The Nature of Man (and The Nature of the PAP Government)

(I) THE NATURE OF MAN

(A) The Non-Productive Orientations
of Certain Character-Types:

[Source of Reference: The Sane Society (London: Routledge Classics, 2002) by Erich Fromm]



1. The Receptive Orientation

(a) Negative Aspects:

• passive, without initiative;
• opinionless, characterless;
• submissive;
• without pride;
• parasitical;
• unprincipled;
• servile, without self-confidence;
• unrealistic;
• cowardly;
• spineless;
• wishful thinking;
• gullible;
• sentimental.

(b) Positive Aspects:

2. The Exploitative Orientation

(a) Negative Aspects:

• exploitative;
• aggressive;
• egocentric;
• conceited;
• rash;
• arrogant;
• seducing.

(b) Positive Aspects:

3. The Hoarding Orientation

(a) Negative Aspects:

• unimaginative;
• stingy;
• suspicious;
• cold;
• lethargic;
• anxious;
• stubborn;
• indolent;
• inert;
• pedantic;
• obsessional;
• possessive.

(b) Positive Aspects:

• practical
• economical
• careful
• reserved
• cautious
• tenacious
• imperturbable
• orderly
• methodical
• loyal

4. The Marketing Orientation

(a) Negative Aspects:

• opportunistic;
• inconsistent;
• childish;
• without a future or a past;
• without principles and values;
• unable to be alone;
• aimless;
• relativistic;
• overactive;
• tactless;
• intellectualistic;
• undiscriminating;
• indifferent;
• silly;
• wasteful.

(b) Positive Aspects:

(B) The Productive Orientation --

Of A Certain

(Modernist) Character-Type

(a) Positive Aspects:

• confident
• resourceful
• self-understanding
• ambitious
• courageous
• achievement-minded
• artistic
• working class
• modernist
• critical
• discerning
• spiritually indomitable
• socially aware

(b) Negative Aspects:

(II) And The Nature of the PAP Government

(AS NOTED FROM NOTABLE QUOTES

ON THE PAP GOVERNMENT TAKEN

FROM THE READINGS

OF A NATIVE SON):

1. "Distinguishing the state from the government and the PAP is difficult because Singapore has been governed by the one political party for over thirty years, and headed by one continuous prime ministership until 1990. As it stands, the long-heralded succession of Goh Chok Tong to the prime ministership in November 1990 promised only a change of leadership style, not of strategy." -- CHRIS LEGGETT ("Singapore's Industrial Relations in the 1990s"; Singapore Changes Guard: Social, Political and Economic Directions in the 1990s; edited by Garry Rodan)
2. "At the societal level, as Singapore's economic development progresses, the principal domestic concerns will shift increasingly in the direction that Halal identified, that is, towards issues related to the quality of life, such as occupational stress, a materialistic life-style, the availability of home help, the quality of childcare and of family life, problems of the educational system, elitism and social inequities in society, the myriad restrictions and regulations in society, the domination of the political process by one party, and so on." -- CHEAH HOCK BENG ("Responding to Global Challenges: The Changing Nature of Singapore's Incorporation Into the International Economy"; ibid)
3. "If every Singaporean could internalise a little of 'LKY' in his or her mind, and if Lee was sure that open elections could indefinitely return the PAP, he might even be able to tolerate a more liberal and democratic Singapore. Japan was the utopia that Singapore could strive for." -- JEAN-LOUIS MARGOLIN ("Foreign Models in Singapore's Development and the Idea of a Singaporean Model"; ibid)
4. "To simulate citizenry, therefore, is to always focus on the differences between 'true' and 'false'; between 'real' and "imaginary'. The decision on whether something is 'true' or 'false', i.e. whether one is a 'real' citizen or not, is one determined by the model--the ideology put in place by the government. That model, in Singapore, is mostly a representational one, arguing that the real and the representation of the real (the good citizen, for example) are equivalent. There is no room, therefore, for active difference, alternative visions and non-governmental strategies, despite the fact that 'the next lap' is presented as part of a developing openness in Singapore government and society. Any active (i.e. potentially 'damaging') difference is snipped in the bud by the use of the Internal Security Act and, more frequently, by arguing that proper opposition can only take place within parliament--thereby constructing all opposition in the government's own terms--as a representation of itself." -- DAVID BIRCH ("Staging Crises: Media and Citizenship"; ibid)
5. "Against this view, a recent work by a group of sociologists at the National University of Singapore contends that prevailing views grossly inflate the extent of the middle class (Quah et al. 1991). These authors caution against reading too much into supercial indicators like consumption patterns. Moreover, they reject any suggestions that 'social class distinctions have weakened and economic rewards are both high and evenly distributed' (Quah 1991a, p. 3). For Quah (1991b, p. 71), the idea of a 'middle-class society' equates with the appearance of a 'one-class society'. Yet the study concludes that there 'no evidence of a concentration of people in one homogenous "middle" interval' (Quah 1991c, p. 262). In contrast to Chen's reading of the 1980 census data, Chiew, Ko and Quah (1991, p. 78) also assert that the proportion of blue-collar or manual workers (production, agricultural and service workers and labourers) amounted to 52.7 per cent, again attempting to expose as myth the idea of Singapore as a 'middle-class society'." -- GARRY RODAN ("The Growth of Singapore's Middle Class and its Political Significance"; ibid)
6. "Lastly, political leaders and leaderships, though embedded in a given political culture, exhibit individual psychologies and preoccupations." -- JAMES COTTON ("Political Innovation in Singapore: The Presidency, The Leadershipb and the Party"; ibid)
7. "The Singaporean socioeconomic elites do not conform to the 'liberal' model of professionals who, because of their wealth, skills and predominantly private sector occupations, are economically independent of the state, and therefore politically independent. Thus the percentage of the educated elite employed by the state remains remarkably high, averaging about 40 per cent, and the combination of a stress on deference (which has been promoted as an 'Asian value') and material prosperity has produced a depoliticised culture which is not conducive to the spread of ideas of individual or group liberty rights against the state. Any middle-class pressures towards liberalism have been further weakened by the system of education, which promotes, rather than reduces, the kiasu culture (Ho 1989)." -- DAVID BROWN ("The Corporatist Management of Ethnicity in Contemporary Singapore"; ibid)
8. "The international situation is changing in unpredictable ways, and the results of the PAP's own long-term policies are now being seen all too clearly in the consumerism and materialism that pervade the society, urban congestion andf the general feeling of a well-off population that they want more and if they do not get it they will rapidly become bored. Singapore is paradoxical in many ways, not least in the fact that despite defining itself as a newly-industrialising country (NIC) it is in most respects a mature economy co-existing with a very immature society, the constant preoccupation with identity being a very good indication of this latter fact. The constant changes in economic, educational and social policy combined with the PAP's style of constant sloganeering (speak Mandarin, wash your hands, flush the toilet, cross the road only at designated places etc.) contributes to perpetuating this immaturity, which is politically functional since it keeps the population in a constant state of dependency (itself a symptom of immaturity). At the same time, Singapore is an open society in certain respects-- people travel, read and acquire information from numerous sources, despite the government-controlled media, the exclusion of a wide range of foreign publications and the banning of TV satellite dishes. People also migrate, in alarmingly large numbers, and many Singaporeans have relatives living abroad." -- JOHN CLAMMER ("Deconstructing Values: The Establishment of a National Ideology and its Implications for Singapore's Political Future"; ibid).