ABSTRACT
Nowadays, the concept of inclusive development is widely advocated as part of good governance. This chapter uses Singapore as a case study to explore and learn how hawker centres are developed as an inclusive mechanism. The framework is based on contentious politics of how these centres emerged from historical struggles among the main stakeholders. The approach is therefore historical, and it uses secondary data and documents to trace and assess the claim that hawker centres are inclusive. In particular, it addresses the issues of reliability and validity through source criticism, operationalization of concepts, linkages of causes and effects and generalizability. The main findings are that hawker centre development depends very much on the priorities of governments, which in turn hinges on historical struggles between hawkers and other stakeholders. These resistances were mediated by the State; at times, these conflicts were ignored and tolerated; at other times, they became instruments of various forms of inclusiveness and economic development.
