Xenophobia in Singapore

Hi readers, today I will be blogging on xenophobia, primarily the presence of xenophobia in Singaporeans. For starters, here is a basic definition of xenophobia. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, xenophobia is the fear and hatred of strangers and foreigners or of anything that is strange of foreign. Today, I will be blogging on my thoughts on the main causes of xenophobia, and how it affects Singapore.

Firstly, according to Minister for Home Affairs Wong Kan Seng, Singaporeans accounted for 70%, or 3.2 million of the city-state's 4.5 million population as of mid-2006s. After further calculation, that means around 30% of Singapore's population in 2006 were foreigners, up from 14% in 1980 and 26% in 2000. The main aim of encouraging foreigners to come to Singapore was to help make up for Singapore's declining birthrate. The government hoped that with more foreigners, that would be a higher birthrate, hence eradicating some of Singapore's social, economic and defense problems. How significant are foreigners today?

Take myself for example. I have lived in my house for around 9-10 years, ever since 2001. I have regularly seen Filipinos walking around the estate, and have been seeing less locals as time goes by. Singaporeans are known to be especially resistant to change, and I feel that it would take a long period of time for foreigners to be truly accepted and welcomed. There are many instances of Singaporeans exhibiting their distaste for foreigners. For example, the members of the table tennis team that clinched silver at the 2008 Beijing Olympics were all from China, and despite the players proclaiming their loyalty for Singapore, many people still continued to criticise the players for stealing the spots in the national team from the locals. Speaking on the topic of stealing spots, one of the largest complaints by Singaporeans are that the foreigners are stealing their jobs. One comment from prolific entrepreneur, author and performance trainer, Adam Khoo, incited much rage from many people, when he said that he would rather hire a foreigner with a lower wage demand than a local with a higher wage demand. Many Singaporeans who are sandwiched in the middle class are facing much competition for the limited jobs from foreigners, which leads them to lament about the foreigners 'stealing' jobs from them. This, I feel, is the main reason why many Singaporeans have xenophobia, and how it applies to Singapore's society. On the other hand, some might argue that foreigners provide competition for the locals, so that the locals would be motivated to work harder and not remain complacent. This point is not invalid, but the fact remains that for the average Singaporean, life will get harder with the constant competition from foreigners.

Another reason why Singaporeans possess xenophobia is probably due to the huge cultural differences, and Singaporeans' resistance to change. Having many different people, who speak in different languages, who have different practices, who eat different food, would no doubt be hard for many people to accept initially. Therefore, Singaporeans would naturally be hostile towards people who are extremely different from them, and this also contributes to the prevalence of xenophobia in Singapore.

There are many reasons and causes for the presence of xenophobia in Singapore, and I have listed down several of the key issues. I hope that you have a better understanding of xenophobia after reading this post, and as always, comments are welcome! :)

Cheers,

Roystan