October 3, 2025

As part of our ‘Celebrating Singapore Studies: Sixty Years of Nationhood’ campaign for SG60, we present the ‘Looking Back, Moving Forward’ video series — inviting reflection on how Singapore’s past shapes its future.

Through the work of NUS FASS researchers, the series uncovers the complexities behind the nation’s celebrated ‘success story’, bringing to light the inequalities, contradictions, and costs often overlooked.

In the third video, ‘Local Lives, Global Currents’, FASS researchers invite us to see Singapore not as a postcard of efficiency but as a living laboratory where the pulse of everyday life quietly rewrites the global script.

By turning the lens on local voices and ordinary routines, they reveal how the city-state’s smallest gestures—spoken, planted, prayed—echo far beyond its shores, shaping the very architecture of our shared future.

Read more about the four publications featured in this episode on the Singapore Research Nexus (SRN) website using the link above each publication.

1. https://fass.nus.edu.sg/srn/2025/07/23/herding-cats-coordination-challenges-in-aseans-approach-to-china/

• Chong, J. I. (2023). Herding Cats: Coordination Challenges in ASEAN’s Approach to China. China Review, 23(1), 307-339. https://www.jstor.org/stable/48717997

2. https://fass.nus.edu.sg/srn/2025/03/15/can-classic-moral-stories-with-anthropomorphized-animal-characters-promote-childrens-honesty/

• Ding, X. P., Tay, C., Chua, Y. J., & Cheng, J. K. T. (2023). Can classic moral stories with anthropomorphized animal characters promote children’s honesty? Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 85, 101498. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appdev.2022.101498

3. https://fass.nus.edu.sg/srn/2025/03/03/half-of-land-use-carbon-emissions-in-southeast-asia-can-be-mitigated-through-peat-swamp-forest-and-mangrove-conservation-and-restoration/

• Sasmito, S. D., Taillardat, P., Adinugroho, W. C., Krisnawati, H., Novita, N., Fatoyinbo, L., Friess, D. A., Page, S. E., Lovelock, C. E., Murdiyarso, D., Taylor, D., & Lupascu, M. (2025). Half of land use carbon emissions in Southeast Asia can be mitigated through peat swamp forest and mangrove conservation and restoration. Nature Communications, 16(1), 740. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-55892-0

4. https://fass.nus.edu.sg/srn/2025/04/17/retelling-railway-histories-centring-labour/

• Sinha, V. (2023). Temple Tracks: Labour, Piety and Railway Construction in Asia (1st ed., Vol. 16). Berghahn Books. https://doi.org/10.2307/jj.9891561