 Thank you very much. I would firstly like to start by acknowledging the traditional owners of the land, the Nanawa people whose land we're holding this forum upon. And I'd also like to welcome everybody that has come here tonight, students, esteemed guests and particularly those that have traveled from afar to be here tonight. I've got some fantastic international visitors that we'll be hearing from. The Asia-Pacific Learning Community is delighted to be hosting today's event as part of the Malaysia-Singapore Update Forum. And tonight with us to host the, to be the master of ceremonies for tonight is Professor Anthony Milner. Anthony Milner is a esteemed scholar in the area himself and he will be managing some other very interesting conversations. So please enjoy the evening and we'll have questions at the end. The topic, Malaysia and Singapore models for the Asian century. It seems to me the Asian century is a phrase we've got a pause on in this. Greg Lopez in that session this morning asked how do we go about saying, on what basis I suppose, what is good and what is not good when we're making analytical judgments of Malaysia or Singapore. And we're dealing here with two countries which we had a particular, we Australians had a particular perspective on decades ago at the very beginning of their creation. Australia playing quite a role at that stage. It's now a totally different situation where we've got countries with much larger economies, larger populations and particularly I think in the case of Singapore, larger military forces. These are countries to be reckoned with. This is, by respond to Andrew McIntyre this morning, we're thinking about Malaysia and Singapore these days in a very different way. The way we would have thought about Malaysia and Singapore when he was talking about it in the 50s and 50s was in terms of how we help the development, the creation of these countries, what role we would play in nation building. We're now thinking on what basis, that's how I understand this title, in an Asian century, unlike a Western hegemony moment at the end of the Second World War, in an Asian century, how do we go about making those judgments? So in asking this question about Malaysia and Singapore models, I think we have to keep in mind that vantage point. What is the vantage point and we need to reflect on that. Now a number of different colleagues have been asked to approach this question from different perspectives and each of them has a title there. I'm not quite sure how I see all those particular topics tying into this topic, this overall overarching topic but I'm sure they'll achieve that. Clive certainly will and we'll start with Clive. Once again many thanks for inviting me for being ready to listen to me. I take my hat off as you've seen already to those of you who have come back for some more this evening and those who know me well, it's a very rare occasion indeed if I do take my hat off. Wearing a hat is an inherent genetic condition with me. I also trust that I will be a little less erratic and erasable than I was this morning but I do sometimes get over carried away in my enthusiasm. I shall try to remain within the tight constraints of the time available. Malaysia as a model, a model of what? In my brief pressy of what I was going, what I decided I would try and discuss, I said Malaysia offers itself internationally these days as an exemplar of religious and political moderation and of the successful accomplishment at least in prospect on the road, the successful accomplishment of modernity in an Islamic form on an Islamic basis and in Islamic terms, Malay Islamic terms in short as a model of successfully achieved Islamic modernity that other developing Islamic nations might emulate and that the non-Muslim world should acknowledge and respect. My brief discussion will question these claims both historically and on the basis of recent empirical research. I do believe that there is something, an attitude of my interest towards the world that we might characterise as modernity which means somehow or other standing within one's own tradition, understanding from within the terms in which the tradition works in a modern person the forms of thinking that are historically embedded in a tradition become conscious, its operations are made conscious to itself in the minds of its self-aware or reflexive thinkers and in that way I believe that at least in principle or in prospect there might be not one modernity but many that modernity might be achievable and is ideally should be achieved within any and every civilisational tradition. I believe that the grounds for an Islamic modernity are there and because Islam has a very deep deeply rooted historically valued intellectual tradition that if only people could master it properly would be the basis of an Islamic modernity and is a tradition not is not a way through which one sees the world but a modern person sees the evolution of his or her their own tradition from the perspective of the world rather than seeing the assumptions using their own being enclosed immured within their own tradition and using that as a self-referential basis for understanding everything that's beyond it. Now that may be a little bit higher abstract and so let me say what I might mean concretely by an Islamic modernity and why it is not only possible but I think needed in Malaysia. The basis of a culture of Islamic modernity was articulated philosophically by the kaumuda the followers in Malaysia or the elaborators within Malaysia and Singapore of the classical modernist intellectual revolution of Muhammad Abdul and his followers in the Middle East. This was a tradition that contested the conservative palace-based Istana focused Islam of the rulers. It was an Islam that was marginalised in the Malay states that could thrive for a while only in the straight settlements where there was no local Sultan and dependent class of conservative religious functionaries to squelch and crush it entirely. A tradition that from these marginalised the periphery of the Malay states from the straight settlements tried to project into the Malay world the basis of a culture of critique a culture of modernity but it was a tradition that as Roff's classic analysis explains and Tony Milner's own work following it gives a different account in many ways of the same process. A tradition that was either on one reading marginalised and largely defeated or from another point of view remained in play remained imminent remained embedded in the situation but certainly not the dominant one one that was often contested and overridden by others. I do believe that such a tradition of Islamic modernity is essential in Malaysia today and has been ever since independence. The only way the only basis of which I believe you can create national unity in Malaysia is to find a form is not by you know radical secularism that repudiates religion but in a modern Islam that is it that can that can be the basis of mutual respect and engagement if not agreement between different kinds of Muslims, Malays and non-Malays, believers and non-believers the only basis upon which a modernising progressive centrist Malay national leadership can hope to relieve Malaysia is from such a basis. Well I can elaborate that further but I shan't let me then say something about the great work largely ignored which is of Professor Riaz Hassan of Flinders University first a book called Face Lines and then a successor called Inside Muslim Minds. Face Lines was a preliminary study of four Islamic societies including Malaysia inside Muslim minds of 17 societies it's the kind of sociology that I sometimes deplore and sometimes admire but I certainly value when I find it serviceable and this one I find magnificently serviceable. Riaz Hassan in short I do let me say I do not equate modernization the process of modernization with with modernity itself although they are clearly related. In Riaz Hassan's analysis and empirically based the detailed studies of Muslim in Muslims middle class Muslim in particular in the 17 countries and he then sets out all the data he's collected on two axes one of socioeconomic modernization this is the way the pattern falls out and the other is of attitudes of intellectual and cultural modernity here's those two axes and by and large you can draw a graph from the bottom left-hand corner up to the top right-hand corner so to the shows that the more economically modernized socio-economically transformed a Muslim society is the more its public opinion is Muslim public opinion will tend towards modernist attitudes. There is however one staggering and outstanding exception to this and I won't ask you to guess it is Malaysia where you find that among middle-class even so-called middle-class modernized Malays by and large if on any range of it on a whole range of questions I urge you to read the book about enforcement of Sharia law and hooded punishments and acceptance of non-believers or whatever it is where the range of opinions may be on a ten point scale from something like two to six in other societies where two of the most modern and six other more the least two of the least modern and well let's put the other way where two are the most modern and six are the least modern you get this odd thing the lot of these Malay middle-class supposedly modernists are somewhere up about eight or nine they are more conservative or less modern than the most modern they are less modern than the less modern of the less modernized societies and this creates a question why is this so let me give I think two answers to it to I think how to reinterpret Riaz Hassan's findings I can make only sense of this in only one way and whether and I've said this spoke I've never written this up I've given