The History of Singapore

1955-56 was the peak of mass participation in Singapore’s democratic process. Singapore has a long tradition of highly politicised mutual associations, with fierce internal and external competition. From 1955, thanks to the new government, space for legitimate political activity rapidly expanded in Singapore. Yet the public also understood that the constitution heavily circumscribed what elected ministers could achieve in the Legislative Assembly. In this episode, PJ Thum explains how and why associations became the focus of political activity in Singapore, and how they transformed the organisation and practice of politics in Singapore. Please send questions, comments, and feedback tothehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show atpatreon.com/pjthum.

“Living in a Time of Deception” by Dr Poh Soo Kai will be launched at 2pm on Saturday 13 Feb at the Holiday Inn Atrium, Outram Road. Please come! www.facebook.com/events/214541525557653/

Is it right to use illegal means to resist evil? Or is law and order paramount? Where do we draw the line? How do we decide? This is the moral quandary that faced the actors of the Hock Lee Bus Strike. The law was on the side of the deceitful, exploitative, underhanded owners of Hock Lee Amalgamated Bus Company. The workers felt they had no choice but to resort to an illegal strike to uphold their own rights and dignity. Who was right? Your answer to that question is shaped by your values. Hock Lee demonstrates how history is formed of multiple overlapping perspectives, and that reasonable people can disagree very strongly about the same events and both be correct. In this episode, PJ Thum discusses the context and events of Hock Lee, the many different perspectives on the strike and riot, and how the strike altered Singapore’s anticolonial politics. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show at patreon.com/pjthum.
“Living in a Time of Deception” by Dr Poh Soo Kai: www.facebook.com/events/214541525557653/

 

The outcome of the 1955 general election was a massive shock to the British colonial government of Singapore. They had held the elections precisely because they had expected conservative, pro-British parties to win. They had believed that the silent majority of Singaporeans were conservative. But Singapore was not a conservative society and were not interested in conservative policies. Singaporeans voted in droves for the progressive, left-wing parties. The Labour Front, led by the great David Marshall, was the big winner. In this episode, PJ Thum explains why the British so badly misunderstood the electorate; why the Labour Front won the election; the significance of the 1955 elections; and why Singapore cannot be characterised as a conservative society. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit http://thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show at http://patreon.com/pjthum.

In the aftermath of the 13 May 1954 incident (aka “The “Riot Squad Brutally Beats Up A Group of Unarmed Students on 13 May 1954” Incident), the government insisted on seeing the incident as being about maintaining internal order and security in Singapore. It completely ignored the underlying factors which contributed to the incident, including the long history of discrimination, harassment, and oppression towards Chinese students. In this episode, PJ Thum explores what happened after 13 May; how the government’s refusal to understand the causes of the event radicalised the Chinese students, giving birth to a new force in Singapore’s decolonisation; and how this set the scene for future political upheavals and riots. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show at patreon.com/pjthum.

 

On 13 May 1954, the Singapore Police’s Riot Squad charged into a group of 900 unarmed students, brutally beating them, sending 30 to the hospital and arresting 48. The students were not protesting, but were quietly awaiting the outcome of a meeting at nearby Government House. This incident was a turning point in Singapore history – never before had the state conducted such unprovoked and outrageous violence against unarmed students. Worse, in the wake of the incident, the colonial government blamed the students for provoking the riot squad. In this episode, PJ Thum explains the long history of government deceit that led to this act of colonial brutality and its impact on Singapore’s decolonisation. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit http://thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show at http://patreon.com/pjthum.

Apologies for the voice – I have a very bad sore throat.

To safeguard British interests in Singapore after independence, the British desired to leave behind a reliably pro-British population, who would identify themselves as British. To achieve this, the colonial government embarked on massive social engineering to destroy Chinese culture and education. In this episode of “The History of Singapore”, PJ Thum explains why and how the British sought to transform Singapore’s Chinese into loyal English-speaking British subjects, and how this alienated and radicalised the Chinese-speaking community. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com. Support the show at patreon.com/pjthum.

The campaign for Nanyang University (“Nantah”) was the first mass-based, locally oriented, popular campaign in Malaya, and resulted in Southeast Asia’s first crowdfunded university. Why were the Chinese so passionate about Nantah? Why did Chinese people from all walks of life give so much of their precious, hard-earned money to bring about its creation? And perhaps most importantly, what does the creation of Nantah tell us about how Malaya’s Chinese saw their place in Malaya and the composition identity? In this episode, PJ Thum delves into detail about the legendary Nantah campaign; explains the opposing visions of Malayan identity held by the Chinese and the British colonial authorities; and concludes with how the success of its campaign, in the teeth of heavy colonial resistance, emboldened and empowered the Chinese, setting up the explosive confrontations of the next few years. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com. Please note there will be no episodes on Christmas or New Year’s Day. The podcast will return on 8 January 2016.

 

Post-War Singapore was divided into two worlds. In one, rich English-speaking Singaporean elites enjoyed unprecedented political participation and prosperity due to a new constitution; in the other, non-English speaking Singaporean workers were economically exploited, politically neglected, hounded, harassed, detained, and even tortured and deported because of the Malayan Emergency. In this episode, PJ Thum explores these divisions and in particular explains how the events from 1948 – 1952 starkly illustrate the sharp divide that created, in effect, two very different Singapores in one country. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com.

World War II in Southeast Asia was a minor disagreement compared to what came after. With the defeat of the Japanese and end of World War II came the real conflict in Southeast Asia, one that continues to define Southeast Asia to this day: the battle between Southeast Asians for ownership over the newly independent states. Central to this conflict was the question of identity. If you control the definition of a national identity, you can control the membership of a nation, and thus control ownership of a nation-state. In this episode, PJ Thum discusses the opening salvoes of Malaya’s most vicious, savage, violent battle: the battle over Malayan identity. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com.

Singapore was ripped from the hands of one Empire by another on 15 February 1942. The military aspects of Japan’s Malayan campaign have been well studied – but what were its implications for Malayan independence? In this week’s episode, PJ Thum discusses the two major impacts of the Japanese Occupation of Singapore on Singapore’s (and the rest of Malaya’s) subsequent independence movement. Please send questions, comments, and feedback to thehistoryofsingapore@gmail.com or visit thehistoryofsingapore.com.