文化身份视角下移民城市的城中村更新模式探讨 ——基于新加坡与深圳的实证研究

选取新加坡和深圳的3个城中村作为实证研究对象,从文化身份的理论视角切入,剖析移民城市的城中村更新的文化塑造过程;指出要理解文化身份的内涵与本质,需要理解地方蕴含的全球性与在地性、过去与现在这两组关系.在解读宏观文化政策的内在政治和经济推动力的基础上,基于参与式观察和半结构化访谈资料,运用质性分析方法,比较探讨典型移民城...     

Living it up: Super-rich enclave and transnational elite urbanism in Singapore

Notwithstanding the burgeoning scholarship on enclave urbanism, urban gating has often been pigeonholed as an intra-urban development that is somewhat ‘epiphenomenal’ to wider global processes. Overlooked in the literature is how gated communities as globally-oriented spaces are intertwined with the transnational lifeworlds of its elite inhabitants. As key sites where transnational super-rich elites organize their consumption and reproduce their purportedly global lifestyle, gated communities are now emerging as a new ‘meta-geographical form’ that circulates in and around rapidly globalizing cities. Drawing on the case study of Sentosa Cove, an exclusive waterfront gated community in Singapore catering to ‘high net-worth’ residents, this paper critically examines how elite localities and transnationalism are being socially and spatially reproduced in the city-state. To this end, the paper makes a distinct contribution by bringing to bear critical transnationalism perspectives in the understanding of urban gating and the privileged geographies of the global super-rich.     

Navigating the terrains of transnational education: Children of Chinese ‘study mothers’ in Singapore

This paper demonstrates the value of child-centred migration studies which highlight children’s role in shaping the migration journeys of their families, as well as their own projected journeyings. It examines the case of children from China who move to Singapore, an aspiring global education hub, expressly for the purpose of an overseas education that will facilitate longer-term migration and life goals. Focus is given specifically to the children of ‘study mothers’ or peidu mama (literally: ‘mothers accompanying their children who are studying’). Through interviews with the teenagers and the conceptual optic of ‘social navigation’, our paper demonstrates that children are resilient and creative beings able to navigate the twists and turns of their immediate trajectories, as well as develop their own goals and projected destinations for their futures. The paper calls for a refinement in the way we understand children’s mobilities. First, in arguing that their spatial journeying across the terrains of transnational education cannot be decoupled from their process of social becoming and emotional development from passive followers to active negotiators, we wish to disrupt hegemonic discourses and dominant representations of children in migration as simply ‘migrant’s children’ and restore them to the status of ‘migrant children’. Second, adopting the concept of social navigation as an analytical lens allows us to highlight the fluid ways that young people think about their futures and the different pathways by which they can get there. This leads us to conceive of social and cultural capital accumulation through transnational education as a process with many more degrees of provisionality than what is often presented in the literature as a ‘strategic project’ with a fixed and abstract goal.     

Water quality management in Singapore: the role of institutions,laws and regulations

Abstract

The paper analyses the legal and regulatory instruments for water quality management that have been set in place in Singapore for control of water pollution, and their evolution since the time of independence in 1965. The role of institutions in the strict implementation of the laws and regulations is also discussed, with special emphasis on the efficient inter-institutional coordination machinery that has made it possible. The analyses show that overall long-term planning and policy-making and a strong political will have been instrumental to give all aspects of water management high priority in the national agenda, thus directly supporting urban, industrial and commercial growth.

Editor Z.W. Kundzewicz     

Lacan on urban development and national identity in a global city: Integrated Resorts in Singapore

Lacanian psychoanalysis has been used in film, literature and other areas of social thought, but rarely in the domain of urban studies and human/cultural geography. Following its introduction by urban planners Michael Gunder and Jean Hillier, I apply the theory of the four discourses and the mirror stage of development to Singapore's urban development of the two Integrated Resorts at Marina Bay and Sentosa. The decision to allow gambling and build casinos was a contentious one and provides a point of departure for insight into the identity issues and planning decision making processes in Singapore. I critically analyse the rhetoric of the public debate from 2004–2005 to draw conclusions about the government's self‐perception of Singapore as a city‐state and the manifestation of this identity through the creation of cosmopolitan spaces as an attempt to project that identity onto its citizens. The aim of Lacanian psychoanalysis is to provide an understanding and recognition by analysis to enable a change of signifiers, values and ideology among the masters and the subjects to better represent the true needs and wants of the community. This reflective position enables a movement toward postcolonial urban studies and planning.     

