One man more than any other is associated with Singapore’s remarkable 20th-century success. Who was Lee Kuan Yew, and how did he do it? On the north bank of the Singapore River is an eight-foot-tall statue of a man striking a stately pose, arms folded, gazing into the horizon. Stamford Raffles stands – according to the plaque attached to the plinth – on the ‘historic site’ where he first landed as an agent of the British East India Company on 28 January 1819 and, thereafter, ‘with genius and...