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SINGAPORE (Mar 18): It started the day after I returned to Penang from Singapore, a visit filled with the usual shopping and dining, as well as catching up with friends and relatives. An earache prompted a quick visit to the GP, but it didn’t mar the fa

SINGAPORE (Mar 4): With the US Federal Reserve getting cautious on raising rates and China pump-priming its economy, many of the big risks confronting Asia appear to have been contained.

SINGAPORE (Mar 4): The post-war economic success of liberal democracies was not simply the result of letting markets flourish. The US and European countries also embedded markets in a structure that allowed people to take the fullest advantage of them. Th

SINGAPORE (Mar 4): The Merdeka Generation, born from 1950 to 1959, lived through Singapore’s tumultuous early years, and gained a perspective of Singapore’s place in the world that many younger people probably lack. And, like the Pioneer Generation, c

SINGAPORE (Feb 25): As Chinese and US trade negotiators meet in Washington to try to forge an accord on trade, observers are largely focused on the countries’ economic disagreements, such as over China’s subsidies to its state-owned enterprises. But t

SINGAPORE (Feb 11): Climate scientists are sounding the alarm about global warming, but the world is not responding. In October, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned of catastrophic risks to health, livelihoods, water suppli

SINGAPORE (Feb 11): Since the Cold War ended, the West has invested huge amounts of resources in efforts to induce political liberalisation in China, including through programmes to promote the rule of law, civil society, transparency and government accou

SINGAPORE (Feb 11): If you use social media at all, you cannot have missed the rash of #10yearchallenge photos that consumed the internet for the better part of January. For a while, it was impossible to log on to Instagram or Facebook without being assau

SINGAPORE (Jan 21): Will global cooperation finally emerge from the doldrums in 2019? The international community’s recent agreement on a “rulebook” for implementing the Paris climate agreement seems to offer some hope. But opinion polls suggest tha

SINGAPORE (Jan 21): About a decade ago, the Commission on Growth and Development (which I chaired) published a report that attempted to distil 20 years of research and experience in a wide range of countries into lessons for developing economies. Perhaps