09 May 2025

Modelling the 2025 General Election: Was it right to apply Dunleavy to Singapore?

Almost a full month before Nomination Day, we at Illusio used Dunleavy’s dominant party system framework to drive our predictions for the outcome of the general election. We made 3 predictions, only of which  was correct: that the People’s Action Party (PAP) would maintain its dominance due to its perceived competence. No reasonable person would've gotten this wrong, with or without a model. The others landed somewhat off the mark. Yes, WP picked up ZERO new wards but they did not lose a GRC. To quote the Black Knight: Let's call this a draw.  No, the Progress Singapore Party (PSP) did not pick up a GRC in the west. That one was a total dud.

Do the outcomes mean Dunleavy's framework has finally broken down and is not applicable to Singapore? Or do the outcomes mean there's something else going on, which complictes but doesn't invalidate Dunleavy?


24 April 2025

Will PJ Thum present the first and only poll of the election?

Cancel your appointments for the night of 24 April 2025. If you have decided to attend an election rally, you need to reconsider your life priorities. Sure, you can spend 3 hours in a field or stadium experiencing attempts by politicians and their plants in the crowd to whip the crowd into a frenzy. We at Illusio have found a far more important, more exciting, more elusive event in Singapore's political history, one that is literally singular and may never be repeated again.

A political rally, from Wikimedia

This is why you should attend Dr PJ Thum and New Naratif's The Citizen Agenda at 7pm, at The Projector at Golden Mile (yes, it's a free event).

26 March 2025

Was Pritam Singh crying wolf? Modelling the 2025 Singapore General Election

It must've been an annus horribilis for the Wokers' Party for its leader Pritam Singh to muse publicly that his party could face a wipeout in the imminent 2025 general election. Was it the crushing defeat of the government-appointed Leader of the Opposition in the State Court, on charges of lying under oath to a parliamentary committee and a stinging rebuke by the judge? Or its second ever sex scandal? But then, what would we make of the completely opposite forecast by foreign observers who say this is the most competitive general election of Singapore's history, where the opposition is poised for game-changing victories that will surely transform the political landscape?

Only one of these two predictions can be true, but which? Is Pritam Singh voicing a rare warning to his partisans, or is this an attempt to rally his troops by reusing the boogeyman from the previous election?

Pritam Singh prefers to play a game of electronic football with Death!