Questions:
How do most citizens live? Do they own or rent? Do they mostly build their own houses, buy them, or are they provided? How does the government interact with homelessness and housing?
Discussion:
Housing: Introduction
In 1947, a British Housing Commission report called Singapore “one of the world’s worst slums” and “a disgrace to a civilized community” (Binder 2019). It was estimated that 72% of Singapore’s population lived in slums. When Lee Kuan Yew led Singapore’s People’s Action Party to an election victory in 1959 that would begin its uninterrupted reign, only 9% of the population lived in public housing. The PAP considered the housing crisis the most critical issue that, if solved, could keep the party in power indefinitely. This can be seen in how President Lee almost immediately created the Housing Development Board (HDB) in February 1961, and the government began acquiring land and building housing communities. The PAP and the HDB came up together. Today, with seven times the population of San Francisco in just six times the area, over 90% of the population owns a home, and over 90% of homeowners own an HDB apartment (Binder 2019; Statista 2020). When asked about the country’s astonishing success in housing, President Lee’s first response was “luck,” followed by “personal drive” and “sincerity of purpose” (Chua 2011). This paper examines Singapore’s urban planning approach, then analyzes how the system works at the micro-level in the section called “A Promise of Stakeholdership in the Homeland’s Success.” Finally, it will reveal a couple of critiques on the housing process that provide a fuller picture of the HDB’s overall success, including the drawbacks.
Singapore’s Approach to Public Housing
Part of the success of Singapore’s approach to urban housing is due to its place as a centerpiece of the PAP government’s promise to its citizens. An excellent source for information on the PAP housing approach is Singaporean sociologist Chua Beng Huat, who served as a Director on the Housing Department Board in 1984 and has since dedicated his life to academia, shedding great light on the PAP and HDB’s history (Wikipedia, “Chua Beng Huat”). As Chua writes, President Lee believed “[home]ownership was vital for… political stability,” and as a result, homelessness quickly became a scarce sight (Chua 2011).
Chua calls Singapore’s successful approach to public housing a “compact mode of development” model where the HDB would quickly build self-sufficient mini-cities that could provide all the needs of a self-contained community (Chua 2011). The philosophy of the HDB was that “successful resettlement” does not simply mean replacing one’s house. Rather, “[i]t extends to the adaptation of these people[‘s]” livelihoods and communities (Lee 2001). The HDB recognized that “architectural features are unable to promote social exchanges” but that they can “obstruct social communications” (Lee 2001). This specific distinction shows that the HDB developed these housing communities and mini-cities intending to facilitate ease of social interaction while recognizing that physical architecture alone is not adequate for creating a community. The concept can be seen in figure 1, which displays the massive public housing high rises surrounding a park for social activities. Two additional ingredients necessary for success, the PAP believed, were sufficient public resources and economic opportunities. The PAP provided this in coordination with the HDB’s developments by funding infrastructure projects near the housing projects, including schools, shops and grocery stores, playgrounds, and much more. To prevent the segregation that often occurred in other countries’ public housing programs, the HDB and PAP set quotas for the different major “racial” groups that Chua reports were “about proportional to their presence in the national population” (Chua 2011). Further, to foster complete integration among classes, the HDB built the low-income rental flats “specifically nestled” within the communities “so as not to single out or stigmatize” the lower-income households (Chua 2011). Singapore’s government thus took a holistic approach to community development.
In fact, the HDB has taken a holistic approach ever since its first major housing project after the Bukit Ho Swee fires devastated a large kampong in late May 1961. Kampong is the name for the villages that made up most of Singapore at the time – they primarily consisted of highly flammable wooden huts that were often inhabited by people whom the PAP referred to as “squatters” (Götsch 2013). The tragedy occurred just three months after the creation of the HDB. The timing of these two events cannot be stressed enough: responding to the massive devastation in Bukit Ho Swee in the HDB’s first year of existence would set the tone for the rest of the organization’s history. Less than a month after the fires, The Straits Times reported that the HDB vowed to develop multiple mini-cities within seven months, each outfitted with thousands of housing units at low prices and promising “schools, markets and spacious playgrounds” in close proximity (Straits Times 1961). In the meantime, the HDB created temporary housing for those left without a home from the fires (Götsch 2013). Even in this emergency situation with almost no time for preparation, the HDB still promised the development of not just housing but also the physical structure needed for a new society. Thus, this model of compact, self-sustainable mini-cities was the blueprint for the physical infrastructure needed to pull Singapore out of its overpopulation and slum problem.
Any conversation on the Bukit Ho Swee fires and the HDB’s subsequent resettlement actions would be incomplete without a brief literature review on the topic. In the book “Flammable Cities: Urban Conflagration and the Making of the Modern World,” Nancy H. Kwak delves into “[t]he politics of Singapore’s fire narrative.” Kwak sheds light on the discrepancy between the PAP government’s framing of its response to the Bukit Ho Swee fires as a “major [successful] undertaking” and the reality (Kwak 295, 2013). She writes that the PAP’s “simple story unravels in the details” (Kwak 296, 2013). Because “[t]he PAP faced serious political challenges” since its inception in 1959, it became easy for the government to push focus away from its political power grabs and put the spotlight on a heroic effort of monumental proportions (Kwak 2013, 297). The kampongs, which often contained highly flammable structures, were erected under British authority during the mid 1900s, and they remained a thorn in the side of governments looking to modernize housing, since the kampongs had become “deservedly popular in rural areas” for their cheap prices and comfort (Kwak 303-304, 2013). Therefore, Kwak contends, while the Bukit Ho Swee fires were not a unique occurrence of a kampong fire, they became important in their use as a tool of the PAP to coerce and justify resettlement and land acquisitions (Kwak 309, 2013).
