Moderating a Dialogue with Mr George Yeo on Singapore-China Relations 2026

On 28 July 2026, Mr George Yeo visited ACS(I) to speak on the dynamics of the Singapore-China relationship. I was asked to host and moderate the session before an audience of over a hundred.

Most writing on Singapore and China begins with trade volumes and supply chains. Mr Yeo began elsewhere, with language, tradition, and a longer historical inheritance between the two countries. The economics did not disappear; it became part of something older. That stayed with me because it made the relationship feel less transactional and more layered.

The questions soon moved to harder ground. Could Singapore credibly hold a neutral position in AI and technology? What would it mean to diversify defence procurement towards China? How should a small state navigate the shifting relationship between two larger powers? Mr Yeo did not offer clean answers, and that left us with questions worth sitting with.

The afternoon also reminded me of the Humanities Overseas Enrichment Programme in Shanghai and Nanjing last November, where I kept thinking about how governments choose which version of history to present. What I had not really thought about then was that shared history works the other way too. It is not just something a state tells its own citizens. It also shapes what states expect of one another before any negotiation begins.

Three years ago, I sat in the audience at a dialogue with SM Teo Chee Hean and left thinking that the hardest part is not getting into the room, but knowing what to do once you are there. Moderating felt similar. You can hold the microphone and still not have a question worth asking. What stayed with me was a clearer sense of why the relationship cannot be understood through economics alone.