The unlearned legacy of Lee Kuan Yew

THE name Lee Kuan Yew does not have a very commercial ring to Western ears and Singapore is not in the mind of many people outside the Asean countries. I find it quite pitiful that the death — which occurred more than seven years ago — of such an upright and consistent statesman, an exemplary politician whose pragmatism should be emulated, passed almost unnoticed by most people in the West. Not in Asia though. His great feat can't be considered small: he created prosperity and high life standards in a hostile and resourceless territory of the globe. Singapore before LKY, as the Museum of the History of Singapore illustrates, was just a wetland.

His heterodox political mindset did not marry the socialist faith nor the neoliberal darwinism. His ideas about how to take charge of the destiny of a tiny city-state, although never systematized, deserve to be better known, well-discussed and commented on through the facts. In order to do that, it would be necessary to get in touch with the recent history of the small island of Singapore. His memoirs, which I have read with so much pleasure, constitute not only a source of political ideas and beliefs, but also a great lesson on the advantages that come from practicing certain virtues in life: strength against adversities, determination, perseverance, bravery — just the contrary of the victimism so much in fashion today.