Psst. No one's debating foreign policy

By Janadas Devan
May 01, 2006
The Straits Times

THE nominations are done, the candidates have begun their campaigns. In the six days that remain before Singaporeans cast their ballots, we will hear a great deal from the ruling People's Action Party and the opposition of their respective approaches to public policy.

Health care and education, housing upgrades and transportation charges, civil liberties and democracy - all these will be subjects of debate and controversy.

One issue, however, is not likely to figure much in this election - and that is Singapore's foreign policy. Indeed, the issue has not been a subject of intense partisan debate since the 1960s, when the Barisan Socialis challenged the PAP on the presence of British military bases in Singapore, relations with Maoist China and then Indonesian president Sukarno's policy of Konfrontasi with Malaysia.

In the current general election, ruling party politicians have virtually pleaded with the opposition to make foreign policy a campaign issue, or at least discuss it. How would you propose to deal with Singapore's closest neighbours, Malaysia and Indonesia, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has asked the opposition. How about terrorism? And how would you position Singapore in a rapidly changing geopolitical environment, with China and India emerging as economic superpowers?

So far, only one opposition politician, the Singapore Democratic Alliance's Chiam See Tong, has responded to Mr Lee's challenge.

Significantly, his answers on terrorism and the challenges posed by China and India did not differ from the PAP's. Involve all Singaporeans in combating terrorism, he said, repeating the Ministry of Home Affairs' familiar line; and nurture a more open and creative society, he urged, repeating the recommendation of countless Restructuring Singapore committees.

On the question of Singapore's relations with its neighbours, too, Mr Chiam's line resembled the PAP's - but the PAP of half-a-century ago: Establish an 'economic union' with Malaysia, he recommended, a proposal he has advanced many times before, including in the 2001 election.

Combining Singapore's 4 million population with Malaysia's 23 million would create a ready market of 27 million, he argued.

'Whether you want to make shoes or umbrellas, you have this sudden market of 27 million to sell your products to,' he said. 'The economy would thus have the potential to grow by leaps and bounds. We will have a double-digit growth every year.'

Unfortunately, we have been there before - merger with Malaysia, 1963 to 1965; done that - the common market with Malaysia that the PAP had set so much store by in the first decade of its existence; and failed - separation from Malaysia on Aug 9, 1965, and the end of the abortive common market, which Kuala Lumpur had not allowed to become very common in the first place. Why would one re-embark on a venture that one knows from experience is destined to fail?

Furthermore, even if an 'economic union' with Malaysia were possible, surely the days when Singapore could thrive by attaching itself to a market of just 27 million are long past.

For one thing, we are not making shoes and umbrellas any longer. For another, the challenge which the smaller Asian economies will face in the coming decades will be to hold their own against the giant markets of China (population 1.3 billion) and India (one billion).

A market of just 27 million is not going to hack it against such giants. Only a market of 500 million, which is what Asean would constitute if it became a viable free trade area, would measure up. That is the challenge all Asean governments will face in the next decade, and it is by no means clear they will succeed in creating such a market, given the wide disparities among their economies.

In the meantime, Singapore will have to continue doing what it has done for the past 40 years - which is hook up with the rest of the world, including the advanced economies as well as China and India, and be a hub for global multinationals by providing them with infrastructure and facilities superior to those available elsewhere in the region.

Despite Mr Chiam's somewhat nostalgic intervention, Singapore's foreign policy is not likely to become a subject of controversy in the current election. There is a simple reason for that: It is almost impossible to conceive of alternatives to the fundamentals of that policy. Ultimately, these derive, not from the free exercise of imagination, but from a realistic appraisal of the strategic and economic predicament Singapore finds itself in.

One of the most succinct definitions of that predicament that I know of was offered, not by a Singaporean, but by a foreigner. Many years ago, in 1973, then New Zealand Prime Minister Norman Kirk told then Singapore Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, that New Zealand and Singapore had one thing in common - they were both 'odd'. But while New Zealand, with Antarctica as its largest close neighbour, was the 'odd man out', Singapore, Mr Kirk said, was the 'odd man in'.

The chief, and most important, determinant of a country's foreign policy is location. Where it is, who are its neighbours, whether it is landlocked or on the coast - these count for far more than ideals or principles. Ideals and principles are important, but geography is coercive.

If Singapore were in the middle of Europe, say, like Switzerland, or next to Antarctica, like New Zealand, then its foreign policy would obviously be very different too. But it is in the middle of South-east Asia - a multiracial, multi-religious country in the middle of an overwhelmingly Muslim archipelago. And South-east Asia itself is sandwiched between North Asia and South Asia - a collection of relatively small states stuck between two huge continental powers, China and India. Being 'odd' is one thing. More significant is where you are odd in.

That unavoidable fact has shaped Singapore's posture across the board. It determines its defence policies; it determines its preference for a continued United States presence in the region to help maintain a stable regional balance of power; and it determines the general thrust of its economic policies, which for 40 years has focused on making the island a nodal point in the global economy.

What is, is - and it is useless trying to deceive oneself with choices that do not exist.