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This paper explores the process of transnational institutional matching between elite institutions in Singapore and Great Britain, and the role of state-sponsored scholarships in enabling this process as political and administrative elites are selected and groomed. Using data gathered from in-depth interviews conducted with Singaporean undergraduates studying at Oxbridge and a dataset of the institutional origins of 580 Singaporean government scholars, the analysis illustrates how students are being matched from two Singaporean junior colleges to Oxbridge and back to the higher strata of the Singaporean Public Service. We show that the educational trajectories of these government scholars need to be addressed in relation to the informational capital acquired in specific elite schools as well as the governing roles these individuals are meant to obtain within the state upon graduation. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The educational reproduction of elite masculinity in postcolonial societies has not been properly studied. This is partly because the postcolonial masculinities of non-western elites are accomplished through the cultivation of naturalized practices signifying the body politic of the nation-state. In Singapore, same-sex elite schools of colonial heritage, particularly Christian mission schools, play a central role in cultivating elite masculinity. Focusing on the elite Anglo-Chinese School, I analyze the array of class and racial anxieties displaced by the schooling of imperial white masculinity unto the decolonized field producing a middle-class Chineseness primed for the leadership of men. I also show that the masculinity is being transformed into a cosmopolitan masculinity co-opting maternal femininity, as the elites turn to engage neoliberal globalization. The case of Singapore shows the postcolonial adaptability of elite masculinities formed in the imperial era, achieved through the gender dynamics of resolving ethnic and class contradictions in elite schooling. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

After World War II, Chinese residents of Singapore demanded the establishment of local Chinese universities. The ruling regime, however, which was under the shadow of the neighboring Malay-dominated Malay Peninsula, was forced to suppress the development of such schools. In Hong Kong, the British needed to install a Chinese university to counter Beijing's and Taiwan's campaigns for recruiting students from the colony. As Hong Kong was a monoracial Chinese society, the government, not having to worry about the reaction of other indigenous groups, met this challenge by founding a fully recognized Chinese university. This research demonstrates that under diverse backgrounds of racial politics, state authorities have unequal latitudes to accommodate the educational institutions of subordinated racial groups. It also reveals that state education policies in small and dependent settings, unlike those in big and sovereign nations, are more susceptible to pressures from external powers and influences from the metropolis. These findings urge scholars to pay more attention to the factor of race and use comparative methods when employing the theories of state and hegemony to investigate education and power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]