spoken to this and on occasion I said I can't think of another reason another explanation this is my explanation if anybody doesn't like it and want something better please volunteer a better explanation my explanation goes as this that basically Malay modernization has been produced and generated and underwritten by non-malays by the general diet economic and social dynamism of non-malays for which Malay Malay Muslims have been the beneficiaries they have but they have been neither the producers nor we would say the the producing and self-prosperous self-transforming products of Malay modernity of an Islamic modernity that somehow rather the economic and social dynamism generated by non-malays and non-muslims has allowed and underwritten the possibility of many Malays not only not to modernize but to cling in a very sentimentalized or fetishized or neo-traditionalistic way to maintain an attachment to non-modern and even in many ways anti-modern attitudes. Historically how has this been so well certainly the whole history of modern malays in modern malays as I've observed it while it's not been easy to be in opposition from one point of view from another point of view on this area the government has been not only kind it's been extraordinarily degenerous to its opponents it has created time and time again from Pusat Islam that's become Jachim to the International Islamic University Ikim a whole range of institutions that were meant to be the powerhouses to generate this new Islamic intellectual consciousness this new Islamic culture of modernity and new Islamic intellectualism that would be the rival the alternative the counterweight to traditional conservative Islam and yet all of these institutions were handed over to people who came from exact who did not begin to understand what they needed to understand in order to be able to do the job that they were appointed to do in fact they all had the same kind of conventional background as the people in the traditional organization and to be appointed in Malay in the Malaysian society people had to be politically those in power had to be sure these people weren't going to go to be tear aways and so they ended up appointing they ended up appointing what clones of the very people that they were supposed to replace and so you had basically the same kind of Islamist conventional Islamist mentality some of whom were in passing the opposition and others who were became entrenched and embedded within all these official government institutions that were supposed to be the alternative and we're just pushing the same agenda from within rather than from without that is the my interpretation of that I'm nearly ended let me say finally that that history continued and its most spectacular exemplar was Abdullah Badawi's initiative of Islam Hadari which strategically was exactly the right thing to create the basis of a new civilization or intellectual Islam the problem was that nobody really understood what doing that entailed the people appointed to it did not begin to understand the challenge they faced and of course they made it a flood that and in the end as I put it in and in one of my articles in the old that asian analysis and then again in the sharing the nation Islam hadari became in the end an intellectual orphan it was completely ungrounded there was no foundation for it now that is my analysis of the failure the creation of the kind of Islamic modernity but I think has been all along and still remains essential to any attempt by umno or anybody else to rule Malaysia from the center with a strong Malay base on a base that recognizes the importance of Islam but is able to develop and construe and configure Islam in a way that is creative intellectually for malays and non-malays alike Muslims and non-Muslims alike and can be that become the basis for the political incorporation of all Malay non-malay Muslims and non-Muslims in a Malay centric nation characterized by not by Islamic law or Islamic state but a kind of mobilizing progressive Islamic social consciousness and the action born of it thank you that's really thought-provoking our Clive particularly your response to we are the Hassan so very much on the topic of is Malaysia a model of Islamic modernity let's turn out of Masuki Muhammad on his political change unfolding in Malaysia and will this political change lead to a regime change thank you and well basically when Blake email me asking me what I would like to talk this session I scribble something quite few one shot color few sentences and in one of these sentences is this is political change unfolding in Malaysia and will this political change lead to regime change at that time I just answer straight away the political change yes regime change not to show it is it seems to be quite for an easy question to answer but when I think again and again it is not that easy number one how do you define political change whether political change also equals to regime change or political change will lead to regime change or can it be used interchangeably now I have to define it first when I talk about political change basically refers to the changes that are happening in the in the society as well as in the political sphere both politics and and political politics as we understand it political more about the behavior of politicians in a particular context at a particular time and what regime change of course what I mean is a change of government whether there is a political change unfolding in Malaysia I will say yes why if you look at the way the the politicians behave the way the politics is perceived both by those in power those who govern those of those who are governed mean by the politicians themselves as well as by other people and you see a lot of what you call this new thinking only new thinking but in terms of actions on the ground but I'm sharing with you I'm not going to be too academic tonight but just to share some of my experience working input to Jaya as well as when we go to the ground meeting the people and things has changed experience participating in election campaigns well previously if you look at the literature of Malaysian politics the word is being sure win this is this is just about it's about the margin not even the margin is how big two-thirds majority that you can pay two-thirds majority is is always secure like inshallah present before you look at literatures was our politics be a sure win but the previous is our election I will say that politics has become more and more competitive Malaysian politics when Malaysian elections per se for example has been very competitive but now we can feel that it is even more competitive so for example the last count after the 2008 general election we have 18 by elections nine won by British National and nine won by the opposition and if you look at the the way the British National parties campaign in election how are there a lot of I mean people talking about this and that in terms of the dominance of British National I will say that the British National is over dominant or too dominant they didn't have to campaign that much but the way that you follow the campaign trail it's almost 24 hours meeting the people hate counts gathering feedback and you do a lot of things to what you call this to get or to to approach voters and to get their votes similarly on the side of the political divide do the same thing as well so politics has become very much very much competitive and I will say that this so-called the new world called is a dimension in the electoral contest where the election becomes more competitive if you look at it from the positive side of it then you will see that it moves both the government and the society into a more democratic direction and I will say that this process is irreversible why so for example if you look back a few decades ago and you compare it now I've mentioned this morning you find that people are more educated people are becoming more organized people have access to information if previously you can just control the media example printed presses now doesn't work anymore someone told me that we do some Malaysia circulation has increased by 10% by the same time those who access information on on the web has also increased the latest counter was told at 30% and most of them are young people those in urban centers those who have access to this internet news portals and what not social media Facebook Twitter so this is on the rise and I will say that this is irreversible the process of of the social change is irreversible and as Bridget mentioned this afternoon here's also the government owns making you put the repeat comic development you invest in on education people become more educated people become more urbanized and it's just a natural process a natural process that middle class will be expanding and then you the whole process will of course drive the government to be more democratic or time is up give me two or three one minutes now my point is political change is real the society has moved into a more democratic direction if the government wants to get people's mandate the government has to respond to those changes there is no two ways when I talk about government as I mentioned this morning or this afternoon both but a national government as well as the government at a state level you know rule by the opposition political parties at the federal level plant and finance so politics becomes more contentious and government has to respond more to these changes in the society but will there be regime change as in what called this change of government I will say not to sure no people are saying you ever this afternoon we heard about well-hung parliament is about if be an ever wean it is only marginal or if a position wins it is also marginal