Asian Waters: The Struggle Over the South China Sea and the Strategy of Chinese Expansion

by Humphrey Hawksley

More than 75 percent of its six million people are Chinese, and it is because of this demographic that Singapore was forced to separate from Malaysia in 1965. It had been one of the fourteen Malay states, but would have economically smothered the newly independent Malaysia. Here was evidence that Chinese communities and ethnic tensions were part and parcel of Southeast Asian life. Singapore went on to forge itself into an Asian trading hub. Its authoritarianism tempered racial tension and delivered an exceptionally high living standard. China drew on this Singaporean model when it embarked on its own reforms in the 1980s. Although far from being a compact city-state, China has achieved comparable levels of success, and now has the wealth and confidence to challenge a long-held Western argument that elections and democracy deliver the most stable form of government.