OTGV #13 - Singapore Identity
Broadcast Date: 24/06/2002
As a land of immigrants, Singapore is close to 2 centuries old.
Much more if you count the orang lauts who'd been here before Raffles and the opening of the immigration floodgates.
But as an independent country, it is barely four decades old.
Do the Singaporeans have a common identity?
Hi, welcome to On the Grapevine with me, Chong Ching Liang as I explore whether there's a growing sense of Singaporeanism.
The Institute of Policy Studies recently released the findings of its survey to find out about Singaporean's sense of rootedness.
Director of the Institute, Professor Tommy Koh explained why the study is conducted.
"Back in 1990 IPS conducted a survey. The survey attempted to find out more about Singaporean's sense of ethnic identity, national identity and the sense of belonging to Singapore. The results of that 1990 survey were very encouraging. It showed that across the board, all the ethnic, religious divides, there was a good sense of national identity, of belonging to Singapore and we wanted to do a follow-up study. This study was completed in June last year. I said June last year because I thought it is important to let you know the study was done before September 11."
Senior Research Fellow Dr Ooi Giok Ling highlighted the key findings.
"What we found, you know, the main highlights, 78% of the people we interviewed actually thought of themselves more as Singaporeans than the race they are. Which mean national identity actually does subsume to a large extent, the ethnic identity of people and ethnicity. The same proportion of people said they thought in this way regardless of ethnicity."
But a closer look found that.
While Chinese Singaporeans tend to hold race and religion as more important to their identity,
they reported that they were more likely to feel discomfort in a room full of other races.
Dr Ooi's co-researcher, National University of Singapore's Dr Tan Ern Ser explained this seeming paradox.
"I think this has a lot to do with demographics. I mean the fact that the Chinese being the majority right? As the majority, you may not bump into a lot of the minority and therefore you, you're more or less quite comfortable where you are but it doesn't mean you are racist. You know, it just means that you don't have the occasion, the frequency, the chances of meeting minorities will be much lower. For example if you go to a hawker centre right, the chances are that you will meet more Chinese than you will meet minorities."
Dr Ooi noted that this finding may allow a tweaking of national policies on inter-racial relations to function more efficiently.
"Generally the Chinese, as the majority seemed a bit more laidback in terms of making the effort to bridge ethnic boundaries, to appreciate a bit more, this ethnic diversity. They generally adore this multi-racial diversity but they are not very, very familiar or appreciative of this unique feature of our society. Our survey does help to improve consciousness of exactly where more attention should be paid. And it's certainly not the smaller ethnic groups like the Malays and the Indians if you actually want to concentrate on improving ethnic relations. You have to work among the Chinese as well. There's always this assumption that the smaller ethnic groups tend to be the one, I supposed, more frustrated with their status and their position in the inter-ethnic society, but this seems to be less the issue based on this survey. It looks as though we need to work equally with the Chinese based on this survey. In fact even more so."
But while Singaporeans seem to head towards a sense of a common national identity, there're still differences between social economic classes and certain age groups.
Dr Ooi again.
"We found the younger and the more highly educated a bit more skeptical and then they were less willing to accept without querying the expressed purposes of some of the national policies or policies that have been introduced to, you know, manage inter-ethnic relations. So they are more likely to disagree that, you know, they could contribute to harmony the way they are you know, like the ethnic quotas in public housing estates."
The survey may have provided a hint as to why there's political apathy among Singaporeans.
Only 4 out of 10 Singaporeans say that they feel a sense of belonging to Singapore because they have a say in government policy.
Dr Ooi says more active citizen participation may improve the efficacy of national policies especially in the area of inter-ethnic relations.
"Largely because it is so centralised, top-down kind of policies that has been used, we should re-think, I guess, in the light of this survey whether there's fuller participation, the inclusion of stakeholders like the citizens, citizen groups might help to enrich our approach to managing ethnic relations."
It does seem that the IPS survey has thrown up more questions for the nation to ponder.
But the questions don't detract from the good news it provides.
A recap from Professor Tommy Koh.
"One of the highlights of the 2002 survey is that while ethnic identities are still important but they co-exist with a greater sense of national identity."
And so that may be the destiny for the eventual Singaporean identity:
a national identity that makes room for our ethnic backgrounds.
A reflection of the multi-racial country we live in.
This is Chong Ching Liang for Newsradio 938.
Related Websites:
Newsradio938
http://newsradio.mediacorpradio.com/
Institute of Policy Studies
http://www.ips.org.sg
National University of Singapore
http://www.nus.edu.sg
As a land of immigrants, Singapore is close to 2 centuries old.
