Singapore Guide
Introduction to Singapore
With its dynamism and lack of a welfare system, Singapore today appears a paragon of capitalism, and enjoys a standard of living on a par with that in western Europe. Yet a huge slice of the economy is dominated by conglomerates which were set up by the state and in which it retains a controlling interest. At the core of the success story is paternalism, in which some personal freedoms have been sacrificed so that the government can engineer the economy and society to deliver affluence.
Whatever the political ramifications of the state's economic success, visitors prepared to peer beneath the state's squeaky-clean surface will discover a profusion of colonial buildings, dusty temples and age-old values and traditions that have survived profound social and physical change. Singapore undoubtedly lacks the personality of some Southeast Asian cities, but to dismiss it as sterile is unfair. As with Malaysia, much of Singapore's fascination springs from its having a multicultural population, the main groups being the Chinese (75.6 percent), the Malays (13.6 percent) and the Indians (8.7 percent). This diverse ethnic mix can turn a ten-minute walk across town into what seems like a hop from one country to another.