HAWKER CENTRE: AN INSTRUMENT CONTROLLED, TO CONTROL

Abstract

The formal regulation of hawkers dates back to the early days of the colonial period. Before then, street hawkers were mostly anonymous and not held accountable for. In the early 1920s, the British started applying this ideology as they issued licenses and guidelines to the street hawkers. This allowed the British to deal with the various hawker‐related issues systematically. Even after the government took over Singapore from the British, they continued this practice, developing more efficient and intricate mechanisms to aid the regulation of hawkers. This increasing control over hawkers subjected the hawking practice to numerous changes, including the reformation of hawking space. Most of the radical implementations came after the independence of Singapore, as the newly installed government were determined to tackle all the hawking‐related issues. Through legislations, enforcements and confinements, the hawking practice was entirely reconfigured, resulting in the present‐day hawking typology – hawker centre. In this investigation into the history of hawking, the paper will be analyzing the aspect of governmental control in this practice. • How did the mechanism behind all these hawking regulations work? • Are they still relevant to the government in today’s context? This dissertation hypothesizes that hawker centre is the state’s means to regulate the hawkers in order to control the public. The present hawker centre is the result of a methodical progress that begun humbly, with the licensing of hawkers. In the attempt to understand the circumstances that hawker centre was shaped in, it is hoped that this paper will reveal the implications and ideology implanted in this typology.