Much more if you count the orang lauts who'd been here before Raffles and the opening of the immigration floodgates.
But as an independent country, it is barely four decades old.
Do the Singaporeans have a common identity?
Hi, welcome to On the Grapevine with me, Chong Ching Liang as I explore whether there's a growing sense of Singaporeanism.
The Institute of Policy Studies recently released the findings of its survey to find out about Singaporean's sense of rootedness.
Director of the Institute, Professor Tommy Koh explained why the study is conducted.
"Back in 1990 IPS conducted a survey. The survey attempted to find out more about Singaporean's sense of ethnic identity, national identity and the sense of belonging to Singapore. The results of that 1990 survey were very encouraging. It showed that across the board, all the ethnic, religious divides, there was a good sense of national identity, of belonging to Singapore and we wanted to do a follow-up study. This study was completed in June last year. I said June last year because I thought it is important to let you know the study was done before September 11."
Senior Research Fellow Dr Ooi Giok Ling highlighted the key findings.
"What we found, you know, the main highlights, 78% of the people we interviewed actually thought of themselves more as Singaporeans than the race they are. Which mean national identity actually does subsume to a large extent, the ethnic identity of people and ethnicity. The same proportion of people said they thought in this way regardless of ethnicity."
But a closer look found that.
While Chinese Singaporeans tend to hold race and religion as more important to their identity,
they reported that they were more likely to feel discomfort in a room full of other races.
Dr Ooi's co-researcher, National University of Singapore's Dr Tan Ern Ser explained this seeming paradox.
"I think this has a lot to do with demographics. I mean the fact that the Chinese being the majority right? As the majority, you may not bump into a lot of the minority and therefore you, you're more or less quite comfortable where you are but it doesn't mean you are racist. You know, it just means that you don't have the occasion, the frequency, the chances of meeting minorities will be much lower. For example if you go to a hawker centre right, the chances are that you will meet more Chinese than you will meet minorities."
Dr Ooi noted that this finding may allow a tweaking of national policies on inter-racial relations to function more efficiently.
"Generally the Chinese, as the majority seemed a bit more laidback in terms of making the effort to bridge ethnic boundaries, to appreciate a bit more, this ethnic diversity. They generally adore this multi-racial diversity but they are not very, very familiar or appreciative of this unique feature of our society. Our survey does help to improve consciousness of exactly where more attention should be paid. And it's certainly not the smaller ethnic groups like the Malays and the Indians if you actually want to concentrate on improving ethnic relations. You have to work among the Chinese as well. There's always this assumption that the smaller ethnic groups tend to be the one, I supposed, more frustrated with their status and their position in the inter-ethnic society, but this seems to be less the issue based on this survey. It looks as though we need to work equally with the Chinese based on this survey. In fact even more so."
But while Singaporeans seem to head towards a sense of a common national identity, there're still differences between social economic classes and certain age groups.
Dr Ooi again.
"We found the younger and the more highly educated a bit more skeptical and then they were less willing to accept without querying the expressed purposes of some of the national policies or policies that have been introduced to, you know, manage inter-ethnic relations. So they are more likely to disagree that, you know, they could contribute to harmony the way they are you know, like the ethnic quotas in public housing estates."
The survey may have provided a hint as to why there's political apathy among Singaporeans.
Only 4 out of 10 Singaporeans say that they feel a sense of belonging to Singapore because they have a say in government policy.
Dr Ooi says more active citizen participation may improve the efficacy of national policies especially in the area of inter-ethnic relations.
"Largely because it is so centralised, top-down kind of policies that has been used, we should re-think, I guess, in the light of this survey whether there's fuller participation, the inclusion of stakeholders like the citizens, citizen groups might help to enrich our approach to managing ethnic relations."
It does seem that the IPS survey has thrown up more questions for the nation to ponder.
But the questions don't detract from the good news it provides.
A recap from Professor Tommy Koh.
"One of the highlights of the 2002 survey is that while ethnic identities are still important but they co-exist with a greater sense of national identity."
And so that may be the destiny for the eventual Singaporean identity:
a national identity that makes room for our ethnic backgrounds.
A reflection of the multi-racial country we live in.
This is Chong Ching Liang for Newsradio 938.
Related Websites:
Newsradio938
http://newsradio.mediacorpradio.com/
Institute of Policy Studies
http://www.ips.org.sg
National University of Singapore
http://www.nus.edu.sg
posted by CHONG Ching-liang | 5:38 PM
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