The relationship between the internet and politics in Singapore is an arduous issue. The features of 'virtuality' and 'disembeddedness' connected with the internet places an onerous burden on the new medium to deliver a new approach to conducting politics in the tiny nation state.

In the process the internet provides a panacea in altering the nation's consensual and submissive political culture.

With a very high proportion of computer usage surpassing that of many countries in Western Europe, Singapore stands as a unique example of the tenuous links between increasing computer literacy and the use of the medium for political empowerment.

With increasing development, political analysts like Samuel Huntington had anticipated a vociferous middle-class agitating for more spaces for political articulation in authoritarian regimes.

This has not materialised in Singapore. While the use of the internet for interest articulation by the civil society cannot be dismissed in Singapore, the potential for online political expression among the wider society is muted by political belief and value systems.

In general, the issue of empowerment and agency with regard to politics and the internet is covered by a wide variety of definitions. Political empowerment with regard to the internet can range from having access to alternative information to actually affecting policies at a decision-making level through citizen feedback and consultation.

The political potential associated with the internet also assumes a high level of technological determinism where a new technology can alter the state of politics and political discourse.

Technology itself is neutral but its appropriation and usage with regard to its immediate social and political context determines the degree and potential for change.

In the context of Singapore, the internet has provided a stage to test some of the hypothesis concerning online politics and empowerment. This is due to the authorities' ongoing development and expansion of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and their tight control over political expression.

Nation-wide survey

A nation-wide survey conducted by the SBA and the Infocomm authority of Singapore in 1999, among adults and students to collect empirical evidence to show the consequences of the internet, revealed that both groups did not believe that the internet would provide political empowerment.

Only 13.6 percent of the users felt that the internet would give people more say in the governance. Over 40 percent of the respondents felt that the Internet will not give people increased say in what the government does.

The pessimism of the respondents with regard to the internet and politics reflects the anaemic nature of political activism and expression in Singapore. The increasing use of new media may not rectify the situation and in many instances may amplify the reservations citizens have towards political expression both online or offline.

This is due to the fact the new media is also bound up with issues of monitoring and surveillance. The latter has been increasingly justified under the banner of national security especially since 9/11.

Social norms in mediating political expression are often discussed in terms of political culture and socialisation patterns. Much has been written about Singapore's political culture, the climate of fear and the practice of self-censorship in the Singaporean society.

While the internet has provided a platform and new spaces for political expression it may not necessarily alter people's orientations to politics and political expression. The idea of the internet and the virtual world conjures an image of a space divorced from the social realities of the real world.

There is a tendency to assume that new media will release individuals from the shackles of values, attitudes and belief systems, thus allowing them to express themselves without any of the inhibitions experienced in the real world.

The features of 'virtuality' one may experience on the internet further confound this argument. The ability to remain anonymous or to reinvent and adopt the 'avatar culture' is assumed to free users from the realities of their immediate social situations and contexts.

This dichotomisation of the offline and online world ignores the fact that the internet is a cultural artefact being used by people who have been socialised by their immediate society. As such, they bring with them learnt patterns of behaviour, habits as well as prejudices.

This interaction of values from the real society and habits acquired in cyberspace may thus give rise to a new hybrid culture but does not negate the existence and the effect of value systems acquired in the offline world.

In Singapore, the internet has undeniably opened up new spaces for political expression. Various websites, forums and chat rooms have enabled Singaporeans to express their opinions on issues and policies.

Politics for politicians

But the potential for online political expression is invariably mediated by the legacy of PAP's one-party rule. It's hegemony over the last 40 years and an overarching ideology marketed to the citizens on the basis of sustained economic development has been built on the premise that politics is best left to the politicians.

Any political discourse which does not fall within the government manufactured organisation is viewed as deviant and alternative. This casts a shadow over the attempts to create an organic and spontaneous Harmasean public sphere, both offline and online.

A study of producers' and audience's orientation towards online political expression reveals the ongoing tensions between expanding the public sphere and the observation of covert rules with regard to political expression in the Singapore society.

The interviews overall highlighted a sustained degree of uncertainty among audiences of political websites. While engaging with political discourse, users were acutely aware of the invisible boundaries and tacit rules of engagement.

These rules are often constructed from legal precedents as well as cultural memory of what is acceptable or deviant in Singaporean society. The degree of arbitration in terms of what will be tolerated online had the effect of urging many users to err on the side of caution rather than testing some of the tacit rules with regard to political discourse.

The study in essence highlighted the potency of residual political culture in the online environment and how it can tamper online political discourse.

Notions of 'being responsible' and respecting your leaders, as well as practices of discussing 'issues rather than personalities' meant that users largely conformed to many of the rules of engagement of which they have been socially conditioned in the offline society in terms of political discourse.


Tomorrow: Beyond the clutches: Dissent among expats S'poreans

More articles in the 'A new Singapore?' series

YASMIN IBRAHIM is a Singaporean presently based in the United Kingdom. She is a PhD Candidate at the London School of Economics' Media Studies programme.

Malaysiakini is publishing a 12-part series by different writers on the challenges facing Singapore as new leader Lee Hsien Loong takes the helm. These articles are edited by James Gomez, coordinator of the Monash Asia Institute's Singapore Studies project on civil society. For more information about the project, visit www.jamesgomeznews.com.