Foreseeable: A Podcast Series by Global-is-Asian

“Homelessness exists in Singapore.” That’s the first thing that Senior Research Fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy Dr Ng Kok Hoe told me when we had a chance to discuss the topic. And it’s true. They are just less visible. It’s often difficult to distinguish a homeless person from any other member of the public, for a variety of reasons that we’ll get into. Dr Ng and his team issued a first of its kind report, “Homeless in Singapore: Results from a Nationwide Street Count,” in November of 2019. They estimated there were between 921 and 1,050 street homeless people in Singapore. Since then, the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic has become a global problem. Singapore announced a stringent set of measures, called a “circuit breaker” on April 7th, 2020, designed to curb the spread of the virus. Singaporeans are urged to stay indoors whenever possible and access to public spaces are tightly controlled. This has complicated the homeless situation, as rough sleepers are urged to move to shelters that are struggling to cope with the situation. And as Dr Ng pointed out in a recent interview on Channel NewsAsia, many of Singapore’s homeless people have low-wage jobs in the retail and services industries, which have been some of the hardest hit by the pandemic.This conversation was recorded on 15 October 2019:See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Recycled drinking water is not a new concept.  In Singapore, it has been around for two decades, but if you talk to people about it, there's still a certain "yuck factor" that surrounds the idea. Leong Ching, Associate Professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, dedicates a lot of time studying why people behave the way they do when it comes to the environment. She jokes, sometimes calling it "useless research," but it actually sheds light on the subject and as it turns out, this phenomenon is much more complex than you might think. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In light of the COVID-19 virus that continues to plague China and other countries, we caught up with Tikki Pangestu, Visiting Professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. Professor Pangestu spent 13 years at the World Health Organization in Geneva as Director of Research Policy and Cooperation Department. He shares his insider's view of the global health response. This podcast episode was recorded on 14 February 2020 and does not take into account more recent developments of the ongoing coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode, we will be speaking to Ong Ye Kung, Singapore's Minister for Education. He's been a Member of Parliament since 2015. And he has held a wide range of government positions, including Deputy Secretary-General of the National Trades Union Congress - NTUC, Chief Executive of Singapore Workforce Development Agency - WDA, and Deputy Chief Negotiator for the US-Singapore Free Trade Agreement.Minister Ong recently spoke at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy's Festival of Ideas2019, where he shared his views on what he considers the key governance issues of ourtime; like technology disruption, inequality, and climate change.Global-is-Asian met up with the Minister to follow up and have a deeper discussion:See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Thomas Friedman, noted author and foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times, believes the world is being reshaped today by three simultaneous accelerations: in technology, globalisation and climate change. He likes to call the accelerations hockey sticks, referring to the steep angle they represent on a graph. Friedman travelled to Singapore recently to take part in the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy's Festival of Ideas, 2019. He presented his ideas in a panel called "How to Thrive in the Age of Acceleration" He gave his take on how to adapt to all three accelerations at once, then sat down for a discussion with Kishore Mahbubani, Distinguished Fellow at the Asia Research Institute. Later, Global-is-Asian sat down with both of them for this podcast interview.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The idea of racial harmony is deeply ingrained in Singapore's national identity. The national pledge recited daily by school children states, "regardless of race, language or religion" - yet discussing racial integration remains a touchy subject. Dr. Mathew Mathews is Senior Research Fellow and Head of the Social Lab at the Institute of Policy Studies, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy where, among other things, he conducts research in race, religion, immigrant integration, family aging, and poverty.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Danny Quah is a noted economist, teacher and writer. He has a long list of qualifications and accomplishments, and currently he's Dean and Li Ka Shing professor in economics at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. His work focuses on income inequality, economic growth, and international economic relations. Lately he's been studying the global power shift and the rise of the East and alternative models of global power relations. He's also quite a student of pop culture, and if you stick around, you'll hear exactly what I mean.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.