there will always be possibilities of defections and whatnot I mean it's all these stories we heard but if you ask me sincerely of course as a be an supporter I will say be angry with no two ways worry and I want be and to win politics becomes more competitive nothing the sensible answer that I can give is not too sure we have to work harder we have to meet more people we have to convince them that this government is a better government because what people want is basically not change of government what they want is better government better governance and okay because times is up I think we save this we can we can discuss that Q&A session thank you very much yeah I suppose first one question is how whether people can conceptualize regime change in Malaysia to some extent it's an advantage for the incumbent government that there's a confusion between party and state even the way history is taught in Malaysia so I suppose I'm just wondering how perhaps we can talk about this later but is it becoming the sort of society where you can when many people could conceptualize regime change even if they want to go on supporting this government this party let's turn to Singapore and to turn to the Singapore economy and really the big issue is what are Singapore's secrets to success that's that's a that's a question it's going through Australian corporate minds as well so can I ask Shandra I've never given a talk in the evening and also in a podium no it looks very strange to me and I don't even have my slides out I prepared my slides anyway I don't I will not waste my time okay it's interesting question the question they give me was is that Singapore model the answer is no there's no such thing as a Singapore model and I don't think so there is even a Malaysian model ASEAN model but I can highlight certain key fundamentals the drive certain growth in the region and also drives the growth of Singapore economy and the way you're going to think about how ASEAN is growing how Malaysia is growing or how Singapore has grown is based on certain factors parameters already given to us we have no control over these parameters one parameter is we don't we are very scarce in land we don't have any natural resource and we are strategically located in the east-west trade routes and this is already given to us so the natural question then was how to grow given these constraints so what are the choice I have what are the choice variables I can use to manage the economy and grow to the maximum so I can think of five choices at every point in time or that drives the Singapore economy and this was thought off from the beginning first one is stable institutions the idea of stable institutions is quite broad so you can have several subgroups in the stable institution a good example is make sure that you don't is corrupt free corrupt free economy is very important because from the beginning they knew that in an open economy you want to drive growth and you want to drive export growth you need very corrupt free institutions if not they're going to be a lot of wrenching so they start up stable institution and the key idea stable institution is actually allows you to hedge your risk what is this hedging of risk hedging of risk is very important because one you want to live in any economy you're going to hedge current future consumption future savings and with current consumption current savings so it allows you to smooth your consumption and maximize your standard living and the other aspect of stable institution is this afternoon you talk about that it's the trickle down effect any growth you want to have the institution must redistribute the wealth such that there is more equity in the economy in the 70s and 80s the equity issues and driving employment issues and driving standard living issues was much more easier the second one is stable and strong infrastructure so if you go to Singapore it's very easy go to Singapore every five years we change their infrastructure new infrastructure is always coming up they're always changing ability sometimes we ask when I'm driving down the highway I will always ask myself why are they digging a hole here and digging a whole day right what kind of employment are they going to create no so this taxi driver told me so this kind of public construction is very important because it shows the government is doing something to the economy and is very visible you know so the perception is whenever they're digging something when you got inconvenient you know the government is doing something so that's that is exactly but actually sorry so actually the the government putting very good infrastructure whether it's now we are talking about 4g they're going to 4g they want to connect everybody and fiber optics now fiber optics is coming to my TV I'm a really linking up a smart TV and so on so forth so they're trying to reduce the cost and try to introduce technology as fast as possible not only to the businesses but individual households so again infrastructure allows us to maximize our return in terms of economic growth and send out living so that is a second choice variable they had from the beginning so they keep changing it the third one is openness and this parameter is already given to us from the early 90s century years open trading place so we always very open so what the government did was make sure that openness is enhanced by having the lowest tax rate so the highest tax base you're going to have in Singapore is most is 20% the highest there means the highest person will only be the maximum 20% and businesses are given a lot of subsidies and tax holidays and so on so that you enhance the openness with more fiscal policies and of course the other thing is with the openness is you have to be pro-business you have to be pro-business if you want to be open you have to be pro-business so there's another choice they have and not only they want to be pro-business but they also allow businesses to participate in the decision-making the trapatism and so on so forth okay the last the next one is human capital it's very very important for us and the evolution of the way institutions set up in terms of human capital is changing over time so initially we moved very fast from creating employment to secondary education to institute technical education so nobody is leaked out of the system and now we are building five in fifth universities so that we want 40% of our cohort to have university education the last one I think the choice variable is the way they plan you go to Malaysia and Singapore you will have a five-year plan a blueprint what the economy should be a ten year plan and even I have been asked to make a forecast what the economy will be in 2050 to 2060 they want a vision they want a scenario they want different scenarios so that you can make a choice and that is again a fundamental of how the model itself works if I have these five choice variables what are the problem what are the challenges we have I'll go through each of them the first one is stable institution increasingly although our institutions are still very strong some questions has been raised the one of the questions we had in terms of our institutions are we must grow at whatever the causes because they open economy of pro-business so when you are pro-business you will drive growth to the maximum that means you invest in human capital you invest in infrastructure you will bring in MNCs to drive growth as fast as you can again we had this discussion this drive in terms of investment growth is driving the higher 20th percentile income faster because we are moving to a frontier where we still have the growth but the trickle down effects are much much slower and not everybody have the skills it's they're going to take a longer time to acquire the skills so the skill gap is widening so the social dimension of how our institutions going to deal with this becomes very very important now whether it's income equality or the aging population or how the vulnerable population even we are talking about working poor so you might be working but you are still poor below the poverty line so we define a poverty line maybe thousand two hundred two thousand five so you are still working but you're considered poor so that is one challenge which we are facing the second one is again going to infrastructure it's very scarce land so what one of the things we have done is increase the population size so our MRT subways are getting very very crowded so people are asking questions are we getting a maximum from from our infrastructure especially the subways the roads is it is getting very very congested normally takes me 10 to 15 minutes to get from where I am to the university but that's only a certain period of time if I go morning from 8 to 9 it would take me 45 minutes to reach my office that frustrates me because it's taking my time away from doing a lot of things so the call is a stable and strong institution is supposed to increase the return is creating a cost to the economy now the third one is openness initially when we started doing openness we invited multinationals we trade we drive growth and so on the other thing we realize is that one multinationals when they set up they also become very focused that means they move out of the economy fast as as they they move in very fast they also move out very fast especially at a high value added activity so we start experiencing no following out effects especially after each crisis and again the governments are thinking how to keep MNC so one of the strategies was not only create my own technology and focus on three important sectors electronic pharmaceutical and chemicals so that can diversify my exports but at the same time try to allow semi-skill and skill workers to come