Need help 3 slides power point about Singapore.

Section 1: Introduction

and History

Singapore has been a crossroads of trade

through most of its history (Abshire, 2). This city-country of 269 square miles, located at the southern extent of the Malay Peninsula, was originally a minor port for regional trade in Southeast Asia (Abshire, 10), a function that it has expanded through

its subjugation by multiple different empires over the centuries - since 100 C.E., Singapore has been in the possession of the Srivajanyan Empire, the Majapahit Empire, the Thai Kingdom, Japan, and Britain, which ceded the country to self-governance in 1965

(Abshire, xiii-xiv).

Singapore’s independence movement began shortly

after WWII, in which Japan had temporarily wrested control of the colony from Britain (Abshire, 109). With Britain relinquishing its colonies after the war, there was little doubt that it would surrender control of Singapore, but the timeline was uncertain,

as was the issue of whether Singapore would merge with Malaysia or become an independent country. After almost a decade of unrest and economic rationing after World War II, a major step toward independence came with Singapore’s first real elections in 1955,

although Britain retained control over policing, military defense, and international issues (Abshire, 117).

In the 1955 elections, the English-educated

lawyer Lee Kwan Yew and his People’s Action Party (PAP) rose to prominence. PAP’s core party planks included citizenship reform, education, local industrial development, and a merger with the Malay Federation. Although PAP did poorly in the 1955 elections,

it swept a second set of elections in 1959, winning all but 8 seats in parliament and installing Lee Kwan Yew as head of government (Abshire, 121). In 1961, Lee established an Economic Development Program with a focus on import substitution and the establishment

of a 4,000 acre industrial park, created by offering tax incentives to both local and foreign investors (Abshire, 125). In the immediately subsequent years, Lee also oversaw massive and highly successful projects to create public housing and offer public education

in four languages (Abshire, 128). In 1963, Lee also fulfilled his platform promise of merging Singapore into the Malay Federation, but ethnic riots and different economic visions made the merger short-lived. In 1965, Singapore withdrew from the Malay Federation

and became an independent country.

Today, the country is a highly developed

entrepot hub for global trade, and has progressed from an impoverished third-world colony in the 1960s to one of the most productive countries in the world as measured by GDP per capita. The majority of this progress is attributable to the strong guiding hand

of government in the economy, and in particular the role of Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding father.

Demographically, the Singaporean culture

is very diverse, with influences from all over the world. Britain’s long period of control, from 1819-1965, left a strong impact on Singapore’s language and culture, but Singapore also bears the culture imprints of China, India, and myriad other Asian culture.

The majority of the population (77%) is of Chinese ancestry, and other major ethnic groups include people of Indian (8%) and Malaysian descent. The country is rapidly acquiring citizens from other ethnic backgrounds, since the government welcomes immigration

and Singapore’s economy offers a strong “pull factor” for workers. In 2000, one in every five residents was a non-citizen immigrant (Abshire, 5). Partly as a result of this diversity, the country has four official languages: Chinese, English, Malay, and Tamil

(a dialect from southern India) (Abshire, 4).

Singapore’s diversity also extends to religion,

as the country contains significant numbers of Buddhists, Taoists, Muslims, Hindus, and Christians. The government actively promotes religious harmony, and works to limit extremist religious education (Abshire, 4).

The government itself is a parliamentary

republic headed by a prime minister (Abshire, 5). Although elections are democratic, Singapore’s government is essentially a one-party system, with the People’s Action Party (PAP) maintaining an almost exclusive control over government since 1965 (Abshire,

5).

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