The ‘New’ Singapore: mediating culture and creativity

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Notes

Petrina Leo is a Doctoral Research Scholar at the Faculty of Media, Society and Culture, Curtin University of Technology, Western Australia. She was previously involved in media regulation and broadcasting policy at the Singapore Broadcasting Authority, which was restructured into the Media Development Authority on 1 January 2003.

Terence Lee is lecturer in Mass Communication and Chair of International Programs at the School of Media, Communication & Culture, Murdoch University, Western Australia. He is also Research Fellow of the Asia Research Centre based at Murdoch University. His research centres on media, cultural and creative policies in Singapore and Asia. Correspondence to: Terence Lee, School of Media, Communication and Culture, Murdoch University, South Street, Murdoch, WA 6150, Australia. E‐mail: tlee@central. murdoch.edu.au

These include: the Renaissance City Report (MITA, 2000) dealing with the arts and culture in Singapore, the Singapore 21 Report entitled Together, We Make the Difference (1999), the Creative Industries Development Strategy (Creative Industries Working Group, 2002a, b) as well as the Singapore Broadcasting Authority's (2002) Media 21 statement.

It is apparent that the two core media players—Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) and MediaCorp, respectively—are operating as separate economic entities. The media restructuring policy has positioned both players in more direct competition with each other in both the print and broadcasting media. However, much more observation and investigation are needed to assess the extent to which the changes in their respective economic imperatives and dynamics have (or have not) impacted on their respective political roles and influences.

See reports by C. W. Lee (2003), Tan (2003), Reuters news releases (5 Dec. 2003), and ‘SPH says it is not in talks to buy MediaCorp’ in The Business Times (15 Nov. 2003). See also Cherian George's (2003) commentary in support of media competition.

Television was introduced by the PAP in 1963 when the fate of Singapore and the PAP were hanging precariously on the negotiations over its merger with the Malaysian Federation and the power struggle against its party breakaway faction, the Barisan Socialis. Television was believed to be a more powerful and effective medium than the radio in amassing and motivating the populace in its political struggles (Leo, 1995). Print, on the other hand, as pointed out by George (2002), was at that time ‘out of step with the historic nationalistic project that saw Singapore emerge from colonial rule, through messy merger, to full independence’. It was this experience that had led to the tenuous feelings in the PAP leadership for the press that prompted the establishment of various levels of legal and regulatory controls for the press, journalists and public communication practices in general (2002, pp. 175–176). These, as several researchers have noted, had subsequently shaped the character of Singapore's press.

This project bears some resemblance to Brisbane's major Creative Industries Precinct project in the inner‐city suburb of Kelvin Grove, part of Queensland University of Technology's (QUT) innovatively ascribed Creative Industries Faculty (see Glover & Cunningham, 2003). The authors of this paper, Terence Lee (Murdoch University) and Petrina Leo (Curtin University of Technology), are concurrently undertaking research on Singapore's ‘new’ creativity drive. A study of Singapore's forthcoming ‘Fusionpolis’ vis‐à‐vis Brisbane/QUT's Creative Industries Precinct will also be undertaken by Lee from 2004/2005.

In the face of Singapore's worst economic downturn since its independence, 75.3 per cent of the votes—an increase of 10 per cent from the previous election—went to the ruling PAP. Support for the two returning opposition seats collapsed. Economic deliverance, it seems, is still entrusted to the political incumbents. For fuller assessments on the 2001 general election, see Simon Tay's ‘The coming crisis? Domestic politics in and from 2001’ (2002) and Hussin Mutalib's ‘Singapore 2001 general election and its implications for the future of democracy and politics in the Republic’ (2002). For background and comparative information on Singapore's electoral history, refer to Rodan (1993). The collection of essays in this volume provides a rich review of Singapore's 1991 general elections and the 1992 by‐election as the prospects for political liberalization in light of the leadership transfer from Lee Kuan Yew to Goh Chok Tong in 1990.

This definition, found in the Singapore Creative Industries Working Group (2002a, b), is adapted directly from the UK Creative Industries Taskforce (Nov. 1998) document entitled Creative Industries Mapping Document.

To some extent this position does invoke the notion of the ‘cultural turn’ that has been an emerging area in social/cultural concern in recent years. The notion of the ‘cultural turn’ highlights the growing awareness and concerns for the central role of cultural processes and institutions, and of informational and symbolic processes, in managing and regulating the economic. It refers to the ‘turn’ in emphasis in critical social analyses away from economic rationalities with which it had traditionally been preoccupied. For examples of works on this discourse, see Du Gay & Pryke (2002), Cultural Economy: Cultural Analysis and Commercial Life.

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Notes on contributors

Terence Lee

Petrina Leo is a Doctoral Research Scholar at the Faculty of Media, Society and Culture, Curtin University of Technology, Western Australia. She was previously involved in media regulation and broadcasting policy at the Singapore Broadcasting Authority, which was restructured into the Media Development Authority on 1 January 2003. Terence Lee is lecturer in Mass Communication and Chair of International Programs at the School of Media, Communication & Culture, Murdoch University, Western Australia. He is also Research Fellow of the Asia Research Centre based at Murdoch University. His research centres on media, cultural and creative policies in Singapore and Asia. Correspondence to: Terence Lee, School of Media, Communication and Culture, Murdoch University, South Street, Murdoch, WA 6150, Australia. E‐mail: tlee@central. murdoch.edu.au