Analysts told CNA that the “flight to safety” may bear on the election, as it has in the past, but this outcome is not a given as the electorate is diverse and has changed.
“It is human nature to fly to safety when they detect danger, but what entails safety might have changed over time,” said political scientist Teo Kay Key, a research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) Social Lab.
She said the electorate will consider multiple factors – not just the global state of affairs, but also parties’ branding and policy stances, the PAP’s performance, the performance of opposition Members of Parliament (MPs), municipal issues and diversity in parliament.
“In communicating with voters, politicians probably need to remember that the voting decision is multifaceted and also that there is a need for sincere communication,” said Dr Teo.
Sociologist Tan Ern Ser said that the “flight to safety” mindset follows the “survival ideology” – that Singapore is vulnerable and cannot take its survival for granted – from the time of founding prime minister Lee Kuan Yew.
But the political landscape has since become more polarised, and is divided between “those who support a trusted, strong government that delivers welfare to the citizenry” and those who “believe in political pluralism and checks and balances on public policy and governance”.
“With this nascent polarisation, it’d be harder for the PAP government to convince those who had previously voted for asset enhancement and the rising standard of living to stick with it,” said Dr Tan, who is the adjunct principal research fellow at the IPS Social Lab.
Instead, people may vote based on perceptions of lack of housing affordability and the rising cost of living, and see the impact of geopolitics as “fearmongering”, he said.
Past election results indicate there may be a “flight to the familiar”, but Assoc Prof Chong said “whether this is really safety or not is a gamble”. “More of the same can be good. There is no guarantee that it is, although that used to be a tendency among Singaporean voters.
“Singapore must now be able to navigate uncharted waters externally that it had not previously faced since independence in ways that affect local bread and butter issues,” he added.
“GE2025 will not simply be about laying out and identifying the risks Singapore faces externally and their domestic spillovers, it will involve coming up with a clear plan that all Singaporeans can get on board with.”
DARK CLOUDS AHEAD
This year’s General Election will not be the first to take place amid global political and economic instability.
GE2001 was held in October, not long after the Sep 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the US. The PAP held on to 82 out of 84 seats and 75.29 per cent of the popular vote then. This was its highest vote share since 1980.
GE2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic saw the PAP win 83 out of 93 seats. However, it garnered 61.24 per cent of the popular vote, a drop of almost 9 percentage points from the previous GE and also the lowest since 2011. The ruling party lost a historic second GRC as well.
IPS Social Lab’s Dr Teo said that voting decisions in the two elections were probably not the same as the polls took place at different stages of Singapore’s political history and the respective crises.
During GE2001, opposition parties were in an early phase of development, with none yet able to win a Group Representation Constituency. The aftermath of the terrorist attacks was a developing situation, and the response was aimed at combating external threats.
“Hence, the voters would probably have gone for an option that would have been more classically ‘flight to safety’. But we also see the two opposition MPs retaining their seats, which meant that it was more of wanting things to remain status quo,” she said.
In contrast, GE2020 took place about a year into the pandemic, when measures to combat the virus were already in place. “Opposition parties were also more developed and well-organised, with a few gaining more credibility compared to 2001,” said Dr Teo.
GEOPOLITICS AND DAILY LIFE
The cost of living and inflation topped voters’ concerns in a January survey of 1,310 Singaporeans by Blackbox Research’s sentiment tracker SensingSG. Jobs and employment, then the economy, were a distant second and third place.
It is wrong to think of geopolitics and bread and butter issues as separate, analysts stressed. While geopolitics may not in itself become a key election issue, its impact on pragmatic concerns like the cost of living, jobs and economic stability might weigh on voters’ minds.
Singapore’s “phenomenal” growth in the past was driven by economic globalisation and liberalisation that rested on institutions backed by the US, said NUS’ Assoc Prof Chong. A weakening of these conditions will put Singapore’s “basic business model” under stress.
“In the globalised international system, Singapore was a middleman, a broker, or a comprador par excellence. It brought together companies and markets from across the world,” he said. Globalisation brought investment, created jobs, helped growth and kept inflation under control in Singapore.
“Hopefully, our voters are informed enough about this reality to make it an important consideration on how they vote,” said IPS Social Lab’s Dr Tan.
The decline in the PAP’s vote share in GE2020 makes it harder to anticipate if there will be a flight to safety this time around, said Dr Woo Jun Jie, senior lecturer at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.
Voters are more likely to focus on bread and butter issues, but may “unconsciously” be affected by broader geopolitical developments.
“Geopolitical instability can give rise to a sense of unease among voters and colour their perceptions of domestic economic challenges, even if it may not directly influence their decisions,” he said.
Analysts said that Mr Wong’s message on the tariffs, delivered on his YouTube channel, is that voters should understand the challenges Singapore faces and be assured that the government will act.
The speech helps Singaporeans make important connections between global developments and the impact on daily lives, while helping to prepare them for the impact that the tariffs will have, said Dr Woo.
“Given the significant impact that the tariffs will have on our economy, it is unfair to think of it as ‘fearmongering’. The messaging from both Mr Wong and Mr Singh would have been just as important even if it were not an election year,” he said.
Because it is election season, Mr Wong’s position as leader of the ruling party adds to the interpretation of his use of the word “unity”. It was expected that Mr Singh, as Leader of the Opposition, expressed views relating to this, said Dr Teo.
“His main aim would be to present the view that having a diverse parliament is not going to result in disunity, but rather to work together as fellow Singaporeans,” she said.
As for the comments by PSP’s Mr Leong and Dr Tan Cheng Bock, they can come across as trivialising the challenges ahead, said Dr Tan Ern Ser.
But the PSP leaders “point to something that cannot be ruled out at this point – that the PAP may be trying to use a genuine crisis to encourage a flight to the familiar in their voting”, said Assoc Prof Chong.
