So can you pause to ponder the following well articulatedarticle I picked up from the onlinecitizen.com via:
http://www.theonlinecitizen.com/2013/04/trust-public-institutions-differs-blind-faith/
Trust in Public Institutions Differs From Blind Faith
By: Jeraldine Phneah
Singaporean youth response to ST commentary “Singapore’s biggest blessing: Safety”
I came across a recent post on The Straits Times titled “Singapore’s biggest blessing: Safety”. It was a unique piece on Singapore and I am glad the author, Dr. Mahbubani, has a very high opinion of our Singapore system. I do agree with some points he has raised, especially the title.
Dr. Mahbubani is open to feedback from the public regarding his piece but I am not sure if mine will be selected by The Straits Times or not, soif I may be so bold, I would like to offer my two cents worth on some points which I could not totally agree with.
1. Singaporeans have valid reasons for cynicism
The author expressed his worries that the Singapore Blogosphere seems to have a growing distrust towards public institutions. He said that this cynicism “could act like an acid that erodes the valuable social trust accumulated”.
I would like to highlight that Singaporeans are not cynical just for the sake of it and have many valid reasonswhy we doubt public institutions.
Drawing reference to the recent Shane Todd incident, I feel that questions and doubts we have towards organizations involved are justified.
Source: http://www.michelleparsons.com
The arguments and observations put forward by Todd’s families, girlfriend and the American investigators contradict what the SPF has found. Todd told family that if anything happened to him they should call the American embassy in Singapore and tell them it is linked to his work at with Hua wei. Also, all his friends said that Todd was in a good mood and happy to be returning back to USA. There was no signs of suicide.
Besides the this incident, there are several other reasons why some netizens distrust SPF. A very recent one would be when the local documentary maker Lynn Lee was questioned and detained for 8 hours and had her mobile phone and laptop confiscated in the process. Lee had not done anything wrong and was only covering the perspectives of the suspects in the SMRT strike.
As such, this cynicism is a understandable response of Singaporeans to the various public institutional failuresover the course of many years.
Trust works both ways. Instead of merely hoping alternative media can support public institutions. I believe the latter needs to do their part to greater accountability for failures and greater transparency. This will create more social trust.
The second reason used to explain why social trust is and should be high in Singapore was that “The best minds in Singapore (go to public service careers).”
Yes, it is indisputable our public service is made up of academically inclined people. Many of the best performing A level students are selected to be groomed as future civil servant leaders at the age of 18.
However, like all people, they can be prone to error and failure. One very recent example will be Ng Boon Gay, a former local merit scholar, who had an affair with Cecilia Sue. Other disgraces by our civil servants or public leaders include the affair by ex- MP Micheal Palmer with a Peoples Association staff.
A very infamous example would be when 48 men comprising of even prominent public leaders were being caught for having sex with an underage prostitute. They include civil servants from the Ministry of Education, People Assn staff, Singapore Police Force, National Environment Agency, Singapore environment council and Singapore Armed Forces.
This raises many questions like does high capability necessarily translate to a good heart which is more essential for social trust? How is this ‘capability’ measured in the first place?
2. The priority of the media is not to create social trust in public institutions
The article stated that if “blogosphere and the mainstream media cannot agree on a core consensus of preserving and supporting key public institutions”, it will lead to a “messier Singapore”.
I disagree on this point because to me, the media’s role is not to support public institutions just for the sake of social trust. Instead, the media’s loyalty should be to the general public. I was a student of Cherian Georgeand one of the first few things I learnt from him in communications school was that the media’s role is that of a watchdog. In this case, some form of doubt is always healthy in monitoring what these organizations and it’s leaders or staff are doing.
Sociopolitical bloggers or citizen journalists serve a similar function of sharing varied opinions with the public. Instead of telling Singaporeans what to think, I believe it is their right to be informed with a wide range of sources, opinions and facts and let them decide for themselves.
3. Inaccurate reflection of the Singaporean sentiments
I believe the article might not have reflected Singaporean sentiments accurately. It stated that our people did not riot because of “rising living standards and rising trust in public institutions”. Contrary to having confidence in our system, instead, what I see via social media is the rising resentment among Singaporeans.