Another major contributor to the conversation is Loh Kah Seng, author of Squatters into Citizens: The 1961 Bukit Ho Swee Fire and The Making of modern Singapore. Loh too calls out the PAP’s Singapore Story of the Bukit Ho Swee fires for glossing over many critiques of the entire resettlement movement after the fires. Loh points to the “rumours of arson… [and] the disillusionment of one-room HDB dwellers” that do not exactly “fit neatly with the state’s account” of the entire event (Loh 307, 2013). Loh pinpoints this dichotomy between the painted-over “anger,” “rumours about the high rents, unsuitability of the [HDB] housing” and the PAP government’s narrative of a HDB that came to the rescue and saved the people of Singapore (Loh 306, 2013). Indeed, Loh’s arguments, along with those of Kwak, help shed light on just one of the many parts of Singapore and the PAP’s history that share both a beneficial side, and a sometimes covered-up harmful side.
A Promise of Stakeholdership in the Homeland’s Success
At the micro-level, Singapore’s public housing symbolizes an affordable investment that can provide everything necessary for a stable job and life. Citizens were offered extremely affordable spots in the HDB’S developments, which anyone could purchase on a 99-year mortgage (Chua 2011). To make it easier, since 1968, citizens have been allowed to use their social security savings equivalent, called the Central Provident Fund (CPF), to purchase public housing (Chua 2011). As long as a citizen maintained a stable income, which they could from any of the numerous employment opportunities built into the city’s infrastructure – grocery worker, teacher, shopkeeper, etc. – then the citizen could pay their monthly mortgage payments with their CPF. This system saw astounding success in populating the new mini-cities and creating full and sustainable communities. Beginning in 1961, the government has offered a plethora of subsidy programs to inspire citizens to buy these homes. The offer helped the PAP shape their housing narrative as a “humanitarian effort whilst simultaneously integrating [its] people into the fold of the economy and the state” (Götsch 2013). As Chua explains, the HDB sold homeownership as an opportunity to “build up a valuable asset” (the apartment itself) that could later be sold for profit or “rented to senior citizens for a national pension” (Chua 2011). Singapore’s economic success, which is built on its urban planning program, has, in fact, driven the price of public housing apartments up drastically over the past half-century (Majendie 2020). So, the “stakeholdership in Singapore’s success” concept that President Lee and the PAP & HDB propagate so heavily has held up so far: the homeowners who invested their social security pensions in their homes have in fact seen their new asset, the public-housing apartment, appreciate in value. However, some critics point out the hidden consequences of the HDB’s homeownership programs. One criticism questions the stability of someone’s 99-year mortgage as an asset.
Critiques of Singapore’s Housing System
The public housing 99-year leases may not be the ever-appreciating asset the government promises. Denis Binder, an expert on international torts, points out that a “dark secret about the housing ownership narrative is that the government actually still owns all the land” (Binder 2019). Indeed, each unit is leased on a 99-year lease, but since “there is no provision for lease extensions,” the unit should “decrease in value as it approaches the end of its 99-year lease,” which would completely deprive the homeowner of their “promised retirement fund” (Binder 2019). Given that the earliest HDB 99-year lease would have been granted in the mid-1960s, none of the leases have approached termination, so it has yet to be seen how this hidden catch will affect homeowners in Singapore.
Another dark side of the HDB housing programs is the land acquisition laws that enable the government to acquire so much land and offer such low housing prices. Between 1959 and 1984, the government acquired over 40,000 acres, which equates to a third of the country’s land (Chua 2011). This land-grab trend benefited the PAP and HDB but hurt the country’s landowners, who were losing their assets at lower-than-market prices. Figure 2 shows a Straits Times article headline from 1961 referring to the passing of legislation that further enabled the HDB to acquire land for low prices. Despite Chua’s past affiliations with the HDB, even he admits that “the government… enact[ed] draconian compulsory land acquisition legislation” that enabled it to “nationalize land at radically increased levels of discount compared” to market prices (Chua 2011). For example, the HDB acquired the land in Bukit Ho Swee for one-third its market value because of advantageous stipulations in legislation (Straits Times 1961). Indeed, Singapore’s housing program is by no means flawless.
Housing: Conclusion
In conclusion, Singapore’s public housing program has seen more success than almost any other program in the world by strictly following its model approach since the HDB’s inception. Beginning in 1961, Singapore’s newly established PAP government took a comprehensive approach to urban planning that created fully functioning communities around each public housing complex. The government’s strong emphasis on homeownership encouraged its population to move into public housing and invest in their housing units as if they were a pension plan linked to the country’s success. However, the HDB’s roaring success came with drawbacks, like an unsolved long-term issue of what happens at a lease’s termination and landowners cheated out of the fair value of their land. Singapore’s housing success story is unlike any public housing initiatives in other countries. It is easy to feel the PAP’s version of the story is idyllic, romanticized, and exaggerated. However, the HDB did pull off a stupendous feat from the outset, rehousing the victims in Bukit Ho Swee, and continuing to expand public housing through to today. Perhaps it is the PAP’s firm commitment to keep corruption out of government – to this day, “no record exists of widespread public corruption in independent Singapore” (Binder 2019). Perhaps President Lee was right when he attributed the success to “luck.” Whatever the true reason, Singapore’s housing program should be studied for both its successes and its failures.