in to hold on to the MNC so I can manage the holding out effect that's one expect the other expect is recently where your experience is we're experiencing more external shocks because we are completely open the external shocks the monetary shocks and the financial shocks are really creating a lot of instability in our economy especially I'll be finding it very difficult to manage our exchange rate now the exchange policy so again openness has been questioned how much we open and which kind of multinational should we attract and so on the the next one is human capital it's easy to increase a human capital primary school easy to increase to secondary school but at the higher level you'd not just want to educate a person but you must must make sure the person drives innovation and increasingly we find that that is becoming very very difficult one to set up the institutions it takes time to to educate a person is very costly and three it takes a longer time to actually increase the supply in human capital as opposed to the way that when you open industries moving very fast and move out very fast so again the demand is rising faster than supply so one of the strategies was to narrow the skill gap as fast as possible the last one was the planning and forecasting the planning model and the forecasting model increasingly getting much more difficult because that as you get closer and closer frontier and become more open it become very noisy that means which kind of skills you want to develop your human capital it's a very interesting question and a very good question by the time you develop a person 20 years investment in a person and develop the skill that skill become redundant by the time that that particular individual gets in a market so become very noisy because skills are changing very fast look at iphone they are introducing iphone 5 and you are still working on iphone the iphone 3 I have iphone 4 whatever I still don't understand technology so technology is changing so fast that our human capital have to catch this now catching up the 70s and 80s technology was catching up with our human capital so we attracted a lot very good elements it's now our human capital is trying to catch up with the technology and we don't have the innovative indigenous you know innovation this is not just Singapore it's also Malaysia in ASEAN itself the next phase of growth I think will come from SMEs the SMEs would be very important to create the production value chain and the network economy which we really really need to drive and that again becomes very important let me finish finally whatever I said here in terms of the choice the five choices and the problems I have the most important part of solving a problem is recognizing the problem and the government has recognized this the issue is the lot of noise and the choice they're going to make become much more difficult because from the beginning when you start growing your growth become path dependent your institutions become path dependent and this is what Lily was talking about that you have an institution and when you liberalize you create frictions so you become so path dependent on going on a certain trajectory that to change a trajectory is going to cost it's going to be structural adjustments and that becomes a very important consideration at this time how to change our path because so dependent for the last 45 years we have grown in a certain can be called benevolent data whatever you want to call that it's all path dependent right and it created growth he created equality and we have one of the highest standard living in the world so there's nothing wrong with that having a different trajectory that give us this growth the question is what is the next trajectory one which is again goes back to this five choice variables what are the five choice choice variables you're going to have each of them are not independent they're interrelated and how they're going to make this choice become very important that is the growth in the next ask Asian century thank you hey would you've given us an in-depth answer to the question about the secrets of Singapore's success I thought you were simply going to say Lee Kuan Yew was the secret Michael Barma perhaps put that argument thank you turning thank you for staying so late on the odd one tonight you're hearing four talks about countries and one about a person Lee Kuan Yew and there's a reason for that I'm talking about the legacy of Lee Kuan Yew and the legacy of Lee Kuan Yew is in fact embedded in a country it is not the country itself but it is an idea Singapore as an idea as a meme that Lee Kuan Yew has quite deliberately and consciously tried to spread throughout the developing world and try to get traction in the West the US Europe hence when I was in Singapore giving a paper very much like this in fact a much longer version of this paper that's where I picked up my Lee Kuan Yew school of public policy pin they have a school of public policy which is training technocrats bureaucrats civil servants and academics and NGO people from places like Rwanda to spread the good word the connection between Lee Kuan Yew and Singapore so close that when I was giving that talk the first question I got was basically a friendly attack saying why are you talking about Lee Kuan Yew and I'm speaking of it as if it's a country and then the second question I got this is a paper about Lee Kuan Yew was an emotional emotional defense not of Lee Kuan Yew but of Singapore and its record as if to just verify and confirm the fact that they have overlapped so much Singapore has been constructed as Lee Kuan Yew's personal message to the world okay so if we're looking at Lee Kuan Yew and his legacy and that's what I want to do the paper the title that you've been given here is what is the real legacy of Lee Kuan Yew the title that I've given this myself is Lee Kuan Yew's enduring legacies and the paper that I gave in Singapore I called that Lee Kuan Yew's global legacies and that's really what I'm looking at so I'd like to talk to you about for about the eight minutes that has left see when historians look back at the life and the achievements of Lee in say 10 15 years they'll potentially have quite a grab bag of legacies from which to choose this is a leader who has been a success by every measure he assumed the leadership of a tiny colony led it to independence vanquished his ideological enemies outlived his peers and bequeathed to subsequent generations of prosperous affluent stable society as we've just heard whatever his detractors and critics might say and I think I fit into one of those categories and regardless of what future generations might bring future developments might bring these achievements cannot be denied they laid the foundation for his legacy but I don't accept that they are actually legacies his legacy in themselves nor I'm sure would leave himself be satisfied with such a characterization since they're all local local Singaporean achievements and he has always craved a bigger stage after being denied Malaysia as he stayed he set out to elevate Singapore to become the template of an idea that could have global currency I believe he's succeeded this idea the idea of Singapore is premised entirely on the success of Singapore as a venture hence those elements that I listed above his local as his local legacy they are treasured by his family and probably by Singapore's constructed it was certainly in constraint Singapore's constructed memory but if we're looking for signs of a global legacy they're only the pre-conditions of being noticed and being taken seriously if you are a success if you have made a success of this then people will ask what is the Singapore model what is the secret of success and that's what he's interested in quite consciously interestedness and has always been interested in that at this point to be relatively easy to construct an argument that presented the legacy as a purely local affair and deny that it actually will have any lasting global influence I think such a view would be incorrect and I think it will be proven incorrect in time I see two primary elements of only CV that deserve to be recognized as being both global and enduring in impact and not necessarily what you'd expect first being an effective the effective inventor of state capitalism an honor that he must share with his long-standing and standing advisor and friend Dr. Albert Winsimius of the World Bank and his one-time right-hand man Dr. Go King Sweet and second being the pioneer of a new and extremely sophisticated form of governance that scholars today variously identify with labels such as electoral authoritarianism and competitive authoritarianism these achievements are closely related and both should be regarded as a foundation of a global phenomenon that have become mainstream and promise or threatened depending upon your perspective to become templates for normal business and governance in vast parts of the globe regardless of the contributions of colleagues and advisors both of these elements are among those that are to be regarded as being most intrinsic to these political and social thought at the deepest level going back to his early days going back to his days in the Cambridge Law School going back to his days when he was a socialist there are other elements that are even more deeply embedded in his political thought in his social thought notably his racism and his elitism and they are among the most prominent of his local legacies but if we're looking at the global level I don't think they register and I hope they don't register the two global legacies that I've identified are however premised upon a conundrum but I don't believe it can be fully reconcilable there is a basic conflict in the