September 15, 2023

The International Day of Democracy is held annually on 15 September to raise public awareness about democracy. As a political system, democracy takes on many forms. For example, Singapore’s style of democracy differs from conventional understandings of liberal democracy. Professor Chua Beng Huat (NUS Department of Sociology and Anthropology), in ‘Towards a non-liberal communitarian democracy’ (in Communitarian Ideology and Democracy in Singapore (Routledge, 2002)), discusses Singapore’s non-liberal communitarian democracy and demonstrates that the required political institutions for such a political system are paradoxically similar to that of liberal democracy.

Prof Chua writes that the People’s Action Party’s (PAP) ideology of communitarianism in Singapore has helped justify state interventions in all spheres of social life in the name of ensuring the collective good. Yet political legitimacy was sustained due to economic success and perceived good governance. However, electoral support for the PAP and its embodied communitarian ideology declined throughout the 1980s, which prompted a rethinking of ideological concepts and administrative practices.

Prof Chua argues that three institutions, which are also present in liberal democracies, are necessary for the upholding of Singapore’s communitarian democracy. Firstly, having free and fair elections provides a barometer for the level of consensus in the state, which provides feedback for the PAP to be more responsive to public sentiments in order to marshal support for communitarianism. Secondly, establishing rights to interest group formation allows the inclusion of diverse interests into the idea of Singapore’s collective good, helping the PAP to better forge consensus and uphold communitarianism. Finally, instituting an independent press lends credibility to the PAP and provides constructive feedback for the PAP to improve its pursuit of the collective good.

Prof Chua concludes that unless the PAP government adopts such institutions, it will still fall short of meeting the necessary conditions for a communitarian democracy to which it allegedly aspires.

Find out more about the book here.