Mixed receptions of "Asian" values by ethnic Malay community in Singapore, 1970s – 1990s

• Main Author: Tow, Wen Lu
• Other Authors: Michael Stanley-Baker
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2023
• Subjects: Humanities::History
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/165375
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

This paper explores how the ethnic Malay community in Singapore responded to the government's promotion of "Asian" values. This paper focuses on the period from the 1970s to the 1990s. It examines how the manifestation of “Asian” values in state policies and schemes played out in Singapore and the Malay community’s reception of the government policies and schemes influenced by “Asian” values. This paper historicizes the experiences of ethnic Malays' through analysis of newspaper articles and oral history interviews. This paper's finding is that in facing each different circumstance, individuals challenged the narratives set out by the state by recentering their voice and by acting in their capacity as organizations and individuals to amplify their voice. In some instances, the Malay community had varied responses to a policy or scheme. Firstly, this paper explores Singapore’s “war on drugs” from the 1970s to the 1990s. This is followed by examining the introduction of the Special Assistance Plan in 1979. Lastly, this paper discusses the Religious Knowledge program from 1984 to 1989 and the introduction of Shared Values in 1991. This paper hopes to fill in the gap in the existing literature about “Asian” values in the Singapore government’s policies by locating the voices of the ethnic Malay community.