The relationship between soft-bottom macrobenthic communities and environmental variables in Singaporean waters

Univariate and multivariate methods were used to study soft-bottom macrobenthos collected in December 2002 from the coastal waters of Singapore. The univariate parameters and community structure of benthic communities were related to environmental variables. Three samples were taken with a 0.1 m² Van Veen grab (33 × 30 × 15 cm) at each station from 12 sampling stations of two different geographical areas. The water depth ranged from 6.5 m to 34.0 m. The mean values of species number, abundance and species diversity (H′) were 24 species/grab, 77 animals/grab and 3.35/grab, respectively. A total of 172 species was recorded. Total petroleum hydrocarbons were strongly negatively related to species number, abundance and species diversity, suggesting that petroleum hydrocarbons have harmful effects on macrobenthic communities. The BIO-ENV analyses for all stations identified median particle size, silt–clay content, salinity and Zn as the major environmental variables influencing the infaunal patterns. However, separate analyses for two areas produced stronger correlations and different best-correlated environmental variable combinations. Total petroleum hydrocarbons were the only common factor in both areas, showing the importance of petroleum contamination in determining the community structure of benthic infauna in Singaporean waters.     

Response spectral attenuation relationships for Sumatran-subduction earthquakes and the seismic hazard implications to Singapore and Kuala Lumpur

Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, may well represent the classic examples of area with low seismic hazard but with high consequence. Both cities are located in a low-seismicity region of Southeast Asia, where active seismic sources are located more than 300 km away. Seismic designs have not been implemented in this seemingly low-hazard region though distant earthquakes in Sumatra had frequently shaken high-rise structures in the two cities. Several studies have been conducted to systematically assess the seismic hazards of Singapore and the Malay Peninsula. The present research particularly addresses issues in deriving a new set of attenuation relationships of peak ground acceleration (PGA), peak ground velocity (PGV) and response spectral acceleration (RSA) for the Sumatran-subduction earthquakes. To be relevant for the seismic hazard assessment of the remote metropolises, the derived attenuation relationships cover a long distance range from 150 to 1500 km. The attenuation relationships are derived using synthetic seismograms that account for source and path effects. The uncertainties in rupture parameters, such as stress drop, strike, dip and rake angles, have been defined according to the regional geological and tectonic settings as well as the ruptures of previous earthquakes. The seismic potential of the Sumatran subduction zone are high in the region from 2°N to 5°S as there has been no recurrence of great thrust events since 1861. A large event with M_w greater than 7.8 in this particular subduction zone may be capable of generating destructive ground motions in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, even at a distance of 700 km.     

Seismological Research in Singapore

The Singapore seimic network and the seismicity of Singapore are briefly described,the four tremor events experienced by Singapore are discussed and the ground responses of different stations are compared,The tremor incident standing operation procedure is also prsented.     

Corporate Greening of Foreign Transnationals in Singapore

The environmental performance of transnational corporations (TNCs) may need to be updated to include evidence of increased corporate environmental responsibility. This is a challenge to geographical perspectives that have been critical of the environmental performance of TNCs. The paper reports the findings of a survey of TNCs with branches in Singapore. Using the survey evidence, TNCs are classified according to their degree of participation in a range of voluntary environmental initiatives. According to the classification, there is a similar proportion of low and high performers but a dominance of medium level activity that can involve little organisational change. A significant association between organisational size and environmental activity is found. Respondents most frequently report that corporate environmental standards motivate environmental action in Singapore. Overall the survey evidence indicates that few TNCs are significantly changing their environmental behaviour. The absence of citizen, NGO and government pressure on TNCs is reducing the extent of voluntary environmental action in Singapore and expectations of widespread corporate greening overlook organisational differences in their opportunity to benefit from investment in environmental management. It is concluded that voluntary corporate environmentalism does not reduce the need for government regulation.     

Changing Geographies and the Geography of Change: Some Reflections

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography and the 75th anniversary of the teaching of geography in the Department of Geography, National University of Singapore, the home of the Journal, this article, based on personal reflections and "objective" academic materials, provides an overview of developments in geography in the Department and Journal. The paper argues that the department's and Journal's"identities", since the post-World War II period, have been shaped by Singapore's changing domestic politics, the changing university academic environment, the personalities and academic interests of heads of the department and the Journa's editors, the state of the changing regional and global political economic environment, and the individual research interests of faculty in the department, and reflects a complex mix of colonial/post-colonial, modern/post-modern, North-South and East-West discourses. While a defined Singapore school of geography has yet to emerge, the article shows that both the department and the Journal have made major strides in meeting the challenges of globalisation and, in the process, have gained international visibility and academic legitimacy. In particular, the Journal has consolidated its position as a major voice for academics in lesser developed countries, its platform for "tropical world" discourse and maintaining its edge in the colonial/post-colonial and modern/post-modern discourses of states within the tropics.