Best airport in the world, best seaport in the world, tallest observation wheel in the world… Best manners in the world?
Singapore is renowned for its excellence in many areas. We are the best in many things and the regional hub in many others: logistics, finance, biotechnology, petroleum, tourism… The list is endless, and it grows longer every passing day as we develop expertise for even more sectors. In particular, we are strong in our ‘hardware’ but how do we fare in our ‘heartware’?
The National Courtesy Campaign was a campaign launched in June 1979 to help improve Singaporeans’ social graces. Singaporeans were charmed by the courtesy mascot, “Singa, the Courtesy Lion”, who was introduced in 1982. The campaign used many different publicity tools to get its message across, including articles, documentaries, jingles, posters and banners.
Improvements have been seen in areas like clearing their plates after eating in foodcourts and hawker centres, keeping public toilets clean, letting public passengers alight first, greeting or smiling at neighbours and taking care of small children in public so that they do not cause a nuisance.
However, there is still behaviour that upsets people. Have you had any of these encounters - drivers switching lanes suddenly when driving, reserving seats in foodcourts while others are waiting, snatching parking spaces from waiting drivers and cutting queues while waiting at traffic junctions or entering carparks?
So while we see that courtesy campaigns work, education needs to start from young. Our children have to understand that being socially graceful is not a hodgepodge of actions to be pulled out when convenient, but a way of life and a method of thinking which should permeate both our conscious and unconscious behaviour.
The rise in the “Graciousness Index” shows that we can successfully work to improve in our social graces. To become the embodiment of social grace, Singaporeans have to internalise courtesy as a way of thinking and translate this mindset into a lifestyle every waking minute. Once we can do that, Singapore can definitely add social graces to our list of achievements!