People's Action Party
인민행동당 (싱가포르)
A Singaporean party founded in 1954 by Lee Kuan Yew and others. Initially a centre-left party, it expelled its left wing after taking power in 1959 and shifted to the centre-right. It has governed without interruption since 1959, making Singapore a de facto dominant-party state.
In depth
According to the English source, Lee Kuan Yew, Toh Chin Chye and Goh Keng Swee had been active in the Malayan Forum, a London-based anti-colonial student group of the 1940s and early 1950s, and after returning to Singapore they prepared a party with trade union and student leaders. The People’s Action Party was registered on 21 November 1954, with Lee as secretary-general and Toh as founding chairman. In its first election in 1955 three candidates, including Lee and co-founder Lim Chin Siong, were elected. In 1957 the trade-union “communist” faction won half the seats on the Central Executive Committee, but Lim Yew Hock’s government arrested them en masse and Lee returned as secretary-general.
The party won the 1959 general election, and Lee became prime minister. In 1961 disputes over the plan for merger with Malaysia and an internal power struggle led the left wing to break away and form the Barisan Sosialis under Lim Chin Siong as secretary-general, taking 35 of the party’s 51 branches. After Singapore joined Malaysia in 1963 the PAP acted as an opposition party at federal level, and conflict with the United Malays National Organisation ended with Singapore’s separation from Malaysia on 9 August 1965.
After independence the Barisan Sosialis withdrew from Parliament in 1966, and the PAP won every seat in the elections of 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1980. The Workers’ Party won its first seat at a by-election in 1981, but the PAP has since taken over 60 percent of the vote and over 80 percent of the seats at every election, keeping the two-thirds majority needed to amend the constitution. The source says the party exerts strong influence over the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) and the civil service.
Lee handed the premiership to Goh Chok Tong in 1990 and stepped down as secretary-general in 1992. Lee Hsien Loong became prime minister in 2004, and Lawrence Wong was elected secretary-general in December 2024. The English source classifies today’s PAP as a centre-right party combining social conservatism and economic liberalism.