<ARTICLES>Formation of Ethnicity in mult-culturalism : 'Formal Ethnicity' and 'Multi-racialism' in Singapore

This study aims to consider the ethnic formation in multi-culturalism. For this purpose, the experiment of 'Multi-racialism' in Singapore is examined for concrete discussion. In Singapore, the government itself promotes and tries to fix the four distinctive ethnic identities, that is, 'Chinese', 'Malays', 'Indians' and 'Others' which are effective components of Singapore nation. Singapore government therefore classifies all the people to one of them. By doing so, the government tries to integrate national unity of Singaporean. For the Singaporean government, the existence of plural ethnic groups becomes an advantage to the nation building. In order to consider 'Multi-racialism' in the context of formation of ethnicity, this paper has reviewed and classified theories of ethnicity into three models, that is, subjectiveobjective model of 1970s, primordialinstrumental model of 1970-80s, continuousdiscontinuous model of 1980s. This study would like to point out the limitations these models and put up an alternative, which I call formalinformal model. 'Formal ethnicity' is created and manipulated by state power for efficient domination of the people and 'informal ethnicity' is formed and developed in everyday lives outside the state control. The experiment of 'Multi-racialism' in Singapore provides a social field where these two dimensions of ethnicity are working. For further discussion, this study takes up the projects of the Housing and Development Board in Singapore. This board has promoted public housing policies to make different four ethnic groups live together. We would like to focus on not only 'formal ethnicity' but also 'informal ethnicity'. This is not only the problem of Singapore, but also can be applied to many other countries in context of formation of ethnicity in multi-culturalism