TOC News ? Political Fault Lines

Unrepresentative Politics: as dangerous as Racial or Religious Conflict?

The danger of racial or religious conflict in Singapore is widely discussed. There is another danger that is much less discussed ? pent-up political frustration stemming from unrepresentative institutions.

The danger can be expressed in one sentence: that political institutions and outcomes that do not fairly reflect the political aspirations of all the country?s people will sow the seeds of conflict or alienation.

What could happen if this situation persists for a generation or more? For one thing, disaffected Singaporeans might become alienated from public life, withdrawing into private life. Or they might decide to quit the country altogether. The worst-case scenarios would be mass civil disobedience, violent protests or worse.

It is often argued that Singapore?s one party dominant political structure is good for the country because it prevents policy paralysis or destructive political competition. This forgets that the threat to stability can come not from political competition but from the lack of it ? or rather the lack of competition that is seen as fair by all groups.

How badly can unrepresentative political institutions fracture society?

Consider these examples of conflict that grew primarily out of political divisions, not ethnic or religious ones.

• In Malaysia, the issue that has led to the most disruptive political conflict in recent years has been about political fairness, as embodied by the Bersih campaign for fair elections.
• In China, an estimated 100,000 public protests occur every year, largely against what are seen as unfair land grabs by local officials. The protestors cannot vote out local government officials whom they see as corrupt and oppressive.
• In India, the most harmful internal conflict has not been ethnic but political ? the Naxalite rural rebellion. The Naxalites see the political system as having failed India?s impoverished rural communities. Thousands of people have been killed in this low-intensity civil war.
• In 2011, the Jasmine revolutions in the Middle East led to street violence and, in some cases, out and out civil war. The axis of conflict was primarily political.

All these cases have one thing in common. The people who initiated political conflict did not believe that their national institutions gave a fair chance to everyone to achieve political representation.

Is Singapore?s political system fair?

Could Singapore fracture along political lines because of perceived unfairness in the political process?? Perhaps not in the immediate future. Could today?s political fault-lines widen into fractures in one or two decades? Absolutely.? Especially since the pro-change group in Singapore may be disproportionately younger (see below), deepening the divide over time.

Consider the following ways in which the dominant institutions, public culture and electoral procedures fail to represent all Singaporeans fairly while infusing almost every aspect of public life with a partisan political character that favours the ruling party, at the expense of non-partisan or bi-partisan space.

• 40% of the electorate voted for the Opposition in GE2011, but their votes translated into 7% of voting parliamentary seats. The gap between the popular vote and the share of seats in Parliament is not just greater than in other comparable electoral democracies analyzed below. It is of a different order of magnitude and can be termed ?off the chart? ? at a shocking 33%, whereas the others come in at below 17%, with the median at around 10%.? The list below is weighted towards Asian and high-to-middle-income electoral democracies world-wide. Data is drawn from the most recent elections in these countries. Singapore?s political system distorts the popular vote far more than other countries with essentially the same Westminster-style first-past-the-post electoral system, like Malaysia and the UK, so this is not an argument about Proportional Representation. ?The distortion is also incomparably worse than in the latest US Congressional elections, where Republicans have been criticized for using gerrymandering ? redrawing electoral boundaries in their favour ? to increase their share of seats beyond their share of the vote. The reasons for this distortion in Singapore might include the process for defining electoral boundaries and the GRC system. Whatever the reasons, the outcome is highly unrepresentative ? and unfair to Singaporeans who voted for the Opposition.

Election for national legislature	Ruling party or Ruling coalition share of popular vote (%)	Ruling party or Ruling coalition share of seats in the national legislature/Parliament (%)	%? point difference in seat share over vote share
Jamaica 29 December 2011[3]
Taiwan Legislative Yuan 14 January 2012[4]
United Kingdom 6 May 2010[6]
South Korea National Assembly 11 April 2012[8]
US House of Representatives 6 November 2012[9]
New Zealand? 26 November 2011[11]
Australia Federal 21 August 2010[12]

