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Đối Thoại Với Lý Quang Diệu: Nhà Nước Công Dân Singapore: Cách Thức Xây Dựng Một Quốc Gia (2000)

by Tom Plate(Favorite Author)

3.54 of 5 Votes: 2

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English

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review 1: I wanted to read this book for a paper I was writing on LKY for a leadership class. In those respects it was useful. My only complaint is that in the chapter the author said he wanted to write a book about LKY without referring to the chewing gum laws, which is what conjures in the minds of Westerners. By four chapters in, I was going to put the book down if I read one more reference to anti-chewing gum laws.
review 2: For those who have yet to read LKY's From Third World to First or LKY: The Man and His Ideas, Conversations with LKY is sort of the "lite" version for getting a sense of the man, his personality and intellect. A lot of the material here is familiar ground who have read LKY's books, heard him speak or read his articles - LKY's pragmatism, his vie... morews on governance, development, eugenics, China, etc.The good part about Plate's book is that the format - an account of 2 afternoons' worth of interviews with LKY - allows LKY's voice and personality to come through. And it wasn't all just a rehashing and a summary of earlier expressed views. When one thinks of LKY, the term "indomitable" often comes to mind. So there was a certain poignancy in Plate's book, when we see the man's frailty from age, as he repeatedly fiddles with and tightens the heat pack on his injured thigh, or suffers from an incessant coughing fit. And there are the anecdotes I'd never heard before: LKY's respect for Kissinger and George Schulz and the historical depth they brought to US foreign policy, and conversely, his criticism of the US's mishandling of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis because "Madeleine Albright and ...Larry Summers knew nothing about the history of Indonesia and were wrong in wanting to use the [crisis] to oust Suharto". LKY argues that the US should have let Suharto exist the scene gradually, as he would have to eventually, after putting in place a good deputy to manage the transition, instead of forcing Suharto's resignation and plunging Indonesia into a crisis that it is still slowly recovering from. And his opinion that Carter, although a "good God-fearing man", was the "worst American president" he'd interacted with because the former peanut farmer was clearly out of his depth as president and who spent his first meeting with LKY going through a "laundry list" of talking points of "irrelevant small things" like "why do you want this improved Hawk" (because it's better than the one we currently have), rather than focus on broader geostrategic issues like "where is East Asia heading?" And his amazement when he read Carter's campaign book "Why Not the Best" where the president recounts how he used to steal money from the pew box as a kid. "Why does the man do that? Having done it, how does telling the world that he was a petty thief help" LKY asks in amazement. So those are the great moments in the book. The downside of the book is that Plate's personality intrudes. As a journalist, he tries hard to put his own spin and voice in the book and it's often jarring. Like how he tries to position the interview as an investigation into the Great Question of: "Is LKY a Hedgehog or a Fox?" Does he hew to some central idea (or gasp - ideology??) like a Hedgehog, or does LKY's pragmatism suggest that he is really a Fox?" And then there's Plate's attempt to sometimes jazz the book up with what are meant to be clever (but mainly forced) puns and references, like the opening where he compares Singapore to a "spectacular dramatic epic movie" with its landscaping, dramatic journey to independence, etc. But I don't want to hear Plate's voice. I'm reading the book because I want to hear LKY. Still, plenty of LKY comes through in the book and for anyone who's interested in getting a sense of the man, Conversations with LKY is a quick and compelling read. less

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