TIL detention without trial is a thing in Singapore [^1], ministers love to brag about increasing the severity of detention without trial [^2], and that the longest someone was held in detention without trial in Singapore was 23+9 years [^3]. That person was never charged.
[^1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_Law_(Temporary_Provis...
[^2]: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/politics/my-views-on-...
There's an extremely low fertility rate paired with a rapidly aging population. When I visited there were endless advertisements for geriatric type care / end-of-life type planning / etc, and a notably older population working quite low wage jobs in a place where everything was crazy expensive, especially relative to its northern neighbor. It felt depressing.
It seems like one of those places that is probably quite nice if you're loaded, but it seems like a pretty rough place if you're not already well off. I was also surprised that many of the stereotypes about 'one fine city' were not quite on the mark. Jaywalking, crossing against a cross-walk light, and various other little infractions were ever-present which left me feeling a bit odd as when in Rome do what the Romans do, but yeah... not gonna risk that.
I think Singapore's immigration policy is still interesting and relevant to western countries, but it's true it's also kind of similar to the UAE.
Essentially it's (relatively) easy to get work visas for areas where there's a genuine shortage but difficult to get permanent residency and almost impossible to get citizenship.
That's still a very different policy to what most western countries have right now.
The UAE has the most extreme version of this so the milder Singaporean version is less interesting as an example.
Do they get to vote? Also in general elections? Are they typically organised in unions?
The UAE still murders gay men just for beeing gay. Besides the lack of morality this affects 7 % of all men worldwide.
Im not sure if UAE really be an exciting place and thus would someone migrate to it if you care about culture and stuff.
Yes, Singapore will execute people for different reasons, not for being gay.
OP's critique feels like a celebrity economist's variant of those travel magazine pieces that tell us why Zermatt, Phuket or Nantucket is no longer a "cool" vacation spot. On some sort of momentary buzz meter, sure.
But the factors that help Singapore be an Asian or often global hub in so many respects are still running strong, no? Worrying about whether a couple dozen X/Twitter legends are hyping you today feels silly.
The difference between Singapore and yoghurt?
Yoghurt has an active culture.
> Singapore’s free speech restrictions, whatever you think of them, no longer seem so far outside the box. Trump is suing plenty of people. The UK is sending police to knock on people’s doors for social media posts, and so on. That too makes Singapore more of a “normal country"
That seems like it should make Singapore _more_ cool, at least my personal theory is that this changed a lot of perception of China (at least in some parts of gen z social media, "it's a very Chinese time").
Cool? Out of all the major world commercial hubs, wasn't it always the hottest and muggiest?
Ironically, UAE and Qatar have nicer weather in the winter than Singapore.
I think it is due to China. I remember Singapore was a large financial center for Asia, but China's rapid growth overshadowed Singapore.
I also think Hong Kong is going through the same thing, plus I believe China is trying to make Shanghai into its main Finance Center, letting Hong Kong's center fade away.
It's hilarious that we think of Singapore as competing with China where China has 1000x more people.
Singapore is pretty impressive.
Look at the map, all ocean travel between East Asia and India/Europe basically has to go past Singapore. They've been a trade and financial center with a substantial chinese population for a long time.
Well, 230x.
SG's value-add was as a door into China. China has strict capital controls so it makes FDI risky.
During the 1990s when there were open questions about HK's status, a lot of the business community (and at least 10% of HKers) immigrated to SG to operate there.
During the 2000s, the PRC made some good faith attempts at assuaging investor sentiment in HK, and that slowed the business and financial services outflow from HK to SG as HK had added linkages to Mainland China that SG would never have.
And during the 2010s-2020s the flow from HK moved back to SG since China started their major changes in HK.
I'd say it went 50-50 Mainland-Singapore.
By 2019, if you were a Chinese company that only intends to operate within China, you had no reason not to move legal and leadership operations to Shanghai.
If you were a foreign investor, HK functionally de facto becoming "yet another Chinese territory" means it's not a good hedge for an ExChina/China+One strategy which is executed in ASEAN or India, so Singapore becomes attractive.
Basically, the only loser was HK.
That said, this is all business and financial services - no one was actually dedicating serious effort building sustained R&D capacity in either HK or SG.
> If you were a Chinese company that only intended to operate within China, you had no reason not to move legal and leadership operations to Shanghai.
Where's the example where you're a Chinese company with most revenue in China (for now) but do sell elsewhere and anyhow, there are lots of reasons to not 100% stick to China,
e.g. gaming companies have moved to Singapore in masses (at least some capacity) due to time and time of gaming crackdowns and censorship
we call it the rich version of north korean
It hasn't been cool for a long time. My dad was offered Singaporean citizenship in the 1990s despite then being an Indian national but decided to immigrate to the US to work in tech in Silicon Valley instead and raise us. This is a pretty common story among Bay Area Chinese and Indian Americans who immigrated during that era.
In the 90s and 2000s, Singapore's value add was that it could act as a door into China, India, and ASEAN due to expansive trade and investment treaties, but why would I want to build an R&D center in Changi staffed with PRCs and Indians when I could just hire them directly in Shenzhen or Bangalore.
After China committed to being hands-off on HK business law in the 2000s, SG lost some value as it didn't have the same connections that HK had legally speaking to enter the Chinese market.
SG continues to remain the best place to incorporate a business in Asia, but just because your lawyers and holding company is in SG it doesn't mean your operations, operational headcount, and capital expenditures is there.
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Man, imagine the biggest complaint that people can come up with re: a country is that you don't like the local english pidgin's politeness marker.
this kinda comment damn jialat sia. come outside settle
I'll take "begging the question" for $500.
There’s a reason William Gibson called it “Disneyland with the Death Penalty”
https://www.wired.com/1993/04/gibson-2/
Well, to get the death penalty you have to be charged. I actually think Singapore laws on what could get you the death penalty are pretty clear, and you'd be stupid to violate them. Being detained without trial seems scarier imo