Race and Class in the Anti-colonial Movements of Postwar Singapore, 1954-1956

Abstract

The postwar history of Singapore has taken a revisionist turn in recent times, but these histories have nonetheless failed to identify the social transformations occurring during that period. This was particularly so between 1954 and 1956, during which race and class consciousness were most heightened, as expressed through the emergent anti-colonial movements. Most notably, the Chinese middle school student movement and the left-wing trade union movement contested prevailing conditions of racial and class inequalities in postwar Singapore society, and attempted to rearticulate race and class through their shared anti-colonial motivation. This thesis is an attempt to situate these movements within decolonization, against the backdrop of colonial racialization, and as consolidated under the PAPb s original anti-colonial formulation of multiracialism. By adopting a Critical Race perspective, the relationship between race and class will be explored, and the argument forwarded for the necessity of sociological analysis to the study of Singaporeb s postwar history.