foundational logic of these two achievements both are premised upon maintaining extraordinarily high levels of professionalism and accountability to ensure responsiveness to changes opportunities and challenges and freed him from inefficiency and corruption without those things state capitalism won't work and authoritarianism will just degenerate into despotic governance secondly both are also premised upon tight control of information the political agenda and patronage upon strong government and relative freedom from interrogation and accountability the contradictions between these two things one calling for tight control and the other one calling for high levels of interrogation and accountability are painfully obvious when they put in those dark terms but it's not commonly realized the extent by those who watch Singapore from afar just how endemic the latter negative fucking use that term set of qualities are in the Singapore system the significance of lines of patronage freedom from interrogation freedom from inspection freedom from accountability discretion in appointments these things are so deeply woven into the fabric of Singapore Inc that I dare say that if Singapore simply had on its books the concept of conflict of interest and the registration of conflict of interest and the impermissibility impermissibility of conflict of interest the system could not function the levels of net networking patronage protection and consanguinity family lines are such that the professionalism that is needed to guarantee its success is severely compromised the promise that the problem is exacerbated by the fact that the higher one goes up the ladder of the elite the closer one gets to the center of power the less accountability there is and those with family connections suffer the least scrutiny of all such as the level of control of information and the regime of disciplinary regulation of public discourse that even in the more robust atmosphere generated by the stronger opposition presence in parliament and the prevalence of the internet it seems unlikely that this this path it seems likely that this pattern will continue into the long term with only minor modifications to try to capture very briefly sort of in a sentence part of the conundrum of the facing is they're trying to harness the all the advantages of freedom and creativity while still retaining quite tight control they want creative and energetic entrepreneurship in the service of the state now am I saying that these inherent weaknesses I believe they are inherent in the joint system of authoritarianism and state capitalism they are one joint system do they mean that it can be do they mean that they can be discounted into the long term despite their immediate currency no I'm not saying that but I do believe that they will limit the effectiveness of both legacies and that both of the challenges but that most of the challenges to both systems will emerge as contradictions between these two impulses that are fighting against each other contradictions are natural in human systems most political and economic systems and indeed most human systems contain contradictions and tensions that inverted commons logically should bring the system to an end and yet many survive for generations or even centuries adapting compensating and adjusting to meet new terror new challenges no system lasts forever but I have no trouble envisaging a future where these two legacies endowed to us while Lee Kuan Yew emerge as major factors shaping 21st century as significant rivals to liberal democracy and liberal capitalism gosh that's a tough analysis right we'll come back to Lee Kuan Yew I hope and to I'm know and make some comparative discussion I hope we've got time about the role of these of Lee Kuan Yew and I'm know and their respective states let us now turn finally to Bridget Welsh for comparative insight into Singapore Malaysian electoral politics and predictions I mean insight and predictions are you going to give us predictions I talked earlier today about dominant party decline and I'm not going to talk about elections and I'm not going to talk about predictions we've heard earlier from Marzipi that the BN may win he doesn't know I think the answer is no one really knows what I'm going to do instead is to talk about these two countries and the cusp of change and what I see some of the lessons and issues that we need to look at as they move forward as we look and reflect on them as Asian models and am I going to just mention sort of five sets of points that I think are very important for us to look at and to ponder in a reflective fashion building a little bit on similar points that was raised by Michael but before I do that I'd like to take a moment to wish Clive an early happy birthday he's still young at heart and definitely young in mind okay what do I want to talk about the first issue that in looking at Malaysia and Singapore is we have to recognize their success but when we look at success one has to appreciate that sometimes there are unintended consequences of success that create a challenge both countries are actually facing big-life transitions or transformations and with these transitions come real serious challenges and how to engage these things as a product of the very successes that they've had the first lesson we learn is the centrality of governance and when we look at both Malaysia and Singapore we have a very dominant matrix that the government is the solution to the problem when in fact in many cases this may not be the case but there are some very important lessons we see that the successes of Malaysia and Singapore have come from good governance and in areas particular of quality service provision the building of infrastructure the expansion of the state into the areas of addressing questions of inequalities these have been the lessons of the 70s and the 80s and the 90s in both countries and we've seen as a product of that because the state has played a prominent role we've had prominent areas of economic growth but the question is can this particular model a state capitalist model actually be sustainable in this contemporary global century there are two areas that i think are on the table one has been mentioned by Michael and that is you have the problem of that people now are very much vested in the state and they actually do not see the conflicts of interest of being part of the elite and the potential abuses of power that they come from being within this particular state apparatus the second aspect of that which is so prominent in the context of Malaysia and we by the way prominent throughout Asia and all survey data shows that the number one concern in the area of governance remains corruption now how can you deal with these issues of abuse of power and corruption and and try and try to improve governance i don't have answers i think i don't have a clear situation but what i see in the lessons of both Singapore and Malaysia is that you have to have some sort of check on state capitalism check on the government knows best that there has to be some as the societies evolve into more checks from society itself and i think this is going to be the next decade the next half century of these countries where you see the rise of the market and the rise of civil society as part of these checks in the way that these models move forward and we're seeing this in other parts of Asia Taiwan and Korea i expect this will continue and expand within the context of Malaysia and Singapore the second area that i think about when i look at the issues of the models of these two countries is the issue of equality we have had in both these countries tremendous success education class mobility has been a feature of both societies where you could see now thirst and second generation of people who have now gone on to university this the NEP for all of its detractors in the 1970s and 1980s profoundly transformed Malay and Malaysian society in very important ways but what is happening now is actually since 1997 in a regional phenomenon in Asia but particularly acute in Malaysia and Singapore are rising comparative inequalities the genie coefficients are expanding and every single report that is coming out that's looking at these issues from government numbers sees this as a huge red light a huge problem that they don't know how to address there is a discourse of this happening in Singapore and there is a big and there was there has yet to be a full discourse of this issue in the context of Malaysia but when we look at the challenges for these models ahead will be whether or not they can continue to actually create opportunities and deal with the issues of of equality in particular in the case of Singapore because it is such a small place as a not necessary in terms of geography it's a big place in terms of spirit but in terms of geography there are the real challenges that Singaporeans feel about having choices many of them are choosing to leave the system and leave the country because of the constraints that exist we still have the similar dynamic of choices in the context of Malaysia so the challenge here is how do you get to the questions of equality especially for certain vulnerable groups we now have studies in both countries that there are certain groups of people that are being left behind we have intergenerational exclusion among certain sectors of society and we have groups that involve social problems mentally ill that are being left to mind systematically as these countries are moving forward and i think this is expanding the inequalities that exist within these societies because of this entrenched dimension this needs a dialogue third area that is often touted about Singapore and Malaysia is the issue of ethnic stability the