growth rather than depending on further capital and labour accumulation. As an indication, the word “productivity” is again frequently mentioned in budget statements, with 2010 Budget being particular with 72 mentions of productivity – more than double the previous peak of 26 times in 1983 and an average of 5 times between 1985 and 2009 (Auyong, H. 2016). The Industry transformation programme, as the key strategy of the government to ensure sustainable economic growth in this new economic and policy environment thus was selected as the focus of this research exercise. In particular, the analysis will focus on (i) the de-construction, based on public statements, document analysis and individual interviews, of the logic and scope of the programme and (ii) an evaluation, based on collected evidence, its capacity to achieve impact on productivity and economic growth. Given that ITP is combining many of the on-going productivity and growth oriented policy measures, notably those introduced since 2010, the analysis will have to cover also the scope of those policies in order to put together a comprehensive overview of all the major interventions covered, related or having similar goals and being implemented in parallel to the ITP.
3.2. The underlying logic of economic development policy Ensuring continuing growth of Singapore citizens’ income has for a long time been the primary political goal of Singaporean government. In addition, the perceived capacity to achieve this goal was an important factor legitimating the stay of People Action Party (PAP) in power during each election since the time of independence in 1965. In order to achieve this goal, it is argued by some authors that the government pursued a pragmatic economic and industrial policy approach – not driven by any specific political ideology, but rather as the main criteria to choose among competing policy options using a short and medium term potential of those policy options to generate higher economic growth and, presumably, consequently increasing the income of Singapore citizens. Such economic logic can be well illustrated by the opening statements of the Economic Strategies Committee (ESC) report published in 2010 – an outcome of one of the latest national long-term strategic guidance exercises which states that: “The goal High skilled people, innovative economy, distinctive global city We must make skills, innovation and productivity the basis for sustaining Singapore’s economic growth. This will also provide for inclusive growth, with a broad-based increase in the incomes of our citizens. <...> 1. The Singapore economy has fared well amidst the challenges of the last decade. Growth averaged 5 percent per year during the period, even with the deep recession of the last two years. The majority of households have seen significantly higher real incomes over the decade, with median incomes rising by over 20 percent.” In addition to these high-level economic and development policy goals, political decision making in Singapore has also been objectively constrained by the geo-economic conditions of the Singaporean state. These constraints, but also enabling factors, which have been explicitly acknowledged numerous times by the government leaders, include: - Lack of natural resources; - Small amount of land; - Limited internal market;
39
