On Governance: Authority and Order IV
Part 4: Models of Guided Governance
Part 4 of 5. This examination of Singapore’s system and competence-based leadership builds on three parts of foundational critique. Without the prior context on voter psychology, information control, and historical precedents, these examples will seem incomplete and potentially misunderstood. Begin with Part 1. If you are new to my writing, you may also want to read my disclaimer about my thoughts.
Series
Part 1: The Evolution of Authority
Part 2: The Illusion of Choice
Part 3: Individual vs Collective
Part 4: Models of Guided Governance
Part 5: Rethinking Progress and Success (coming soon)
Singapore’s Managed Democracy
Something thought-provoking from recent times is that Singapore’s “managed democracy” has achieved remarkable economic development and social stability in ways that challenge conventional assumptions prevalent in American and European political science literature. While Singapore operates as a democracy on paper, scholars often classify it as “soft authoritarianism.” The people elect Members of Parliament, and the leader of the winning party becomes the Prime Minister for five years before elections must be held, as expected from a Westminster-style parliamentary republic inherited from British colonial administration. A president is also elected separately, though their powers are largely limited to checking on how reserves are utilised and keeping tabs on key appointments—a system that resembles constitutional arrangements in countries like Ireland. So why is democracy so successful in Singapore?
Firstly, the People’s Action Party (PAP) has governed Singapore since 1959, and while elections are held regularly and are generally acknowledged as fraud-free by international observers, the institutional rules, media control, and electoral design make it extremely difficult for opposition parties to gain power. The governance approach in Singapore is immensely regulated, highly efficient, and acutely focused on long-term planning in ways that contrast sharply with electoral cycles in the United States, United Kingdom, or other Western democracies. While elections must be held every five years, there isn’t a fixed term limit, so prime ministers can serve as long as they retain parliamentary confidence (that is, the party maintains a majority and supports their leader). Before the 2024 elections, the prior three leaders served for 31, then 20, and then 14 years, respectively.
When political leadership can govern with long-term certainty, they can plan decades ahead and manage national development like what Singapore’s founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew described as running the country “like a well-managed corporation.” The punctilious and stringent institutional framework manages to keep corruption near zero, outperforming most Western democracies. Freedom of speech, media, and public assembly are tightly regulated through laws that Singaporean legal scholars acknowledge constrain political competition, though Singapore scholars like Chua Being Huat argue this represents a different approach to balancing individual rights with collective welfare rather than simple authoritarianism. In exchange for limited political freedom by American or European standards, Singaporeans receive what surveys consistently show they value highly: stability, safety, economic growth, and competent governance that has transformed a small island nation into one of the world’s wealthiest societies.
Singapore’s success reflects both the institutional design and the cultural context that differs a fair bit from the individualistic assumptions underlying American and European democratic theory. East Asian societies traditionally prioritise social harmony and collective welfare over individual political expression, which provides fertile ground for a “guided democracy” that would likely face resistance in more individualistic cultures prevalent in North America and Western Europe, and scholars and political scientists have argued that Singapore’s approach represents an adaptation of Confucian governance principles to modern institutional frameworks rather than an outright deviation from democratic norms.
However, Singapore’s success, while informative, naturally needs consideration when it comes to scalability and replicability. City-states naturally face inherently distinct challenges that continental nations with broader lands, diverse populations, myriad ethnic groups, and varying regional interests may not encounter. Singapore has a unique position as a Southeast Asian trading hub, and its small scale allows for direct administrative oversight. Additionally, its relatively homogeneous consensus may not transplant seamlessly onto larger societies like India, Brazil, or Nigeria (particularly when considering the traditional cultures whereon these societies are based). It could be, and has been, argued that Singapore’s model works partly because of its exceptional circumstances rather than because of the inherent superiority of guided democracy.
Furthermore, Singapore’s approach was built upon specific conditions that may not fully exist elsewhere: a highly educated population (though we could say this is due to the methods with which Singapore was founded), an absence of significant rural-urban divides, and cultural traditions that accept technocratic governance. And so, the question remains whether societies with different historical experiences (such as those shaped by European colonialism in Africa, indigenous governance traditions in Latin America, or federal systems in large, diverse countries like the United States or Russia) could successfully adapt Singapore’s institutional innovations. Though, this leans into the idea that governance necessitates a distant horizon, which provides the necessary time to build the foundations to construct a successful and stable society.
Nonetheless, the principles underlying Singapore’s success, such as long-term planning insulated from electoral pressure, merit-based selection for key positions, managed information environments that prioritise social stability, and institutional mechanisms that maintain responsiveness through expert feedback rather than popular contestation, can potentially be adapted to different cultural and geographic contexts. The challenge lies in identifying which elements represent universal governance principles versus context-specific adaptations to Singapore’s particular circumstances as a small, wealthy, and strategically located city-state.
