Despotism

Despotism is defined by

wikipedia as "a form of government by a single authority, either an individual or tightly knit group, which rules with absolute political power". You can read the whole entry here

dictionary.com as
1. the rule of a despot; the exercise of absolute authority.
2. absolute power or control; tyranny.
3. an absolute or autocratic government.
4. a country ruled by a despot.

Why am I writing about despotism. Well, besides bringing a point across I wanted to talk slightly about history.

Germany went from a democratic country to a despotic one, all by the 'power' of 1 man, and WWII was born.

What has this got to do with Singapore, with Singapore being so small? Well, nothing really but you can gather from history a despotic societies, it usually starts off as democratic but slowly, more power is given to the government or 1 person or a small group of people and then rights and freedoms are slowly taken away from the people.

The changes are so small, that nobody notices them it first, then one day, they realised that they are not in a democratic society anymore.

Europe is frightened of that happening again that lots of checks and balances are in place (like transparency in the government, information about things the government does can be asked for and given, where everything the government does can be questioned by the people). These things were almost destroyed in USA during the Bush administration and if you have kept up with USA politics, you'll see how frightening it can be. E.g. People have been detained in jails (with no legal recourse) and tortured, the press was being suppressed, citizens couldn't get information from the government when they request for them...... This is only the tip of the iceberg and this happened within 6 years.

Having elections does not a democratic country make.