have witnessed on many occasions the school administration root out pupils who criticised teachers on their weblog and extract a public apology from them (posted in cyberspace, nonetheless). I believe such measures are necessary, especially when certain comments border on promotion of ill will or hostility. However, comments made about teachers in jest, and on some occasions perfectly harmless, should not be dealt with so harshly. Even students who unknowingly quoted certain paragraphs from a peer's blog were chastised and given a sound lecture.

It is only to be expected that teachers will take an interest in the students' feedback of any kind. Student blogs are extremely useful in this regard because of their more permanent nature--compared to to old fashioned grousing behind the teachers' backs. If tracked down, they can be saved as evidence. I'm sure many people will have opinions about the fitness of the teachers' reactions reported above so I shan't add to them. The next part, however, is amazing, if true (or truly amazing, if you will):

To my knowledge, this phenomenon does not transpire within the boundaries of our fine institution alone. Teachers in many schools in Singapore have started to take an interest in student blogs. Some have even publicly announced to their students their decision to practise favouritism according to what they find written about themselves in students' online diaries.

No kidding...

update: (Sep 26, 1930 -0400)

Today's ST has more in the article, "Schools act against students for 'flaming' teachers on blogs" by Sandra Davie and Liaw Wy-Cin. Some highlights:

FREE speech may be the buzzword on the Internet - but libel is unacceptable everywhere. The message has been sent out loud and clear, with five junior college students being punished for posting offensive remarks about two teachers and a vice-principal online. The students, all girls, were made to remove the remarks from their Internet diaries, or blogs, and suspended for three days last month. Their parents were also informed.

[Scroll way down to see the newsflash.] Some of the more colorful details:

Seven secondary schools and two JCs have asked bloggers who criticise or insult their teachers online - 'flaming' in Internet jargon - to remove the offending remarks. One such remark referred to a secondary school teacher as a 'prude' for disciplining a student for wearing a too-short skirt. 'Frustrated old spinster. Can't stand to see attractive girls,' the blog read. Tanglin Secondary science and PE teacher Tham Kin Loong said: 'I've had vulgarities hurled against me, my parents and my whole family in some students' blogs.'

With as many as 18 secondary schools and junior colleges (out of 31 contacted) reporting an increase in "such incidents", it's only a matter of time before somebody raises that most Singaporean instrument of response--the lawsuit:

The 33-year-old [Tham] added: 'Most of them do not realise the legal implications of what they are writing in such a public domain.' If teachers wish to prosecute, they may have legal grounds to do so.

Singapore Teachers' Union general secretary Swithun Lowe said the union is ready to back any teacher who wants to take legal action. It has offered legal help to a few members, but they did 'not want to affect the prospects of their young students'.

Lawyers say students can be sued for defamation, even if a teacher is not named. 'As long as someone is able to identify the teacher, and it is an untrue statement that affects his reputation or livelihood, then the student is liable,' said Ms Doris Chia of Harry Elias and Partners.

An injunction can be taken to get the student to remove the blog and issue an apology, she added.

Since the increasing in the incidence of blogging partly came about as a result of English and GP teachers encouraging their students to do so so as to improve their writing (not to mention the school blogging competition), don't expect any schools to actually ban blogging. And unless any school has excess budget to burn, don't expect them to be snooping around cyberspace looking for problems. That's not optimism, just common sense...well, not counting any teacher with any...complexes.

Schools also said they do not police blogs. They say they only check them after complaints are made. 'And if we feel that the remark is untrue or unfair, then we expect the student to apologise,' said Raffles Institution vice-principal S. Magendiran.

On a different note: actually, I would be quite interested to see if blogging has improved the writing of our students.

latest: more from Mr. Wang (who does not suffer fools lightly) and Mr. Brown (who thinks that the natural solution is simple: "Maybe teachers should start their own blogs and flame their students back. Better yet, have a yearly Interschool Teacher-Student Flamewar Blogging Championship. Like a WWE of blogging.")

more: Tomorrow.sg has other links, so I shan't repeat them. But they seem to have missed the Void Deck, and this related piece from Singapore Ink. On a slightly different note, I am a little puzzled as to why the link on the Tomorrow.sg entry to me is under "trackback" (and not just a regular link) since I wasn't the one who left it. As I understand it, the who point of a trackback is so that, for example, if A notices something interesting on B's blog, blogs about it and links to it, and A wants B to know that he has done that, he leaves a trackback on B's site. I'm not complaining, just puzzled; anyone knows anything about their procedures?

newsflash: The ones suspended for blogging nasty about their teacher, that is, "because 1 withdraw from school and has already left for Australia." ~~And this is from le blog célébré itself (discovery courtesy of sitemeter referral)~~ (link removed).

Quickstops (Sep 24, 2005)

2005-09-25T10:26:00.000+08:00

- NGO Mercy Relief has completed some 50 classroom structures in 19 schools on the island of Nias to replace buildings lost in the March 28 earthquake (CNA, Sep 24). Earlier, it is also reported that the group will be rebuilding two boarding schools in Meulaboh (CNA, Sep 15).

- Singapore may be on its way to getting two more submarines from Sweden (The Local; hat tip Military Nuts). These are Västergötland class boats; but the likelihood is that they will be upgraded to the Södermanland Class.

- Now for the weather: the link--or lack thereof--between hurricans and global warming (BBC, Sep 23). Another not unrelated article (Reason.com).

New US Ambassador to Singapore nominated

2005-09-24T07:10:00.000+08:00

And her name is Patricia Herbold; her testimony (Sep 22) to Congress is available. She will have big shoes to fill. Frank Lavin, the current ambassador, has over twenty years of experience with Asia issues, a Lt Commander in the U.S. Naval Reserves, and not to mention a B.Sc.F.S. from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, an M.Sc. in Chinese Language and History from Georgetown, an M.A. in International Relations and International Economics from the School of Advanced International Relations at the Johns Hopkins University and an M.B.A. in Finance at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Herbold, on the other hand, has lots of experience with GOP activism, among other virtues. From Seattle Times (July 13):

There always has been a small collection of "plum" ambassadorships that U.S. presidents of both parties save for their closest friends and reliable contributors: Paris, London, Tokyo, Buenos Aires and Singapore...Herbold, of Bellevue, has earned recognition by the Republican National Committee and the White House for her political successes in the Seattle area, and the more than $100,000 she has contributed to the GOP in recent years.

Let's hope Mrs. Herbold likes the weather in Singapore. (Also relevant: the wiki on Pamela Harriman, former US ambassador to France appointed by Clinton.)