In his final lecture, Mr Patrick Daniel shared his thoughts of the future of both Singapore and the local media. He suggested a two-decade timeframe to 2045, when Singapore would celebrate the 80th anniversary of its independence, and coincidentally also the 200th anniversary of The Straits Times.
He proposed adopting the approach of “backcasting”, a method introduced by Canadian professor John Robinson. This is essentially the opposite of forecasting, and involves envisioning and defining a desired future, then looking backwards, or backcasting, to the present, and identifying the steps needed to get to that future.
Mr Daniel said that Singapore’s founding fathers had envisioned in 1966 a remarkably clear desired future when they crafted the country’s National Pledge that our students still recite daily. This has stood the test of time and would be a good place to start if we are envisioning a new future for 2045.
Updating Existing Desired Futures
Mr Daniel said the Pledge encapsulated Singapore’s desired future then but there were three areas he wanted to focus on where updates were needed for a new future — one united people, equality and happiness.
On one united people, the original concern was to emphasise unity mainly in the context of differences of race, language or religion. Today, however, Singapore needs to grapple with a widening in scope of differences. One area is domestic political differences, which has become more prominent in Singapore. How to remain united in the face of political diversity would require some deep thinking, Mr Daniel said.
Another area of differences is in attitudes and increasing acceptance of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community. This reflected wider differences in values between conservatives and liberals.
On the goal of equality in society, Singapore has made equality in opportunities core to its ideology, he said, and social mobility has been high. He felt that social mobility and inclusivity should feature in our desired future. However, the inequality of outcomes remains an issue, with growing societal pressures for policies such as minimum wages and wealth taxes to achieve a more equal society.
On minimum wages, Mr Daniel felt it was untenable for a city-state like Singapore, which has a high proportion of migrant workers, to institute a minimum wage as it would have to apply to migrant workers too. Aside from imposing hefty costs to the economy, the number of migrant workers wanting jobs here at our minimum wage, would far exceed our capacity to take them in. Policing the problems caused, such as illegal workers and errant employers, would not be a trivial exercise.
Instead, Mr Daniel felt that Singapore’s existing Workfare Income Supplement (WIS) scheme, which started in 2007 and targets citizens, would be a far better approach to help low-wage workers by topping up their salaries by up to 30%. In 2020, some 500,000 workers benefitted from payouts totalling $850 million. With the WIS as the centrepiece, the tripartite Progressive Wage Model would be an additional support scheme to provide wage increases for low-wage workers.
Mr Daniel also suggested tying the WIS to wealth taxes as a means to redistribute wealth purposefully, and to address unhappiness over inequality. On wealth taxes, he hoped Singapore would preserve its policy of encouraging, and not disincentivising wealth creation.
Mr Daniel also argued for philanthropy to be encouraged on a wider scale to mitigate inequality of outcomes. The aim should be to encourage a sense of “noblesse oblige” among the wealthy and encourage them to give back to our society. More broadly, a culture of giving and kindness should be part of our desired future, with the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre (NVPC) and the Singapore Kindness Movement leading the way.
Mr Daniel then touched on the inclusion of happiness in our desired future. He urged that it remain so, as any desired future would be pointless if happiness does not feature in it. Raising Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness Index as an example, he said that Singapore should define its own concept of happiness, without ignoring urgent issues such as alleviating ill health, distress and discontent in society.
New Areas in Desired Futures
Mr Daniel also talked about new areas that have emerged since the writing of the Pledge, which should feature in our new desired future. He cited three areas: climate change and sustainability; technological advancements in artificial intelligence (AI); and the Internet and the Metaverse.
On climate change and the broader challenge of sustainable development, he said “the climate crisis is without doubt the most urgent global challenge of our time”. He called for Singapore to adopt the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) laid out by the United Nations and make it part of our desired future.
Singapore also needs to embrace new digital technologies and its benefits, while safeguarding itself against its risks and disruptions, said Mr Daniel. Singapore must think of how to deal with AI’s transformative impact on almost every industry, including high-value intellectual professions, and the risk to even high-end jobs. But Singapore’s desired future must be an AI-driven economy and society, where we enjoy the full productivity dividends.
