Asian Cities, Globalisation and Cultural Diversity – Challenges of the 21st Century

Cities, their populations and city governments as agents of change

Globalisation and the Globalisation and the Asian cityAsian city• Economic and social impact of globalisation concentrated in Asian cities• International and regional migration of labour as well as businesses bringing ever increasing diversity to cities in Asia

Year 1990 2000

Non Residents 

% 10.2 18.8

Number 311,264 754,524

Average Annual Growth 1990- 2000 (%)

9.3

Residents (PRs & Citizens)

% 89.8 81.2

Number 2735,868 3263209

Average Annual Growth 1990- 2000 (%)

1.8

Permanent Residents (PRs)

% 3.7 7.2

Number 112,132 290,118

Average Annual Growth 1990- 2000 (%)

10.0

Citizens % 86.1 74.0

Number 2623,736 2973,091

Average Annual Growth 1990- 2000 (%)

1.3

Total Population % 100 100

Number 3047,132 4017,733

Average Annual Growth 1990- 2000 (%)

2.8

Managing tensions and conflicts of interests

•Diversity brought by globalisationDiversity brought by globalisation•Diversity of urban population already Diversity of urban population already in placein place

Urban social or political-economic space?

•Urban space the Urban space the current and future current and future centre of tensions centre of tensions and conflicts?and conflicts?•Practically 40% of Practically 40% of Asia’s population Asia’s population now live in citiesnow live in cities•Argument that class-Argument that class-based urban politics based urban politics now replaced by pre-now replaced by pre-modernist, modernist, millenarian, faith-millenarian, faith-based affiliations based affiliations (Kaplinsky 2008).(Kaplinsky 2008).

New millennium – urban conflicts or politics of the dispossessed

•Multi-religious urban population

•Faltering `multiculturalism’ that has been largely ethno-centric

Governance and policy

•Multi-religiosity, multi-lingualism, multi-racialism have been the approach in many Asian societies•So have been preferential policies, assimilationist and other approaches that tend to `flatten’ differences•Nation-building held hostage by sectarian politics

Religious revivalism in Asia

• Islamic revivalism, new Hindu religious movements, increased Christian fellowship activities and new churches

• Issues emerging such as, the wearing of tudung to schools and the role of Islamic religious schools have been in the spotlight from Paris to Singapore

• Community centred around religion vs other interests such as, civic causes – much voluntary activities are organised by religious groups

Negotiated urban space•From local urban to global urban•Question of citizenship vs trans-nationhood among varying classes of trans-nationals from highly mobile and skilled to unskilled and low-skilled migrants

Language most frequently spoken at home

LanguageLanguage TotalTotal ChineseChinese MalaysMalays IndiansIndians Others Others

English 665,087 533,948 32,173 75,079 23,887

Mandarin 1,010,539 1,008,489 303 228 1,519

Hokkien 329,583 328,768 136 81 598

Teochew 141,569 141,337 16 38 177

Cantonese 163,703 163,279 53 58 313

Other Chinese Dialects

52,418 52,376 14 16 11

Malay 406,549 5,270 371,401 24,434 5,445

Tamil 91,015 29 286 90,621 80

Other Indian languages

19,862 32 187 19,522 121

Is language at the centre of the effort to manage cultural diversity?

Significant `other’ languages•Japanese, Korean, Hindi, Thai, Myanmese, East European languages•Should all migrants speak English in Singapore?•Singaporean population struggling to speak good English and not Singlish to be globally competitive•Elite are trying to be effectively tri-lingual with English, mother tongue and a third Asian or European language like German or French

Can Asian cities manage diversity?

•World came to Beijing for the Olympics and Beijing had to learn about the world and the accommodation of diversity

•Singaporeans debating if a dormitory for 1000 foreign workers from South Asia and China should be provided in a middle-class suburban neighbourhood where already 5000 expatriate, largely white and professional community already live and feel perfectly welcome