At an exhibition commemorating Stamford Raffles’ 1819 arrival in Singapore, a question is plastered on a wall: “Which DNA trait do you think is most important to Singapore?” The most popular answer: “Self-determination.”
Two centuries after the landing that resulted in the founding of modern Singapore, the island is one of the few colonial port cities to have withstood the test of time. But as a tiny island nation of just 700 sq km and 5.6m people, Singapore has lacked the scale that has fuelled many of its economic peers.
Commercially, that has meant opening up to global trade flows, leading to Singapore’s services and merchandise trade volumes reaching three times gross domestic product in 2018 — one of the world’s highest ratios.
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