On the Metaverse, Mr Daniel felt it will be part of the future. He cited a Wunderman Thompson report which said: “A new digital era is on the horizon as the Metaverse evolves from a sci-fi concept into a reality.” Singapore’s best option would be to closely engage with it and benefit from its opportunities, while striving to keep it safe, especially for the young.
Desired Futures for Singapore’s Legacy Media
Looking to the future of Singapore’s legacy media, Mr Daniel first envisioned the future of local journalism. There would still be good audiences in English and Mandarin for high-quality, trusted news content in both written and audio-visual forms. For Malay and Tamil, there would be smaller but loyal audiences. In addition, there would be many more news sources on the Internet, with more players in local journalism than before, mostly in niche spaces.
Zooming in on the SPH Media Trust (SMT), he outlined five feasible futures for it. First, the SMT distinguishes itself from others through the quality of its content, but trust would be its key differentiator gained through accurate and balanced news coverage. Second, it builds strong newsrooms that produce compelling content and are well supported by technologies such as AI. Third, it grows its regional and international paid reach, with strong subscription campaigns. Fourth, Lianhe Zaobao achieves wide reach in China and among the overseas Chinese diaspora. Fifth, Malay and Tamil papers, having invested in stronger newsrooms, are alive and well, supported partly by benefactors.
Mr Daniel said: “If you were to ask me to summarise what I've said and describe the future SMT in one sentence, here's what I'll say — A financially independent, thriving media group whose products in four languages are trusted by both their Singapore audience and regional and international audiences, all of whom pay for their premium content.”
Backcasting once more, Mr Daniel listed six priorities for the SMT to achieve this desired future. The first is developing forward-looking people policies, with a sharp focus on talent acquisition and retention, and on high employee engagement. Second, using government funding to make continuous investments in the technology stack to support news operations, as well as all other functions. Third, quickly scaling up capabilities in both corporate and international subscription sales, such that subscription revenues significantly contribute to SMT revenues.
Fourth, developing strategies to turn around the long decline in advertising revenues, supported by the use of technology. Fifth, seeking broad community support for providing trusted news as a public good in the four official languages. Sixth, conducting targeted investments in media-related businesses to generate new streams of future revenue.
Mr Daniel ended his lecture by citing two recent surveys — one by Nanyang Technological University and the other by Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism — which showed strong interest in news and readership in Singapore as well as high levels of trust. Mr Daniel said this was why he is confident of SMT’s ability to achieve its desired future and its goal of becoming financially independent.
Question-and-Answer (Q&A) Session
The Q&A session was moderated by Dr Shashi Jayakumar, Senior Fellow and Head of the Centre of Excellence for National Security at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS). Dr Jayakumar is also Executive Coordinator for Future Issues and Technology at RSIS.
Dr Jayakumar and Mr Daniel began by discussing whether legacy media should take advantage of new media platforms, and how it can attract the younger generation, who are perceived to be moving away from traditional media.
Mr Daniel responded that he expects legacy media to remain core to keeping Singaporeans up to date on a large variety of topics. At the same time, flagship papers like The Straits Times are also experimenting with new media platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
He debunked the myth that youths were not engaging with legacy media: “The common view is that we are losing the young readers, that they are going to TikTok, et cetera. But actually, Generation Z — those aged 15 to 24 — comprise 13 per cent of Singaporeans aged 15 and above; the ST readership in that group is 12 per cent. Among millennials, who comprise 29 per cent of the national profile, ST readership is at exactly 29 per cent ... the numbers actually look quite positive.”
Mr Daniel also added that youths read the news from multiple sources to stay informed, unlike the older generation, who tend to lean towards only legacy media.
One question posited that new media platforms may change the quality of national discourse in Singapore, and wondered if legacy media had a role to play in addressing this such as conveying news impartially and more analytically.
Mr Daniel expressed concern about the prevalence of fake news and misinformation on new media, and felt that legacy media’s primary role is to convey the facts truthfully and compellingly, as well as to stay in the middle of both sides of intellectual debates. On playing a more analytical role, he observed an “unprecedented amount of factual latitude” and that it was difficult to engage biased readers.
An audience member also asked Mr Daniel if journalism would become obsolete in the age of AI. Mr Daniel said AI is already in use in the news industry in areas like financial reporting, but it is “merely passable” in terms of content writing at this stage. Most notably, AI lacks editorial judgement, which only good journalists can offer, he said.
Click here to watch the video of lecture III.