Competence
It’s important to look closely at the actual systems that are used to choose leaders, rather than just the common theoretical ideas, to find out whether democratic or centralised systems contribute to better leadership. In theory, democratic systems based on the American and European frameworks are supposed to reward politicians who are effective at local and regional levels before they are promoted to national positions. But is this assumption an accurate reflection of the real world? When faced with the veracity of reality, it often diverges significantly from this ideal.
The truth is that in practice, democratic progress more often resembles “bureaucratic climbing” rather than merit-based promotion. Building coalitions, raising funds, and appealing to electoral bases allow politicians to move up through the party hierarchies, when these skills in actuality don’t have a lot to do with how well they manage their actual duties. Research conducted by South African scholar Mahmoud Mamdani on post-apartheid politics shows us how charismatic figures can excel at campaign rhetoric and emotive speeches while still, in fact, struggling with administrative issues. An analysis of democratic India asserted that electoral success is typically more contingent on caste, regional matters, and media manipulation than on policy efficacy per se.
At the approaching apex of the COVID-19 pandemic, liberal democracies grappled with organising emergency initiatives, waded through parliamentary deadlock, and fought unrelenting misinformation crusades that undermined public health responses. Here we saw patently the undeniable imperfections of decentralised power structures. Conversely, many centralised systems excelled at crisis management. China’s large-scale lockdown coordination showcases how centralised decision-making can mobilise entire communities when urgent action is absolutely critical. Moreover, democratic systems in developing nations tend towards rewarding politicians who master patronage networks and establish ethnic coalitions, instead of those who prove their competence at lower levels. Perpetual campaigning and fundraising can verily go against the kind of long-term thinking and technical expertise requisite to successful governance.
Research on cadre promotion within the Communist Party of China, conducted by Wang Shaogang (a political scientist from China), shed light on how officials rise through the ranks by proving themselves in more and more complex governmental roles. Their careers range from managing counties to cities, then provinces, and finally reaching national leadership. A “performance legitimacy” system is born from the examination system, wherein progress depends on quantifiable results. Results such as economic growth, poverty reduction, and social stability, rather than mere election popularity alone. Similarly, Lee Kuan Yew characterised the Singaporean system as recognising potential leaders early on and then providing them with progressively challenging roles to test their competence before granting any significant authority; this approach has yielded leaders with extensive governing experience and proven track records in specific policy areas.By focusing on institutional capacity-building rather than individual competency, technocrats can ensure that policies are consistently implemented throughout regions without the jurisdictional conflicts that plague federal democracies. One vivid example is when the European Union struggled to coordinate economic policy across member states during the 2008 financial crisis, which contrasts ever so sharply with China’s unified stimulus response, which deployed resources across provinces with extraordinary speed and consistency.
Furthermore, centralised systems demonstrate superior resource coordination capabilities that democratic systems struggle to match, and infrastructure development is a clear example of this. Whereas liberal democracies often while away decades debating or planning large and crucial projects due to governmental red tape, local opposition, and political changes between administrations, centralised systems can complete beneficial infrastructure at what are astonishing rates in the eyes of liberal democracies. China’s high-speed rail network and renewable energy deployment exemplify this aptitude for large-scale coordination.
However, I’d be remiss not to state that centralised systems face their own competence challenges, as acknowledged by scholars in these contexts. Loyalty to superior officials can sometimes outweigh technical competence in promotion decisions (particularly during politically sensitive periods). It’s true that authoritarian systems could create incentives for officials to tell superiors what they want to hear rather than provide accurate information about policy effectiveness, and an analysis of socialist governance shows how ideological conformity requirements can exclude technically competent individuals who hold heterodox views. Transparency International rankings, despite their methodological limitations, suggest that some centralised systems like Singapore achieve remarkably low corruption levels, while others argue that concentrated power can facilitate systematic corruption when institutional safeguards are weak—though this problem is inherent to all governance systems, as we’ll now see.
Singapore and Rwanda demonstrate how centralised systems can achieve exceptional corruption control through institutional discipline and performance accountability. Singapore consistently ranks among the world’s least corrupt nations, while Rwanda has dramatically improved governance indicators under centralised leadership. These systems create clear accountability chains and performance metrics that may be more effective than the diffused responsibility characteristic of democratic systems with multiple veto points. Indian political scientist Ashutosh Varshney’s comparative research indicates that democratic systems provide multiple access points for corruption through campaign financing, legislative lobbying, and electoral competition, but they also create multiple oversight mechanisms through opposition parties, independent media, and civil society organisations.
The evidence suggests that, while democratic ideals may remain important for many, the practical governance advantages of well-structured centralised systems—rapid decision-making, long-term planning capacity, technical expertise prioritisation, and resource coordination—may be better suited to addressing complex 21st-century challenges than the increasingly dysfunctional democratic processes observed in many Western nations.
Look out for the fifth part of this five-part series coming soon.
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