September 19, 2017

What constitutes a family in Singapore?

It is not uncommon for the family to be considered as the ‘building block’ of a community and nation, but what exactly is the ‘family’? In many Western and non-Western contexts, the dual-parent family continues to be viewed as the ‘normal’ and desirable family form. In Singapore, this means that single parents outside the margins of ‘normality’ – including divorcees, widowed parents and unmarried parents – are considered by the state as undesirable.

The Singapore government’s efforts to discourage single parenthood take the form of asymmetrical policy directives. This means that certain groups of single parents may not be eligible for benefits given to married couples, such as subsidized public housing; special tax rebates; and other grants for education and skills upgrading. According to Prof. Brenda Yeoh (Department of Geography) et al., the state’s privileging of dual-parent family values and exclusion of other family forms have led to single parents becoming a ‘silent minority’ whose concerns are marginalized in favour of Singaporeans who form ‘normal’ two-parent families. This ‘silent minority’ therefore needs to negotiate the ‘spaces’ of family life in a variety of cultural, economic and political contexts.

In their paper, Prof. Yeoh et al. noted that single parents have internalized to some extent notions of a ‘normal’ family. In addition, views on remarriage as a way to return to ‘normality’ are strikingly differentiated by gender. While single fathers are uneasy taking on the ‘unnatural’ role of ‘nurturer’ and thus consider remarrying a ‘necessity’, single mothers are more likely to consider remarrying as an extra burden for themselves, suggesting remnants of patriarchal notions about gender relations and roles of husband/wife and mother/father.

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