Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

6-2001

Abstract

The small nation-state of Singapore has increasingly been referred to in the popular media as the Intelligent Island of the future. With significant state investment in the promotion and dissemination of information-communications technology and attendant social ramifications, this has become an area that can no longer be ignored or taken for granted. This article intends to map the conditions of possibility on which Singapore can be conceived of as an Intelligent Island, in situating the role of information technology and Intelligent Island discourse within the discourses of postcoloniality, technocapitalism, late modernity, and globalization. In particular, this article attempts to show how, in Intelligent Island discourse, the processes of the construction of a Singaporean nation are intricately linked to the shift in political discourse from mobilizing a rhetoric of crisis to one of utopianism.

Keywords

Intelligent Island, technology, discourse, nation-building, crisis, utopia

Discipline

International Relations | Political Science

Research Areas

Political Science

Publication

Bulletin of Science, Technology and Society

Volume

21

Issue

3

First Page

175

Last Page

192

ISSN

0270-4676

Identifier

10.1177/027046760102100303

Publisher

SAGE Publications (UK and US)

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1177/027046760102100303

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