sense that they have maintained ethnic harmony my own view is that there's always an element of truth to this but there's also an element of myth and that in both societies there have now been profound demographic shifts in the way in the in the shares of the different ethnic communities in the case of Malaysia it has to do with different birth rates among the communities in the case of Singapore it has to do with migration and of course low birth rates and with this you have real challenges to deal with a new ethnic equation in the context of both countries for example in Singapore you cannot talk about the same CMIO anymore in any real sense and in the case of Malaysia you have to talk you actually are dealing with very smaller minority groups in terms of the overall population and ethnicity is transformed into issues that involve questions of religion and other different markers the question now is how do you deal with ethnic exclusion in a in a substantive way in polities like these both that are extremely racialized the Malay community in Singapore faces real challenges the Chinese community faces systematic feelings of exclusion in Malaysia the Kazan community in Sabah faces even higher levels in terms of their perceptions when we look at these countries as role models we must think about what are the solutions to these sets of problems and in many ways these things are not being discussed in any substantive way on both sides of the causeway the aspect that i point to when i think about these two countries as role models and how they're moving to the future and that is what i see is ideological splits there is now a much more complex politics of religion in both countries there's much talk of this in the context of Malaysia the place where issues of Islam and Islamic state and issues of theology and others are quite pronounced but that's only a very small part of the discussion and discourse in the complexities of politics of religion in Malaysia where you've had religious revivalism across the different communities across Christians across Hindus and others and that same dimension is existing within Singapore you now have to deal with real ideological splits in these societies and religion becomes where that becomes most manifested you have different generationals of different practices of religiosity can these countries manage this new politics of religion not so easy you have now new postmodern ideals in both countries especially in Malaysia you have a new active environmental movement predictions this will matter in seven seats in the election and i can tell you which ones because you now have a people who are very conscious of different sets of values you have a green movement this is the new parts of the new politics and identity sexuality debates in Singapore we've seen can now we have rising debates of these issues in the context of Malaysia this is all part and parcel of a new transformative dynamic of politics in both countries of where Malaysia and Singapore will become close watched for the sense of how they manage these ideological divisions i close now by raising the issue of elites Malaysia and Singapore in most of their decades were very successful because there was respect for leaders sometimes they use fear to get that but there was a sense of hierarchy of sense of tolerance or acceptance of leadership behavior in both societies this is eroded considerably there are very large trust deficits of all leaders irrespective across the political spectrum this and there is been a massive leveling where the leaders are seen as everyday politicians as opposed to people who can be insulated and to carry out policy away from everyday environments this is the new politics the much more difficult aspects of governance Singapore and Malaysia will continue to be successes but there has to begin by a recognition of the new sets of problems that they will face and the new challenges and again searching for these solutions are not easy but i think if we continue to see politics in these countries only through old spectrums of race and elite rules and leadership without recognizing the transformations that have taken place from below and from these societies we'll miss the point we'll miss the lessons i'll finish there i knew and Singapore and the connection being so close i wondered if mazuki and and the micro perhaps would both both talk about this first of all is there an assumption in an asian century one of the features of our model would be that you could change governments that you could change governments and my question really is has almost succeeded in the change in your position in Singapore again in the Singapore now and we find you so central in the construct of Singapore the state and state narrative what difficulties does this in both cases provide for an opposition it's one thing to to vote a bit for the opposition for protest but to what extent in both countries are people beginning to feel they really could change governments okay um the legacy of leacon you goes far beyond how he's actually viewed by the current generation of voters and oddly enough one of the things that is happening is that locally his name is being relatively trashed because of basically he stayed there too long but we need to be careful not to judge niquon you by the the the man he was in his last 10 years in government when he shouldn't have been there he should have been home in his silvers last 20 years i mean goodness gracious you know in the in the in the 1980s he's all ready to be in his 60s or something like that i don't know but an age when you should retire now i do believe i don't believe that it has reached the stage where they don't where there is a model that ties a country intrinsically or naturally with a set of supercells to a person but there is a model where they tie themselves to a system and especially in a place like Singapore where you have an elite which is beyond the canoe and which is which permeates the whole of society every aspect of decision-making every aspect of the economy and it is impossible it is nearly impossible to imagine a change of government back in Singapore in the next 10 15 years that could succeed because if an opposition were to win government and be allowed to govern their real their real opposition would not be the pap in opposition of parliament it would be there in the judiciary the military in the government companies and they are there to stay they are the system doesn't work without those people there and without those people working and working actively and that is a problem and that is a real conservatism and that is a negative conservatism i think that will make it harder for them to change and harder for them to make the changes that they actually do recognise needs to be made it's very hard to make changes if it means ending your own job and making yourself irrelevant that's part of the problem about Malaysia well it's not an easy question the people say that there are only 70 policies and 70s so whether we want to try and break the party with the state but i would say that in Malaysia for example the experience of change of government at a state level Penang, Kelantan, Sabah, Islam, they change but at a federal level it's something different it's always been a surgeon for his life when politics become more competitive nothing is not in store now if you compare what are the challenges what are the challenges whether it's possible or not possible experience a change of government i think we have to do that both side of the political divide now we see that what challenge the kind of challenge that there's a national space in the other side of the political climate there is a facing same challenge but my question is particularly my understanding is when Amno's tendency in telling the narrative of Malaysia for instance is to see Malaysia itself as largely an Amno creation now the historical record is a bit different I mean Amno is part of it but it's not an Amno creation even so it's said to be given their position in some discussion in the other way their position is ensured it's thought of and attributed to by Amno but Amno seeing itself as really identical to the state in that same way that we just heard of in Singapore that's makes it hard to conceptualize the state and neutral separate from the governing party yeah if you look at I mean you look from that angle you can see that Amno is very much institutionalized in terms of what you call is the party itself closeness with the system the state as well as the society but again probably this is something that is good for Amno it is something that is good for Amno you have this one for this the benefit of incompetence you also have the benefit of one for this mobilization organizational strength that you have in terms of how you mobilize the people that you have here this one for this advantageous it's good for the nation good for the nation it is but it's very subjective it is it is it is very very much subjective always one yes you have this the kind of political structure let's look at example how Amno one of these operate both at the professional level both at the structure and how Amno responds to the changes taking place in the society even though that we say that Amno is having this one for this the strength for the benefit of the currency with the kind of organizational structure deep in the comfort up to the local this casual level but what will determine Amno's future is how we transform the party and how we transform the party and how we respond to the changes in the society the same example recently there has been a work called this constitutional amendment where the party election will not be determined by there's a couple of thousands to come to the