How to Singaporize Belgium?
10 ways Belgium can take inspiration from Lee Kuan Yew’s political masterpiece
In a new book entitled Prosperity, Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever calls on his countryman to take inspiration from Singapore as an economic and social model.
According to media reports, the book outlines the history of the West’s economic rise—De Wever is a historian who likes to pepper his speeches with quotes from personalities as diverse as Cicero and François Mitterrand—right up to Belgium and Europe’s current economic malaise.
De Wever praises Lee Kuan Yew—the founder and longtime Prime Minister of Singapore—for having instituted a culture of “order and respect,” created a “healthy national sentiment,” and “fought against communism, corruption, and drugs.”
Believe it or not, De Wever is an interesting chap, though “selling” Belgian politicians abroad usually not straightforward. He rose in conservative Flemish politics as an advocate for the dismantling of Belgium and for an independent Flanders. He has since moderated his message and, remarkably, now governs the country he sought to abolish in a coalition which notably includes the Reform Movement (MR), the most right-wing and classically liberal Francophone Belgian party.
The ruling coalition—the so-called “Arizona coalition,” so named because the colors of the participating parties correspond to the flag of Arizona—has been in charge for a year. Their agenda includes reducing public debt (107% of GDP as of 2025), cutting taxes (42.6% of GDP as of 2023, fifth-worst in the OECD after France, Denmark, Italy, and Austria), eliminating lifetime unemployment benefits (achieved, drawing much hatred from the Left), and restricting economically unproductive immigration (asylum and family reunification).
De Wever’s cat Maximus has become something of a hit on social media.
De Wever is quite aware of the tremendous challenges facing Belgium and Europe, including demographic aging and rising social spending, which are massive uphill struggles. In addition to the priorities mentioned above, he wants reforms to facilitate business and invest more in innovation. He argues: “The pillars of our welfare state must be sculpted by eliminating the abuses. The resulting gravel can be used to consolidate the foundations of our prosperity. This is the only possible way forward if we do not want to end up as a continent without power and without hope.”
In short, De Wever has an agenda grounded in interlocking demographic, economic, and geopolitical realism. However, there is no doubt that acting on these insights is extremely challenging in any country. Look at what Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan went up against; or how unpopular Gerhard Schröder’s economic reforms were (despite laying the foundations of later German prosperity under Merkel); or how French President Emmanuel Macron’s popularity has crumpled to nothing.
De Wever recently also got attention in Davos, arguing that Europeans had to stand up to U.S. President Donald Trump’s economic and military threats against Greenland, if only for their “self-respect.” Shortly thereafter, financial markets collapsed given the likelihood of European trade retaliation (the “trade bazooka”) in the event of U.S. aggression, leading Trump to back down. (Stock market traders have coined an expression: “TACO,” for Trump Always Chickens Out.)
De Wever praises the 16th century Golden Age of the former Low Countries—corresponding to today’s Benelux—during which the region generated astonishing art, textiles, trade, and industry. He concludes: “Let us give birth to a new golden century so that this region can again become a beacon of progress and be able to guide the history of the world. For Flanders. For Wallonia. For Europe. For prosperity.”
Heady stuff. The book, written in Dutch, is being translated into French, so I may try to have a read.
I am myself a Lee Kuan Yew aficionado, having written my second MA thesis on his demographic thought and policies (an academic article going on this is also in the works). Lee was probably the single most successful politician of the twentieth century, scaled for the size of his country. As I have previously written, the Right’s growing interest in Lee Kuan Yew ought to be a healthy antidote to populist incompetence and delusion which is only too common nowadays.
In all modesty, and in line with De Wever’s stated ambitions, here are 10 ways Belgium could take inspiration from Singapore:
10 points to Singaporianize Belgium:
Make English an official language of Belgium, starting with the Brussels Region.
Cut taxes, cut taxes, cut taxes.
Drastically reduce the Belgium’s labor laws (as of 2023 these apparently run to over 344 pages).
Zero tolerance for crime, drugs, filth, and Islamist extremism (all major problems in Brussels and Antwerp, with drugs and gun violence notably increasing).
An emphasis in policy and academia on expertise, facts, and pragmatic solutions, not ideology or moralistic passion.
Radically simplify administrative requirements and procedures for multinational corporations and freelancers (latter face high costs and few benefits).
Brain gain: strictly condition immigration on economic contribution with high salary and skill thresholds for citizenship.
Run Brussels like a city-state: E.g., merge the urban development authority of Brussels’ 19 (sic!) communes into a single agency to enable coherent transport and housing development (taking inspiration from Singapore’s Housing and Development Board (HDB)).
YIMBY: simplify permitting for development by foreign investors with a single industrial permit authority assigning a single case officer per project (inspired by the Singapore’s Economic Development Board).
Gradually reduce welfare provision and tie healthcare and pensions to mandatory private plans (this, no doubt, would be the most difficult, but would help Belgium escape the fiscal-demographic death spiral affecting much of Europe).
In Prosperity, Prime Minister De Wever has set a very high bar for Belgium. At the very least, after years of watching Europe sleepwalk into decline, it is gratifying to see European leaders finally recognizing and working to address the underlying problems. And, as President Macron pointed out in a meme-worthy moment at Davos, Europe also has powerful assets: above all a culture of predictability and of keeping promises, two virtues essential to the rule of law and secure property rights. Those are precious things in a world increasingly marred by erratic (would-be) autocrats.
