State of the City

Central to the rise of the island of Singapore as one of the world's most important cities are its location on one of the planet's most important waterways and crossroads and its potent mix of the behavioral values of two cultures—British and overseas Chinese.

There's no other place quite like Singapore, which goes back hundreds of years to a once-prosperous city called Temasek that essentially disappeared. Singapore's long colonial status started in 1819—when it was founded by Sir Stamford Raffles as a British trading post—and ended in 1963, when Singapore briefly merged with Malaya, only to anxiously turn into an independent city-state in 1965 when it became clear that a Malay marriage with a city dominated by overseas Chinese was doomed.

But then, Singapore has always been a site of grand reinventions, some gradual and some fast. And John Curtis Perry, emeritus professor of history at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, provides a (usually) engaging history of this complicated place. Most important for us, he explains cogently why Singapore has become so successful. And he works in some glamour and romance, too, about a place that people of a certain age still see as "exotic,'' like something from a Somerset Maugham story.

Being part of the British Empire, which was held together by the Royal Navy and British commerce (based on free trade), was essential to Singapore's 19th-century development. It wove Singapore into an international system that swiftly made it into a major entrepôt and gave the rapidly growing city stable, competent, and fair government that promoted prosperity:

Thanks to .  .  . its strategic location between India and China, and a commitment to free flows of goods and people, the settlement .  .  . proved an instant success as a gateway and place of exchange.