general assembly to cast their vote but those at the different traditional level will also have their say yes this is how Amno responded to change and this you can find say for example in the democratic action party you cannot find it in the party you cannot find it in party islam but Amno has responded this so if you say say for example now we talked about parties have to respond to the changes in the society you also look at how their position responded to the changes in the society has they have they been responsible enough to warrant political change and they change so this is a serious question mark people always look at Amno you don't look at pass you don't look at the AP you don't look at the changes hey thank you for that vigorous response would anybody else like to come in on this or we yeah i think that uh there are just a couple points i would like to make i think marzuki is correct but i think there is been a democratization of the electoral process with the help of them and i do think that there has been a much more concerted effort to go into the election and work hard in many of the levels i think that there is a fair comment unfortunately however Amno has not held his elections yet we're looking at over three years before it's this last title of selection so we haven't seen some of his changes being brought into the party in any fundamental way because the elections have been most owned before the other elections i think the other issue that i think is a big challenge is that Amno is actually really dealing with a crisis of identity as it transforms itself from the perspective of what it stands for in terms of policies what it stands for in terms of identity issues in terms of religion and can you can you say that but what do you mean well i think you know there is uh what Amno stands for in the society is really about a competency as opposed to a party that has a clear sense of what its ideology is and i think you see for example most recently you've had the lama Amno members in Johor calling for hudu now which is doesn't mesh with what has traditionally been with an Amno secular position in terms of questions of on issues of religion so i think there is a very unclear sense of what the party's identity is beyond being holding on to an elementous sense of power i might just add to that i think that Amno has been enormously successful in transforming just about everything or most things or many things in Malay society the remarkable exception is it is not transforming itself and this is from one point of view an anomaly and from another point of view the key national obstacle whether or not the other parties mostly have transformed as an interesting but very subsidiary question what transforming Amno means means transforming a situation where the Amno having been in power for half a century and more where the state is like a glove that's made to fit one hand in one hand only it's the hand of Amno and where that hand is now the different things of that hand are tearing the hand apart and that is a fundamental not just an issue about can parties transform that's a fundamental question about the nature of the state what makes the Malaysian state i won't say particularly but interesting from a comparative point of view is that because of the underlying ethnicization what i call that of the whole political dynamic you have this very peculiar interlocking nature gets back to let me say that question it's interesting in between elements in state party civil service government judiciary in national economic leadership police security all these things it's a tightly interlocking network all based on the notion that on the notion there's something called a Malay position whatever that might be to protect and that Amno is the only successful guardian of that and this gets to Britsburg Britsburg that that rationale of Amno has now become has become problematic and increasingly implausible to many of the people and Amno appears a little bit can we just put back to Chandra for a minute will you say something about this too in your discussion of the economy I mean how much how much of that world is actually independent of separate from you can separate out from just intangible from the the elite it's quite interesting it's been a long long time since i've heard discussion about the reason why i will say that is most discussions young people don't want so much discussion on the previous leaders they want the current political minds tell them where the next trajectory should be so this discussion about mental minister as if the economy is based on him it's a bit dated to me no offense to the discussions we made what about if you just talk of the PIP and not about this one youngster but the PIP itself is in a transition it is in a transition actually it's very interesting to see how the transition is occurring it's occurring because of two reasons one is the economy itself requires the political mindset to change because of the social issues they are rising and the social dimension that's arising which is it's something quite different from the way the political party has been thinking about how to manage economy they are purely pro-business they are driven by pro-business and economy itself so when they have to deal with these social issues that is certain conflicts that are arising the second dimension that's really changing the political mind is the young people young people are really really changing the way the political scenarios and the political equilibrium of change is here whether it's the the young to the civil society or even the young themselves who are basically traveling quite a bit I would say by more than how of a youth should have traveled quite widely across the world and people across the world so when they come back they bring back more different kind of ideas that need political shift because end of the day it's not the old people which is again the argument that old people basically they will go and vote for the current party the incumbent party it's very clear the the issue is the young what is their mindset and will they vote for the incumbent that is the challenge which the current 80 government is thinking about how to meet that challenge and you can see the response they have in terms of the members they bring it in terms of the new whether each minister have a tutor each minister has a Facebook they respond to those Facebook and they they're rigorously better they respond not that mature but they do respond and it comes on the paper the minister respond and so on so they realize that to meet this challenge of the changing mindset not outside but within the economy becomes an important challenge so that is the new politics there is a new politics in the new centuries which is going to much more interesting that going to change a clothing time so just Michael like when you start the future in the balance world there is one point of comparison between Singapore and Malaysia in this that really strikes me as obviously a conversation around the table in Malaysia in unknown changes the country changes that is not the case in Singapore the party is just a vehicle for something much more important much more significant that's the elite you go through the you go through the civil service you go through business in Malaysia you find the PA you find the unknown and the MCA you go through business and you go through the civil service in Singapore you do not find some of the government's most effective defenders are not members of the party they are civil servants they are invited over a company to join the party at the same time as they are invited to come into Parliament the party is just a vehicle for something much more significant in Singapore hey thank you we've got another microphone moving around yeah others got angles on on these two countries as ideal states yeah speaking of the question of capacity if we were to assume out of the current situation that takes us a common view if modernity were sort of objected a teleological ideal which of the two countries in Malaysia seems to be close to achieving it or has more of this building blocks bearing in mind that modernization is not the same as modernity and modernity is probably not best achieved through erasing one's history and culture also referring to legacy and different news legacy in terms of progress to modernity and different news legacy in any way compared to Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and the Turkish Republic or the major restoration in Japan a person that I don't think so but with what you've made who was the who was the question to everyone we haven't discussed Kemal Ataturk yet would you like to do that I'll take that part that's on the can you do it I'm not about to discuss Kemal Ataturk although Richard and others probably want to talk about the extent to which the Turkish model or anti-Kemalism has now become the the imagine Malanka Kahadapa the new desired way forward of the oppositional Islamic forces I once likened Mahathiyas Mahathiyas blinder agenda to a kind of a Ataturkism I believe he was not pleased with the comparison I would say that in a sense Singapore don't quote me because that's a bit of a quote but Singapore what Singapore's achieved in my is the kind of the achievement of a kind of a sort of a baston half brother to modernity it's a kind of new high modernist authoritarianism of a very sophisticated and successful within certain within limits which are now being which have a certain successful kind I don't believe that Malaysia has achieved the kind of or is even on a trajectory to at the moment towards achieving the kind of modernity that it really needs and then that it imagines it aspires to let's just get that high modernist authoritarianism