tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post3310313363202049561..comments2023-10-29T23:01:38.581+08:00Comments on The Asia File: Painful history: Academic freedom receives another blow in SingaporeUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-74480320843018808122010-06-01T10:04:27.000+08:002010-06-01T10:04:27.000+08:00"Credit should go to Dr Albert Winsemius beca..."Credit should go to Dr Albert Winsemius because he is the one who has Singapore's economy work during the early days."<br /><br />What is your evidence - or is this simply your prejudiced hunch?Anonymous (on 06/01/2010 04:57 am)http://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-66594125434465883912010-05-31T11:43:47.000+08:002010-05-31T11:43:47.000+08:00/// by Incredulous
on 05/28/2010 11:14 pm
To Aut.../// by Incredulous<br />on 05/28/2010 11:14 pm<br /><br />To Autolycus,<br /><br />I think you need to find alternative information other than what is available in Singapore.<br /><br />Did, you know Dr Albert Winsemius was the true architect of Singapore? ///<br /><br />Yes, I know of Albert Winsemius. Yes, he was mentioned by the government as giving us help when we were developing. No, at best Albert was a consultant. And you know what consultants do best? They asked the locals, asked what their plans are, repackage the report and ergo - comes up with a plan for Singapore. I think you are shortchanging Singapore and giving too much credit to Albert.<br /><br />It is like saying the booming China economy and the great leaps it had made so far is due to Goh Keng Swee. Yes, GKS was consultant/advisor to the Chinese coastal city development. To credit him as the true architect of China, as you are doing with albert vis-a-vis SG, is really OTT.Anonymoushttp://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-34905188561935650642010-05-28T23:14:48.000+08:002010-05-28T23:14:48.000+08:00To Autolycus,
I think you need to find alternativ...To Autolycus,<br /><br />I think you need to find alternative information other than what is available in Singapore.<br /><br />Did, you know Dr Albert Winsemius was the true architect of Singapore? He was the UN advisor for Singapore until the 1980s. It was no coincidence that Goh Keng Swee retired a year later as there was no good advisors to help him, and Lee Kuan Yew replaced the cabinet with his Yes-Men.<br /><br />Did, you know the British was apprehensive to cede control of Singapore to the local government because the PAP then was pro-communist? And Lee Kuan Yew betrayed his PAP comrades to the British just so he won't get jailed too?<br /><br />Did you know, Lee Kuan Yew was the architect of the Union and Student riots to bring down David Marshall's then fledging government?<br /><br />There are many more, but unless you are afraid to search for the truth, there will always be only one 'official' history taught in our schools.<br /><br />The issue is not about Academic Freedom but more about Academic Suppression unless it is in favour of the ruling elite.<br /><br />And as they say, 'History belong to the victor'.Increduloushttp://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-89229207123694090722010-05-28T19:41:46.000+08:002010-05-28T19:41:46.000+08:00Oops. Two typos. Barr & Trocki (2008), Heng...Oops. Two typos. Barr & Trocki (2008), Heng's 'New Perspectives and Sources on the History of Singapore' (2005).Autolycushttp://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-60606884321868609812010-05-28T19:38:50.000+08:002010-05-28T19:38:50.000+08:00Before I begin, please don't see this as a PAP...Before I begin, please don't see this as a PAP defence. I'm not affiliated with them. I don't see myself as being a PAP man. However, I do have a family of Singapore historians.<br /><br />You know, I think that this kind of journalism is successful but not completely honest. It sells well. But I don't think that the PAP dominates the historical narrative as much as it did. I think that a kind of national ignorance did not protect students from the propaganda that ended up as our only history. Early textbooks are relatively propaganda-free; only the NE years were heavily propaganda-laden, and the pendulum is now swinging back.<br /><br />Kwa Chong Guan et al, 'Singapore: A 700-year History' (2009); Hong & Huang, 'The Scripting of a National History: Singapore and its Pasts' (2008); Barr & Trocki, 'Paths Not Taken: Political Pluralism in Post-War Singapore' 2008) —these are examples of recent scholarship which don't focus on the PAP mythology.<br /><br />Barr's own earlier 'Lee Kuan Yew: the Beliefs Behind the Man'; Barr and Skrbis's 'Constructing Singapore: Elitism, Ethnicity and the Nation-Building Project'; Trocki's 'Singapore: Wealth, Power and the Culture of Control'; Yao's 'Singapore: The State and the Culture of Excess'; Heng's 'New Perspectives and Sources on the History and Singapore'; even Chua Beng Huat's venerable 1995 book 'Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore' — these are all available in local bookshops to anybody who wanted to study Singapore seriously from an alternative point of view.<br /><br />It is a chimera to say that we don't have academic freedom. We have a goodly amount. On one hand, there are a lot of areas which are 'non-threatening' — does this mean the research is not valuable or not serious? On the other, I'm entirely happy to see is that there is less of that ad hominem approach so beloved of the media elsewhere. I'm happy to see that issues like the religion and sex life of politicians are seldom raised.<br /><br />I mean, heck, you can even buy Dr Chee's stuff at Kino. :DAutolycushttp://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8349632196064141356.post-87652424137888806912010-05-28T22:28:44.000+08:002010-05-28T22:28:44.000+08:00Autolycus,
But we also have Francis Seow's bo...Autolycus,<br /><br />But we also have Francis Seow's books not being sold in Singapore bookstores. And we know what NUS did to Chee. As far as I can see Ben did not say there was no academic freedom, but that academic freedom has received another blow. In any case, as long as a credible threat to academic dissidents exists, as we can see it does by what happened to Chee and the situation with Seow's books, the fact that other dissidents get away with publishing some things doesn't mean that they have academic freedom. The threat is still there -- it's just not acted on according to a uniform standard. But as long as the threat exists, other dissidents will be fearful and less likely to state their views.<br /><br />I also disagree that there is 'less ad hominem' in Singaporean political discourse. Issues like religion and sex life may not arise, but issues about the supposed character of politicians and their affiliations with 'Western' entities do. Focussing on character and affiliations, and not on the substantive policy proposals of politicians, is just another form of ad hominem, even though Singaporeans may have been trained to think it's less frivolous than focussing on religion and sex life.twasherhttp://theasiafile.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com