Aqua Article III - Principles of Governance

One of the key principles of governance of Singapore is 'Reward for work; work for rewards.' In Singapore, the government places great emphasis on meritocracy for the best use of talent. This is commendable as the only resource that Singapore has is people. This is extremely important in order to ensure a pool of local talent that will chart the future of Singapore, lead the people into the future and lead Singapore to success.

However, this has led to rising inequalities in Singapore which has caused much unhappiness among those negatively affected. The problem with meritocracy is that it favours the talented, i.e. the smartest, strongest and all the high-end people. Due to the problem of elitism, there is greater segregation within the society than before. With the incidence of elitism, there is much concern over the social gap between the elite talents and the non-talent. This is due to the fact that the elites have an seemingly unfair advantage over the rest and are able to scout for a higher paying job than their counterparts. This in turn leads to greater income disparity as can be seen that the Gini coefficient of Singapore has been rising over the years from 0.436 in 1990 to 0.481 in 2000. This raises dissentment amongst the non-talent, non-elite majority due to the emphasis placed on meritocratic talent. The Ministry of Education (MOE) also implemented the Gifted Education Programme (GEP) in 1984 to allow students with higher learning capabilities to progress at an accelerated pace. This GEP programme caused much public concern and whenever the mass media reports of any changes or improvements to this programme, there seem to be Singaporeans who start groaning.

Although it seems that the meritocratic use of talents is not the best solution as it neglects the minority who are non-elites, in my opinion, countrites do require talents in order to progress even further in future. Elitism permits the government to select and groom only the most capable and efficient amongst the rest as well as those who are academically-inclined. This gives these talents the more opportunities to be guided properly and to excel. Should a policy not apply in Singapore or in any country, there would be a compromise of leadership standards and this would surely negatively impact the future of Singapore.

In Singapore, it is commendable that the government is trying their best to reduce elitism in society as we can see from the fact that the government is channeling additional funds to create more opportunities in every domain so that everyone (not only the talented) can benefit.

Thus, I conclude that the use of meritocracy for the best use of talent is justifiable and effective to a large extent. Society needs to remove the social stigma attached to the non-elites and learn to treat elites and non-elites more fairly. Only then can Singapore truly benefit from meritocracy.

-Chin You Chuen, 07S15