something like that yes don't quote you well I mean it's not in German but Adolf Hitler would have liked the efficiency of the whole operation would the asian century like which is our that's a serious question that may be in the future I hope it's I hope there's I hope as Bridget says there are greater elements of liberalization and checks and balances that will come in as countervailing forces to that high quasi modernist or you know authoritarianism wonderful I wanted to be with it one check of western modernist side of the first session idea of the national commemoration this is obviously with regards to Malaysia and I said uh the national commemoration seems to encompass the whole society I just wanted to briefly practice my my question and some comments I think at Singapore and Malaysia there's a very dynamic very ethical relationship between the two there's an intrinsic intellect if you look at the two countries I mean Bridget talked about the fact that there are these long regimes with uncontinuous folk rule and and compared to what some people have a lot in common here I know people Singapore the government begins to look at I'm going to say look at this here this great space politics will not work here but what is the sense of Singapore Singapore's model is public relations and subtlety there need to share it to the very opposite as people have written that in Singapore there is this big relation I never can really look at the immigration there's a whole post of they wanted to get the importance and check as well in Singapore and I think that's a very interesting dynamic and I think it's saying in Malaysia there's a lot more of a vibrant civil society is compared to Singapore so very quickly I wanted the prime minister to talk about this national commemoration with much fanfare but it seems to be something that is still quite state managed so to what extent is this national commemoration something that is very sincere and substantive or to what extent is it a case of a case of knowing you've kind of lost the plot I'm surrounded by a coterie of sickle fans I've lost touch of the ground I need to engage with the people in order to keep the regime in power I would like to know about yet especially yet my willing to do you know thank you national conversations like all forms of consultation take on a particular hue when they're conducted by those in power to those who don't have power and the Singapore elite while they're shocked last year is really having trouble coming to terms with the fact that it can it can get in so long and the habits of power are very deep in grain very hard to shape off and I don't believe they are very well equipped to carry on what I think to carry on the spirit of what they mean by that that expression a national conversation quite frankly I don't know what a national conversation is I know a conversation between you and me I don't know what a national conversation is so I wouldn't put too much faith in that I think they would like to do it but they want to do it still keep control which is a problem for everyone just to pick up on the issue of inequality in a discussion you know a parent has a conversation with a child two peers have conversations with each other two parents have conversations with each other I think there is an unequal discourse in a national conversation that is still based on a sense of not a real sense of equality in terms of listen the second aspect of the issue of the national conversation is who's in the table and who's being included as part of it and I think as recently in recent press the question is whether or not the opposition in Singapore should be part of that conversation what elements of civil society should be parts of that conversation what who is actually going to be included what we've seen in the past in the P&P is that they get feedback from the converted and they listen to those that they think will want to hear from them and speak back to them and they don't necessarily see the outer surface of the poor food and I think this is the question of the inclusiveness of the conversation the third thing is a conversation you know we can hear something but we don't listen we can interpret something through a particular lens but we cannot understand it I think a conversation is not something that can be done in isolation from listening empathy and understanding and this is where I think the challenges of the P&P basis are in basically be able to get out of their box and understand where the discourse is coming from and what are the reasons for that and to challenge some of the assumptions of their governance and this is the hardest part of the transition of the P&P spaces yeah what she said yeah I'm really interested in that topic um I think there's a real contrast between Singapore and I think the Malaysian we can't go to it now what a national conversation might be but listening is part of it and it seems to me that one can show the good deal of listening also goes on in Malaysia but I know there's a great deal of passion that doesn't seem obvious and secondly it does seem to me to be much more inclusive in Malaysia I don't mean it's a happy conversation necessarily but it's it involves lots of bodies so next question so I'm sorry question to make any comments and why I'm just a shock when I didn't know how to speak so I'll start with a short joiner um I was looking to speak a lot about political constitution and how it was changing and things like that I'm just trying to make sense of that comment on one hand and the other which is uttered by your boss you know by the way first God and mission began you know how does that make any sense in the end of the more general question which I guess I want more comments from Chandra and Bridget um there is definitely electoral dissection maybe even deep electoral dissection in both Malaysia and Singapore but I think this masks a deeper dimension of sort of like the sort of human dignity in both regimes not respecting the individual citizens as a person and view from this angle that the word success perhaps is not so appropriate for these two qualities about half century their formation and in a way I think the thesis can be constructed that the story of Malaysia in Singapore 50 years later is actually one of two failed social experiments which began in the 60th century they decided quite grossly they need to go their own ways press on India with their own ideas and it's sort of like hit the rocks of it and so instead of thinking of them as models you could think of them as warnings about that activity do not run into troubles okay I just respond to the first question is now whether you first relation set but I think don't make too much into it don't make it a problem and there I used to say of course of course you see how you look at I would rather judge a statement by not just what a person says but what he gives and what influence is this by you look at Malaysia for example as I said for example as a minister of education the deputy prime minister is a minister of education if you think that it is a zero sum give kind of statement that Malaysia will always have what they want and Chinese will never get what they want he will never approve 2.4 billion in the EU with an annual budget to national prime minister the national prime minister in Singapore is a largely so i don't understand because you don't have you don't have the government doesn't spend billion for Chinese education you don't have it in Australia but you have it in in Malaysia China is 30 percent over 30 percent of the population so what does this mean? it means that it means in a democratic center you cannot ignore any ethical not in Malaysia you cannot ignore the Chinese in Malaysia you cannot ignore Indians in Malaysia you cannot ignore the Malays in Malaysia when politics becomes so competitive when you find that in your own constituency for example there are 30 percent Chinese voters in your constituency really ignore the Chinese people talk about ethnic exclusion what kind of ethnic exclusion there so i think religion politics has moved towards being more being more inclusive well if you say i would say i'm the first in Malaysia second identity wise identity wise i'm very rooted deeply rooted in the Malay culture Malay identity i would say i'm the Malay but that doesn't make me less Malaysian doesn't make me less Malaysian you can see a Chinese first Malaysian second does this make you less Malaysian as a Chinese i don't think so you can see your Indian first and Malaysian second does that make you less Malaysian Mahathir says it sounds Mahathir says it does well you can see that i mean anybody can see it no no in his in his memoirs he makes that exact in his memoirs Mahathir makes that exact point that that you need to be Malaysian first and it does make you somewhat less Malay less Chinese less Indian nevertheless he conceptualizes it completely in racial terms well i think i don't don't take a particular statement out of context but i see just now it is identity wise the problem is that the problem is because when you talk about model for example we think that there is only one model you understand this in a particular from a particular perspective that this must be must be the one and only but if you look at say for example this now that particular statement if you look at from the cultural perspective not political perspective it's not political if that is translated into political statement that will later on reflect policies that the government made this is very zero sum game and that is not sustainable relation contacts the zero sum game politics is not sustainable we just have to to cater to the needs to listen to the explorations of people of various races of various