SINGAPORE RISING: The Services Dimension

Singapore's export†services upgrading experiment can perhaps be better viewed as a bid to shift from a branch†plant to a regional†headquarters role for multi†national corporations (MNCs). More generally, a survey of service†based development possibilities suggests a similar conclusion for other world cities as well. What might appear at the local level to be autonomous export†or producer†services activity may instead reflect the city's role in the corporate networks that coordinate global manufacturing. The upshot is the prospect of a multi†polar East Asian industrial landscape. Coordination and control are likely to radiate not only from Tokyo, Seoul, and post†1997 Hong Kong, but also from Singapore — an advanced communications enclave ideally suited to MNCs administering the emerging factory systems of such Little Tigers as Malaysia and Indonesia.