CONTENTS
Acknowledgements zx
Acknowledgements to the First Edition XI
Tables XVll
Figures xix
Plates xxi
Abbreviations XXlli
Glossary XXIV
Note on Currency XXVI
Note on Chinese Names and Terms xxvi
1 Pow&- Relations and the Built Environment in
Colonial Cities 1
The Distinctiveness of Colonial Cities 1
Approaches to the Shaping of the Urban Built
Environment in Colonial Cities 4
The Colonial City as Contested Terrain 9
The Exercise of Power in Colonial Societies 10
Power Relations and the Colonial Urban Built
Environment 16
Rhetorical Form and Recoverable Reality : The Plan
of the Book and the Use of Sources 18
2 Establishing an Institution of Control over the Urban Built Environment: The Municipal Authority
ofSingapore, 1819-1930 28
The Institution of Municipal Government 28
The Administration of Urban Affairs, 1819-1887 31
Urban Development and the Spatial Structure of the City
in the Late Nineteenth Century 35
The Expansion of Municipal Government, 1887-1930 48
Tht Composition of the Municipal Commission 58
The Municipal Authority as an Institution of Power 64
3 Municipal Sanitary Surveillance, Asian Resistance,
and the Control of the Urban Environment 85
The Campaign for a Sanitized Environment in Colonial
Singapore 85
The Aetiology of 'Filth' Diseases and Colonial Perceptions
of Asian Domestic Practices 90
The Scourge of Tuberculosis and Asian Housing
Conditions 93
Municipal Strategies of Disease and Sanitary Control:
Surveillance 101
The Asian Plebeian Response to Municipal Sanitary
Control 111
Chinese Medical Resources and Chinese Attitudes
towards Health and Disease 112
Asian Counter-strategies against Municipal Sanitary
Control 119
The Dialectics of Power 123
4. Shaping the Built Form of the City: From the
Regulation ofHouse Form to Urban Planning 136
An Alternative History of Housing in Singapore? 136
The Municipal Perspective : The Evidence for
Overcrowding and Insanitary Housing Conditions 137
The People's Perspective: The Organization of House
Space in an Overcrowded City 143
Municipal Strategies against Overcrowding : The
Regulation of Spatial Form 146
'Salus Populi Suprema Lex': The Move towards Town
Planning 16 0
Transforming the Built Form of the City: Intentions
versus Effects 167
5 Municipal versus Asian Utilities Systems: Urban
Water Supply and Sewage Disposal 175
Water Supply, Sewage Disposal, and 'Filth' Diseases in
Nineteenth-century Cities 175
The Origins and Expansion of a Municipal Water
Supply 177
Water Supply and Public Health: Well versus Municipal
Water 183
The Cost and Conservation of Water: Taps versus Meters 18 7
The Chinese System of Night-soil Disposal 190
Establishing a Municipal System of Night-soil Removal: The 'Pail' versus 'Sewer' Debate and the
MacRitchie Reports 193
Improving the 'Asiatic Pail System' 195
The 'Pail' versus 'Sewer' Debate Revisited: The Peirce
and Simpson Reports 198
The Move towards Sewering the Town 201
The 'Two-pail System': Compulsory Municipal
Night-soil Collection as an Interim Solution 203
Negotiating Control over Urban Utilities 204
PART II 213
ORDERING THE PUBLIC ENVIRONMENT 215
6 The Naming and Signification of Urban Space:
Municipal versus Asian Street-names and
Place-names 219
The Significance of Street-names and Place-names in
Singapore 219
The Naming Process 221
Municipal Street-names and Place-names 222
Chinese Street-names and Place-names 229
The Contest for the Meaning of the Urban Built
Environment 232
7. The Control of 'Public' Space: Conflicts over
The Definition and Use of the Verandah 243
Municipal Perceptions of Order in 'Public' Spaces: The
Verandah 243
Asian Perceptions and Use of the Verandah 245
Municipal Attempts at Verandah Reform in the Nineteenth
Century 249
The 'Verandah Riots' 250
The Verandah as an Arena of Daily Conflict : Municipal
Versus Asian Strategies 254
The Municipal Campaign against Street and Verandah
'Obstructionists' : Hawkers and Street Traders 262
Restructuring Pedestrian Circulation Space: Widening
Verandahs and Adding Sidewalks 266
Negotiating Control over 'Public' Circulation Space 268
8 The Control of 'Sacred' Space: Conflicts over
the Chinese Burial Grounds 281
The 'Sacred' in the Urban Built Environment 281
Death and Cemeteries : The Western European Tradition 282
Burial Grounds and Urban Development in Colonial
Singapore 283
The Control of Chinese Burial Grounds: The Debate over
the 1887 Burials Bill and Subsequent Legislation 289
Conflicting Discourses: Chinese versus Western
Conceptions of the Significance of 'Sacred' Space 294
Less 'Visible' Aspects of the Conflict over Chinese Burial Grounds 296
The Establishment of a Municipal Cemetery for the Chinese 300
Negotiating Control over 'Sacred' Space 303
9 Conclusion: The Politics of Space in Colonial Singapore 312
Appendix 317
Bibliography 323
Index 346