NEW YORK TIMES: …“To understand Singapore and why it is what it is, you’ve got to start off with the fact that it’s not supposed to exist and cannot exist,” he said in the 2007 interview. “To begin with, we don’t have the ingredients of a nation, the elementary factors: a homogeneous population, common language, common culture and common destiny. So, history is a long time. I’ve done my bit.”..
His “Singapore model,” sometimes criticized as soft authoritarianism, included centralized power, clean government and economic liberalism along with suppression of political opposition and strict limits on free speech and public assembly, which created a climate of caution and self-censorship.
The model has been admired and studied by leaders in Asia, including in China, and beyond as well as being the subject of countless academic case studies. (more)
EDITOR: Can there be too much democracy? Asia leaders believe so.
