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SINGAPORE-INDIA RELATIONS: A Primer. Edited by Yong Mun Cheong and V V Bhanoji Rao. Singapore: Singapore: Singapore University Press Ltd. 1995. xvii, 299pp. (Tables, graphs.) US$29.00, paper: ISBN 9971-69-195-7.
IN THIS AGE OF GLOBALIZATION, nations that pursue policies of trade liberalization and economic cooperation have cause for optimism, but they are aware of the problems that such trade and cooperation engender. In this multidisciplinary introductory book, thirteen scholars analyze three categories of Singapore-India relations: cultural-historical, the economy, and the (ecological and legal) environment/human resources. These scholars succeed in offering their readers a kaleidoscope of economic linkages between a subcontinent and a small island.
Singapore was founded for economic advantages and to make "the British Empire in India complete" (p. 4). In the long run, Indian immigrants contributed to the ethnic diversity of Singapore. During the cold war a lack of consistency characterized relations between Singapore and India. Indira Gandhi and Lee Kuan Yew rectified this inconsistency by stressing economic cooperation...