Project guides S'poreans, foreigners to find common ground on integration

Aim was to find the cause of the “growing angst” towards foreigners, says researcher

- Ng Wei Kai Correspondent

Singaporeans and foreigners came together to talk about the role of multiculturalism, jobs and the economy, and other thorny topics in a pilot to find common ground for integration between the two groups.

The group of 24, comprising 16 Singaporeans, five foreigners and three permanent residents, generated 67 statements about these issues and achieved unanimous consensus on 23 of them.

But the level of consensus was not uniform across all areas.

These patterns reveal where common ground is achievable and where disagreement persists, and statements on the distribution of resources were more tractable than questions of national identity, said researchers from the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) in a report on the pilot.

On community life, which covered issues like mutual respect, the group reached consensus on 14 of 18 statements, while on education, it got there on four out of 16.

On jobs, the group had 100 per cent agreement on four out of 18 statements, but on multiculturalism, only one out of 15 statements got full agreement.

Some examples of these statements include: “Singapore's openness to the world and support for multiculturalism and diversity help welcome people of different nationalities without losing who we are”, and “Singaporeans should be given priority at local education institutions, including universities, even as we uphold the principle of meritocracy”.

The pilot is a local adaptation of a discussion model first used in Denmark, known as a consensus conference. IPS and REACH ran the project in East Coast GRC in November and its results were released at a panel on Jan 20.