A Bureaucratized hawker culture : narratives of Bureaucracy in Singapore hawker culture from the postcolonial to the present

From as early as colonial times, hawkers were a prevalent element in our national story. Since then, hawkers in post-colonial have experienced relocation from streets to food centres, been subjected to registration and legislation, and subsequently become a focal point for Singapore society in their attempts to inventory their personal heritage in an ever-changing Singapore. Indeed, hawker culture in Singapore represents an integral facet within her national identity, establishing itself as a hot talking point everywhere, across social circles: from how we can properly preserve its heritage, to what hawker culture represents for Singaporeans. For academics, the approach taken towards hawker culture stems from hawker food and its socio-cultural, or socioeconomic impacts in Singapore society. Absent, however, from these discourse is the idea of bureaucracy – an oft-repeated concept used in discussing governmental management and nation building, which is very much congruent to the modernization of Singapore. As such, this thesis examines the relationship bureaucracy had with hawker culture in Singapore from the 1950s to 2000s, with interest in how bureaucratic institutions had existed in, and influenced hawker culture. In doing so, I argue that the impinged bureaucracy created fissures within Singapore hawker culture, resulting in adverse consequences for the latter.Bachelor of Art