There is growing public interest in Singapore’s electoral system. AcademiaSG presents here scholarly articles and videos as resources for these discussions.

VIDEOS

In this AcademiaSG Lecture before the 2025 General Election, Constitutional law professor Kevin YL Tan (National University of Singapore) pointed out that the way electoral boundaries should be drawn is left to the discretion of the Prime Minister, who appoints the Electoral Boundaries Delineation Committee, which then acts on his instructions. He argued that electoral reform is necessary if Singapore is to have a more equal and fair voting mechanism.

Political scientist Netina Tan (McMaster University) explains Singapore’s unique Group Representation Constituency system in this AcademiaSG explainer video.

ARTICLES

These articles discuss GE2020 and the political developments of Singapore thereafter. They dive into issues relating to the political scene in Singapore, covering a range of topics on political parties and elections as they pertain to Singapore.

• Electoral boundaries: the backstory — Kevin Y.L. Tan | How Singapore’s controversial boundary drawing system emerged.
  • Kevin Tan (2021) “Delineation and Discretion: The Drawing of Electoral Boundaries in Singapore,” Voting in a Time of Change, edited by Kevin YL Tan & Terence Lee (Singapore: Ethos Books). – DOWNLOAD
• How the PAP has shaped the parliamentary system – Kenneth Paul Tan | It has innovated on the Westminster model to balance representation and effectiveness, while legitimising and strengthening its authoritarian rule.
  • Kenneth Paul Tan (2013) “The Singapore Parliament: Representation, Effectiveness, and Control,” pp. 27-46 in Parliaments in Asia: Institutional Building and Political Development, edited by Zheng Yongnian, Lye Liang Fook, Wilhelm Hofmeister. (Routledge). – DOWNLOAD
• How the political system has made it harder for the opposition to succeed – Kenneth Paul Tan | Several political innovations officially justified in terms that are supportive of democracy increased the PAP government’s capacity and legitimacy to control.
  • Kenneth Paul Tan (2011) “The People’s Action Party and Political Liberalization in Singapore”, in Political Parties, Party Systems and Democratization in East Asia, edited by Liang Fook Lye & Wilhelm Hofmeister (Singapore: World Scientific). – DOWNLOAD
• Democratic backsliding in illiberal Singapore— Netina Tan and Cassandra Preece | Accountability remains weak in Singapore’s technocratic, soft authoritarian regime. The PAP government has returned to relying on the law as a ‘fist in velvet glove’ to muzzle dissent and constrain information.
  • Netina Tan and Cassandra Preece (2022) “Democratic backsliding in illiberal Singapore”, Asian Journal of Comparative Politics. doi: 10.1177/20578911221141090 – DOWNLOAD
• The credibility factor – Steven Oliver & Kai Ostwald | The PAP has used its dominant position to reshape voter preferences in line with its comparative advantages.
  • Steven Oliver and Kai Ostwald (2018) “Explaining Elections in Singapore: Party Resilience and Valence Politics,” Journal of East Asian Studies, 18 (2): 129-156. doi: 10.1017/jea.2018.15. – DOWNLOAD PRE-PRINT.
• The opposition’s first thirty years in Parliament – Loke Hoe Yeong | Singapore’s post-independence opposition has a history of ups and downs that doesn’t conform with theories about democratic waves.
  • Loke Hoe Yeong (2019) “Introduction,” pp. i-xi in The First Wave: JBJ, Chiam & the Opposition in Singapore (Singapore: Epigram Books). – DOWNLOAD

For more articles and videos on Singapore politics, visit the resources page we curated for GE2025 here.