I always recall William Gibson's description of the city-state as 'Disneyland with the Death Penalty'.

The accompanying 1993 article for those who haven't seen it previously: https://www.wired.com/1993/04/gibson-2/

It wouldn't be a post about Singapore without someone bringing up the 27 year old article

Singapore has democratic pressure points than it looks, and that's largely the reason why LKY acted "benevolently" where he did. He was essentially forced to. He was still a thug.

Firstly the fact that the leaders and all the population are squashed up against one another exerts a massive influence on the government. They're much more vulnerable to protest than other governments because they can't hide as easily. This makes them much more nervous and more willing to placate the populace than the government in, say, Myanmar, is.

Secondly they were competing with as well as trying to crush the communist Party. LKY co-opted a lot of their policies as well as trying to crush them. Note the essentially Soviet style housing and various effective social security systems. These were popular. This is a pattern that they have followed since (crush the opposition, steal their policies) and it helped fix their schooling system by bringing down class sizes in the 90s. Is that democracy? Kind of.

Singapore isn't proof that if you get the right dictator he can be benevolent. It's proof that the will of the people can be exerted through means other than the ballot box and that even a thug can do the right thing if he lives in fear.

> Firstly the fact that the leaders and all the population are squashed up against one another exerts a massive influence on the government. They're much more vulnerable to protest than other governments because they can't hide as easily. This makes them much more nervous and more willing to placate the populace than the government in, say, Myanmar, is.

Singaporean here. They've done well in the 55 years we've been around to make sure that people don't protest — people here value wealth and personal comfort over the thought of going to jail for their freedoms.

Even a solo person holding up a smiley face might get charged and indicted for an "assembly" in Singapore: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-55068007

The country is designed for elites, and it's not shy about it.

true, but he did "create" an extraordinary city state.

If it wasn't convenient for many players (from western to asian neighbors) to have a neutral tax-haven state in the area, it would have ended up like any small Asian/African/Latin American state.

I think of it as the Switzerland of Asia.

Switzerland of Asia would probably be the GCC countries: the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, and Bahrain. Singapore is more like Luxembourg/Monaco of Asia.