Editing Politics of Singapore (section)

==== People's Action Party ====
The PAP has been the dominant political party in Singapore, re-elected continuously since 1959. It is headed by [[Lee Hsien Loong]], who succeeded [[Goh Chok Tong]]. Goh's predecessor [[Lee Kuan Yew]] served as Singapore's prime minister from independence through 1990. Since stepping down as prime minister, Lee remained influential as [[Senior Minister of Singapore|Senior Minister]] and [[Minister Mentor]].

PAP has held the overwhelming majority of seats in parliament since 1966 when the opposition [[Barisan Sosialis Party]] resigned from parliament and left the PAP as the sole representative party. PAP won all of the seats in an expanding parliament in the general elections of 1968, 1972, 1976 and 1980. PAP's share of the popular vote in contested seats declined from 78% in 1980 to 65% in 1997. However, the elections of 2001 saw the party's share of the popular vote climb to 75%, winning 82 of the 84 seats. The [[2006 Singapore general election]] marked the first time since 1988 the PAP did not return to power on nomination day, with the opposition parties fielding candidates in over half of the constituencies. Overall PAP saw its share of the vote fall to 66.6%.

The dominance of the PAP, often to the extent that there is no effective and significant opposition for decades, has led to Singapore being described as a ''[[de facto]]'' [[one-party state]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Huat |first=Chua Beng |date=December 2010 |title=The cultural logic of a capitalist single-party state, Singapore |url=http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13688790.2010.518347 |journal=Postcolonial Studies |language=en |volume=13 |issue=4 |pages=335–350 |doi=10.1080/13688790.2010.518347 |s2cid=143497465 |issn=1368-8790}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |url=https://library.fes.de/fulltext/iez/01361inf.htm |title=Electoral politics in Southeast & East Asia |author=Yeo Lay Hwee |date=2002 |publisher=Friedrich Ebert Stiftung |others=Gabriele Bruns, Aurel Croissant, Marei John |isbn=981-04-6020-1 |oclc=223396951 |chapter=Electoral Politics in Singapore |chapter-url=https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/01361007.pdf}}</ref>