History is behind Singapore becoming a democracy
:Stanford don
Singapore Democrats
MONDAY, 26 APRIL 2010
Chee Soon Juan (centre), moderator, with the four speakers
It is a matter of when, not if, Singapore will become a
democracy. This was the view of some of the speakers at a
discussion that was held a couple of weeks ago at the Orchard
Hotel.
Dr Larry Diamond, a political science professor at Stanford
University, made this point when he spoke at length about the
political situation in Singapore. Malaysian opposition MP, Mr Tian
Chua echoed this view, pointing out that Singapore could even
democratise before Malaysia.
The seminar came on the heels of the 6th Assembly of the World
Movement for Democracy (WMD) that was held in Jakarta, Indonesia
from 10-14 Apr 10. Following the conference, some of the organisers
and participants came to Singapore to conduct a seminar to talk
about the importance of networking with pro-democracy around the
world.
Marc Plattner
Dr Marc Plattner, editor of the Journal of
Democracy, briefed the seminar's participants about some of
the developments of the WMD assembly in Jakarta. He spoke about the
impassioned address that the Indonesian President Susilo Bambang
Yudhoyono gave about the need for Asia to democratise.
Another speaker, Dr Larry Diamond talked about the global trends in
the development of democracy and predicted that Singapore will
graduate into a democracy sooner or later.
"History is behind Singapore becoming a democracy," Dr Diamond
pointed out. This is not to say that it is inevitable that
democracy will come, he quickly added, people still need to
take responsibility to make change a reality.
Larry Diamond
Dr Diamond, who had interviewed Mr Lee Kuan Yew a couple of
years ago for one of his books, also listed out some of factors
that were important for political change to occur which
includes:
Tian Chua
Malaysian opposition MP, Mr Tian Chua, was one of the speakers.
He noted that Singapore and Malaysia were like political twins.
Even though the two are separated today, they still contain the
same political DNA. He, too, expressed confidence that Singapore
will one day make the transition to democracy.
"More and more people are beginning to realise that it is not Lee
Kuan Yew's 'brilliant' ideas that has caused this miracle," the
Malaysian politician said, they will realise that it is the civil
service and the other institutions that are helping to move the
economy ahead.
And when people can feel that they don't have to sacrfice that
pension funds or that the stock market will crash because of
political change, they will make the switch to supporting the
opposition, he told the audience.
Ryota Jonen
Mr Chua said that even though ruling regimes change rules or
pile rule upon rule just to stifle change, these rules will
eventually collapse under their own weight and become deadly for
the rulers.
Mr Ryota Jonen, a native of Japan, was the fourth and final
speaker. He encouraged young Singaporeans to become part of the
global network of youths promoting democracy. A coordinator for the
World Movement for Democracy which is based in Washington, DC, Mr
Jonen helps run the World Youth Movement for Democracy.
In this regard Mr Jonen said that there was much that youths could
learn form the seniors in terms of the experience. Being a native
of Hiroshima that went through the horrors of a nuclear bomb in
WWII, he had the opportunity to learn in school from those who
lived through that grim period.
Youth today, he said, would benefit from listening to what
their elders said and not repeat the same mistakes that were made
in the past.
Dr Chee Soon Juan, who chaired the session, closed by saying that
after all the theories have been advanced and all the ideas
scrutinised, change will only come when people come forward to
actively participate in the change process instead of just
commenting from the sidelines.
Videos of the seminar will be posted at a later
time.
http://yoursdp.org/index.php/news/singapore/3640-history-is-behind-singapore-becoming-a-democracy-stanford-don