Thoughts of Lee Kuan Yew

Sentences from the founding father of Singapore in “Success stories: Lee Kuan Yew”

“One value which does not fit Singapore is the theory that the press is the forth state”

“as citizens, we share the burden and rewards”

From a biographer “Since very young, he’s used to exercising a least degree of choice and control”

“Surely we must be in charge of our own lives, and that is the beginning of politics”

“I am not here to play somebody else’s game”

“If you want money, don’t go into politics”

“If you take a bribe, you sell your fate”

“There will be not race riot in Singapore, never…”

“They know that what we say we mean, that this is an equal society”

“One got to get over the temptation of the news media capturing one’s soul”

“To give every family a stake in the country…find a way to give them ownership of their own home. Then, if their sons have to go to war and fight, they are fighting for themselves”

“Everybody is free to put up his ideas. But if you put up foolish ideas, it is our duty to demolish that idea by argument before that idea takes hold of people’s mind”

“What are our priorities? First, the welfare, the survival of the people. The, the democratic norm and processes, which from time to time we have to suspend”

“I ignore polling as a matter of the government. I think that shows a weakness of mind and inability to chart across”

“Whichever way the wind blows, whichever way the media encourages the people to go, you follow, you are not a leader”

“Who was right? Their soft methods or our firm methods?”

“Human beings by nature are unequal creatures”. This is important because then “there is a certain realistic assessment of their capability and their possible achievement”

“Heredity is most important”

“We would not be here. We would not have made the economic progress. If we had not intervened on very personal matters. Who your neighbor is? How you live? Noise you made? How and where you spit? What language you use? Have we not done that effectively we would not be here today”

“To get good government, you must get good men in charge of government. What I have observed in the last 40 years is that even the weak and poor system of government, but with good strong men in charge, you get possible government with decent progress”

“This is not administration doing a job. This is entrepreneurship on a political stage on a national scale. We change the complexion of Singapore”

Documentary director’s conclusion:

“Singapore is wealthy because of i) clean government ii) political stability iii) sense of unity and iv) good relations with neighboring countries”

“On one hand: Lee an autocrat created an obsequious society without a soul. On the other hand: Lee the great politician created and maintained an affluent nation”

“Had it not been for him, Singapore would most certainly not have the country that we know today. Detractors will of course say things could have been much better. But then… conjecture has no part in history”

Shaping Unconscious Thoughts

We do not always operate on free will.

Unconsciousness also leads to action.

Environmental stimuli and heredity are at the bottom of this psychological process.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/329/5987/47.abstract
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2000994,00.html

Imagination and desire

The more you imagine, the less you feel like doing something. This is what scientists call habituation. And the less you imagine, the more you feel compelled to act. This is the phenomenon of sensitization.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6010/1530.short

Determing a community structure

Biodiversity increases the costs of educating predators but decreases competition for food. The opposite is true. Uniformity decreases the costs of educating predators but increases competition for food.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v469/n7328/full/nature09660.html

Flow and Storage

We know very little about the impact of our actions on the environment. This occurs because we do not know exactly how much carbon dioxide we emit into the atmosphere and how much of it is offset by the nature. Science will provide us an exact number of our decisions when scientists understand better the flow and storage of carbon in the natural system.

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/331/6013/50.abstract

The number of leaders and coordination

In “Evolution of personality differences in leadership” Johnstone and Manica define leadership and the relation of conflict with the number of leaders and the challenge of coordination.

Leader is the person able to impose his/her preferences on followers and coordinate effectively.

A society has more leaders as more conflicts emerge. However, the higher the number of conflicts and leaders, the more difficult becomes coordination. The opposite is also true.

http://www.pnas.org.eres.library.manoa.hawaii.edu/content/108/20/8373.full?sid=dad64573-2768-4516-9e51-56c980fcd293

"Measuring Environmental Performance"

“Measuring Environmental Performance (MEP)” is about the design of a metrics program. Metrics is a set of standards for measurement.

The favorable context of MEP is i) the increasing costs of environmental operations ii) market & regulatory & public pressures iii) international standards (ie ISO 14001) and iv) voluntary initiatives.

There are two types of MEP indicators i) leading, which is an in-process management indicator and ii) lagging, which is an end-of-process measurement. The percentage of facilities conducting self environmental auditing is type of leading indicator and the output of chemicals released in air an example of lagging indicator.

Considering this context and indicators, the application of MEP leads to i) measurement of progress against other companies & average industrial performance (benchmark) ii) compliance with trade associations & principles, goals, and Corporate Social Responsibilities iii) designing of more efficient processes iv) decreasing of material usage and environmental impact & increasing yield and profitability.

A successful MEP program follows this order i) design ii) implementation iii) evaluation iv) improvements.

http://www.gemi.org/resources/MET_101.pdf