I think the reason we keep quiet is largely due to the fear of speaking out. According to an article published in the New York Times, people were still scarred by Operation Spectrum, a crackdown on activists that led to the arrest of 22 people (student leaders, lawyers and teachers) “who were bundled away during nighttime raids and forced, during what they say were harsh interrogations, to confess to an anti-government plot.”
An article on Reuters also reported that Catherine Lim described the Singaporean government as as on which “made “systematic use of fear” to silence dissident voices, through “out-of-bounds markers” to stipulate what Singaporeans can and cannot say should they choose to criticize the government.”
Source: http://staticc04.insing.com/images/91/64/0f/00/pc_600x450.jpg
The article also mentioned that “each incident (MRT breakdowns) passed peacefully and that Singaporeans “saw each incident as an aberration – not indicating the emergence of a new pattern of decline.”
I am not sure if the author has been observing the Singaporean Facebook/Twitter reaction to train breakdowns or been in a train which broke down before. However, from what I noticed, Singaporeans in general believe SMRT is detiorating as in a pattern of decline, rather than ‘each incident as an aberration’.
I believe more Singaporeans would agree with me on this rather than the reasons cited above.
3. Social distrust doesn’t necessarily lead to”disharmony”
I am not sure how it was concluded that the lack of trust in Singapore’s public institutions or establishments can lead to chaos in society and social disharmony. Many netizens are also puzzled about this.
If Singaporeans really distrust the group of people managing our public institutions, they can always change the management using their voting rights like how many did in the recent GE 2011. Or they might hold a peaceful protest. In such cases, no riots or social disharmony would be necessary.
When the author used the term “Messier Singapore”, I am not sure if it is a totally bad thing. Does it refer to Singapore’s idea of ‘messy’ or the democratic world idea of ‘civil rights’ and ‘normal and natural’? I am assuming when he said this he was referring to strikes, riots and protests collectively which are often caused by unhappiness with public institutions.
Riots are dangerous and can result in considerable damage and social unrest. However, what about peaceful protests and justified strike?
Could such restrictions on freedom of assembly, one-sided perspective taught in national education and limits on civic rights been a cause of distrust and unhappiness against the public institutions in Singapore too?
From young I have been taught by national education that protests were bad things that will definitely affect our economy, cause disharmony and limit our progress. However, after living in two countries who are renowned internationally for their democratic processes and civil rights (Hong Kong and Switzerland), I have began to doubt what I was taught.
Despite having a strong activist culture with frequent peaceful protests, Hong Kong and Switzerland are doing as well in terms of social harmony and economic progress. These peaceful protests do not seem to interfere with any kind of economic growth as they are often held during non-work times and merely involved a few people standing together, holding banners and expressing their views.
I debunked my “All strikes are bad totally” myth during the recent (and ongoing) Hong Kong Dock Strike, which involved workers were being paid too lowly and forced to work long hours. True enough, this strike cost the Hong Kong International Terminals about less than SG$1 million daily… but for someone at the scene, I saw social unity instead of disharmony. Thousands of individuals from NGOs, trade unions, high school students, opposition parties, media and university student unions were all united there for a cause – to protect the workers who have been mistreated.
This incident made me think about the recent bus drivers strike incident. Globally, many pressured us to drop the charges against the four bus drivers from China and launch an independent investigation into reports of ill-treatment during their arrest and interrogation. Human rghts activists worldwide believed that to strike is a ”basic and fundamental rights must be upheld for all living in Singapore, including migrant workers”.
I witnessed harmony when I saw concerned Singaporeans regardless of ideology and race gathering together to express their concern for the bus drivers. And even some netizens who are usually hostile in their comments about foreign workers,were expressing their sympathy for them.
So I am not sure if “messiness” caused by distrust, aside from riots, is an entirely bad thing or not.
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Ending off, instead of cynicism being a worrying trend, I believe a healthy dose of doubt is always a good thing because power if left unchecked, always corrupts.
I hope that both mainstream media and bloggers can perform their duties as a ‘watchdog’, educate, inform and also support civic activism and engage the public on critical issues.
It is always better to have a bit of distrust than blind faith.
PS:
I hope to hearing from my readers or even the author if I have written anything which is wrong because I will be glad to learn from it and correct my position. You are welcomed to link or share this on Facebook but please do not reproduce this on any other website without my permission.
If you believe in questioning existing systems, I hope you can sign a petition by Creatives For Causes to Media Development Authority, to abolish the ban on dialects on local tv/radio programs in Singapore.
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