What young voters think

April 27, 2006
The Straits Times

AN intriguing variable of this election drawing some attention is the political choices under-30s voters will make, and their impact on policy-setting in the coming years. Overnight the television encounter a group of young Singaporeans had with Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew became a metaphor for the gulf in generational impulses. These instinctual beliefs determine political programmes and thus the maturation of a society, so it behoves every political party to ponder how they should deal with a demanding constituency. There is no precedent to draw on, as each succeeding generation of young people is better informed and more widely exposed to the best and worst foreign examples of governing substance and societal choices. Generation gap? Most assuredly there is one. The People's Action Party and the Workers' Party are tacitly acknowledging the evolution by recruiting more young persons to stand for Parliament, the better to 'get through' to young voters. In the broad scheme of things, it is constructive to study the degree and depth of young Singaporeans' political awakening.

What made the TV chat memorable was the snapshot it provided of some young persons' ideas on participatory citizenship, party politics and the exercise of power that incumbency confers. These diverged from commonly held wisdoms. Are these views representative of their cohort? Whatever the arguments, what is not in dispute is that their influence will grow through the electoral cycles. There is reason to be encouraged that there are young Singaporeans who think through political issues. A constant lament heard from the Government is about their disinterest in public affairs, still less politics. Singapore is going to find it harder to keep generating first-rate political classes through the generations if the young tune out on political developments and confine their passions to credentials, careers and material security. Instant gratification looks like the creed of those in their 30s. Political parties cannot be sure how the Singapore of the future, from this Internet generation on, might respond to cues and inducements. They will just have to evaluate and adapt. In return, leaders of the retiring generation are right to expect that the young cultivate a psychic respect for the sacrifices of their forebears, and an understanding of the forces which shaped this improbable success story called Singapore.