KNOWING WHY YOU'LL LOSE (via Ali Choudhury):

Lee Kuan Yew Reflects: Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew talks with TIME on everything from China's rise to radical Islam, from American values to Singapore's first family (TIME, 12/05/05)

TIME: Western analysts did not expect President Hu Jintao to pay so much attention to the Communist Party, or crack down on the media—or to see so much nationalist sentiment surface. The West has a certain unease and wariness about China's leaders.

LEE: They are communist by doctrine. I don't believe they are the same old communists as they used to be, but the thought processes, the dialectical, secretive way in which they form and frame their policies [still exist]. Their main preoccupations are stability, the continuation of their rule over China, and economic growth. Without a strong center they fear that they will never become competitive, they will never get rid of their state-owned enterprises, and they could have trouble in their inland provinces that are not doing well. A year before they took power, both Hu and Wen left me with the clear impression that they were going to redress this inequality, as best they could. To do that, they need a Party that responds to their orders, not have powerful barons in the provinces.

In other words, because they can't give up the central power of the Communist Party they'll never be able to deal with their problems (see under "Gorbachev").

MORE:

TIME: Do you like American society now?

LEE: I admire American society. But I would not want to live there permanently. If I had to be a refugee, like [former South Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen] Cao Ky, who went to California, I would choose Britain, a less stressful society. [But Americans have] a can-do approach to life: everything can be broken up, analyzed, and redefined. Whether it can or it can't, Americans believe it can be solved, given enough money, research and effort. Over the years I have watched the Americans revise and restructure their economy, after they were going down in the 1980s, when Japan and Germany looked like eclipsing America, taking over all the manufacturing. Americans came roaring back. [They] have the superior system. It's more competitive.

TIME: But the U.S. is a very non-Singaporean society. It's messy and noisy, and it has turmoil.

LEE: You must have contention, a clash of ideas. If Galileo had not challenged the Pope, we would still believe the world is flat, right? And Christopher Columbus might never have discovered America.

TIME: You don't allow much contention in Singapore.

LEE: [The lack of contention] here could be a problem. But I do not believe you must have that degree of contention and political viciousness to be creative ... The exaggerated exploitation of political positions, just to do the other side in, it's so counterproductive, unnecessary. Take Hurricane Katrina. The politicking was incredible. So George W. Bush was not quick off the mark when Katrina struck. But I don't think his adversaries were simply that worried about New Orleans; they just wanted to put Bush down.

TIME: But you would concede that Singapore now needs more contention and turmoil?

LEE: Surely, surely. Ideally we should have Team A, Team B, equally balanced, so that we can have a swap and the system will run. We have not been able to do this in Singapore because our population is only 4 million, and the people at the top, with proven track records—not just in ability, but in character, determination, commitment—will not be more than 2,000. You can put their biodata in a thumbdrive.

We also have a different culture, a different way of doing things. The individual is not the building block. It's the family, the extended family, the clan and the state. The five crucial relationships are: you and the prince or the ruler, you and your wife, you and your children, you and your parents, you and your friends. If those relationships are right, everything will work out well in society.

TIME: You have said that the people of Singapore are overly reliant on the government to solve their problems, but isn't the government partly to blame?

LEE: Should I have fostered more free enterprise, more do-it-yourself? Yes.

Posted by Orrin Judd at February 11, 2006 2:29 PM