• Grassroots organizations (GROs) are not non-partisan in character but have structural ties to the ruling party. GROs do not recognize and work with Opposition MPs when they are duly elected. This creates a partisan (rather than a national, non-partisan) structure subsuming all the GROs across the island ? from the huge Community Centres right down to the pervasive Resident?s Committees in HDB blocks. Even mundane recreational events and festivals in HDB estates are thus infused with a partisan political character, with only PAP MPs invited and the events serving to build political capital for the ruling party, rather than being non-partisan or bi-partisan.
• The bulk of public events that are reported in the mainstream media ? not only political and governmental but also cultural, sporting, arts, community and civil society events -? seem to be graced by PAP political figures. These figures are positioned as guests of honour or patrons. Again political capital goes to the ruling party. Public events that are graced by Opposition party figures or events that involve only non-political figures as the guests-of-honour are in a minority.
• The mainstream media has been more or less controlled by the PAP government since the 1970s due to the Newspaper and Printing Press Amendment Act (NPPA) and Broadcasting Act. Academic Cherian George recently wrote a rigorous, balanced and fact-based analysis of how this system of government control operates in his book ?Freedom from the Press.? This book was not, to my knowledge, reviewed in the mainstream media. Fortunately, alternative perspectives on current affairs are now available online, thanks to the tireless efforts of volunteers who have created socio-political websites.
• The only trade union federation that exists has ?symbiotic ties? not only to the government but to the PAP as an actual political party, with the Secretary-General and two Deputy Secretary-Generals being PAP politicians.
• There is a lack of citizen-driven public institutions that are outside the day-to-day control of the government, but which exist in many First World countries. For example there is no independent Press Commission overseeing media reporting to ensure objectivity and standards, no independent Police Complaints Commission, no independent Electoral Commission to ensure that elections are run in a way that is completely fair to all parties and no independent Ombudsman to field public complaints against state agencies. This prevents any non-partisan watchdog function to ensure fairness in the running of the state machinery. No doubt there are many government committees in Singapore that include citizen representatives. But very few of these can honestly be said to exercise power, or be empowered to communicate publicly, independently of the government. They still report to the government and at best make recommendations to the government. ?Again, the non-partisan space is extremely restricted.

The failure of our political institutions to fairly represent all Singaporeans has undercut the country?s ability to build genuine civic involvement. The country and the ruling party have become conflated in public life ? a fact that is deeply corrosive to nation-building. Social and public life in 2012 remains very much in the partisan shadow of the ruling party ? just as it was in the early 1990s, when George Yeo made his famous Banyan Tree speech.

All this adds up to one big conclusion ? Singaporeans who wish to see a change in the political climate towards more openness and accountability are not seeing their aspirations being reflected in the country?s institutions, public culture or political outcomes. And this pro-change group may lie in the range of 40% to 65% of all citizens. 40% is the share of the electorate who voted against the ruling party in the 2011 General Election. 65% is those who voted against the ruling party?s preferred candidate in the Presidential Election of 2011. Hardly a fringe minority.

Clearly political attitudes in Singapore need much more detailed study. One argument holds that the pro-change group is disproportionately younger. This seems to be supported by the IPS survey of political attitudes (2011). If this is correct, this group will get bigger over time.

Moreover the axis of political division in Singapore does seem to be following a Left-Right divide. Most Opposition parties take positions to the Left of the PAP (I would argue that this is a function of how far to the Right the PAP has shifted over the decades, but that is another discussion). Hence the political divide in our society is somewhat mapping onto the socio-economic divide. The potential is there for pent-up political frustrations to boil over.

The path to a more stable future

If we look at high-income countries in Asia which have navigated the path from authoritarianism to greater political openness and accountability, they share one feature.? I am speaking here of South Korea, Japan and Taiwan. Most politically conscious citizens, wherever they stand on the political spectrum, believe that they can work within the system to get a fair crack at pursuing their vision for society. There is enough non-partisan space in society. The rules of the game, while not perfect, are perceived to be fair enough.

The result? Koreans, Japanese and Taiwanese who care about the country get involved in community and national affairs. They do not shun public involvement for private life. They pour their energy into legal electioneering or legal civil society work. And, with the inevitable exceptions from time to time, they generally accept the outcomes that the system hands down. The system works to resolve political differences in a way that is seen as fair and conducive to stability.

What can be done to put Singapore on the path to future stability where political divisions result in healthy political competition rather than alienation, bitterness or conflict? It all boils down to one factor ? increasing the bi-partisan and non-partisan space.

This means removing deep structural restrictions that monopolise all political capital for the ruling party. These are seen in the regulation of the People?s Association (which is after all a statutory board that should not be politicised) as well as all Grassroots Organizations, the mainstream media, the management of elections and electoral boundaries, freedom of information, the role of independent commissions, and so on. Far from being pie-in-the-sky liberalism, this is a practical necessity for maintaining a stable and successful society. And far from being a Western notion, this is now the mainstream thinking in developed Asia.

As we preserve our hard-won racial and religious harmony, we should not avoid necessary reforms to our national institutions to guarantee a Singapore for all Singaporeans. ?

The author is the CEO of an international professional services firm and a civil society activist. This essay is contributed purely in his personal capacity.

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[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_federal_election,_2010 Considering only the Labor Party?s share

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