Unease: Life in Singapore Families

by Teo You Yenn

In Singapore, a loudly ‘pro-family’ society, why is work-life balance so elusive? And why are parents so uneasy? What accounts for this gap between the lived reality and ideal narrative of Singapore families?

Sociologist and bestselling author Teo You Yenn turns her eyes to the contours and rhythms of life inside families, exploring how ‘kiasu’ parents are made and investigating the ways in which inequality marks life in contemporary Singapore. Drawing from in-depth interviews with parents from all walks of life, Unease examines how social structures, individual strategies and common practices come to produce Singaporean ‘cultures’ of doing family.

An incisive exposé of how the logics of hierarchy, competition and unequal worth infect ordinary people’s lives, Unease asks what these cost parents, children and the values we hold as a society. And what possibilities are there for living differently?

Genres: Nonfiction, Sociology, Politics

264 pages, Paperback

Published April 4, 2026

Reviews

[Amy ☁️ (tinycl0ud) · Rating 5 out of 5]

TLDR whether you grew up here, got married here, or taught/studied in the public school system here, there is something for you. If you are a mother here, this is definitely for you. No intellectual thoughts from me when it's about lived experiences.

For notes taken at the 3 May 2026 book launch: https://www.instagram.com/p/DX4l30eEqTu/

I started this book knowing that although this is about parenting in Singapore, my experience would not be reflected in here (for good reasons). I'm not in any mummy chat groups because I straight up do not have friends in my age group who are also parents because almost everybody wants to remain childfree. Even at work, I'm the only parent. And I get it. They spent two decades in the education system and finally made it out with independence and financial freedom. They want to finally enjoy life, and why would they inflict this on another innocent? They tell me they see iPad babies everywhere. I see those kids too. People with children the same age as mine are 5-10 years older than me and I see this every day at the preschool or playgrounds. They have different values and already have social support systems in place. Many of them are SAHMs who don't have to work so they spend all day together, like a flock. I am envious but I have no idea where to find other mum-friends if I missed the window to go for prenatal yoga classes. But maybe it's a blessing that I don't experience direct pressure about sending my toddler to a 'better' preschool or enrichment classes.

What I did not expect was to see my own parents' experiences reflected even though it has been two decades since. So little has changed. They migrated from Hong Kong, but my upbringing ended up being very typically Singaporean Chinese because they anxiously copied what other parents did. Other parents sent their kids for abacus classes, piano lessons, Chinese tuition, Kumon, so they did too. Other parents obsessed about getting 'A' grades for Maths and Science, so they did too. I don't think they knew what they were doing, having no experience with the local education system themselves, they just knew they could not let their children-of-immigrants 'fall behind' so they made sure they did what their friends advised. I'm not sure it worked. And I'm not sure any of us, both parents and children, were content and fulfilled at any point of the journey. I can see why so few people want to do this after surviving childhood.

And then every single year we have to hear about the falling birth rate. I don't know anyone who actually cares because they're too busy trying to not die at work. Why is it always about babies being born and not about how to make life as adults in this country less unbearable? It seems pointless to be pro-birth but not pro everything else that makes the raising of children easier. This place is not actually pro-toddler, pro-children, or pro-family. Preschool teachers work long hours and are paid peanuts. Preschool waitlists are crazy long. Remote work is being phased out. Formula milk is insanely expensive. The primary school balloting system is.. I don't even have the words for this. Do we want more babies born because we value children and see the task of raising them to be an immense privilege, to protect them as the most vulnerable members of society, or are they valuable insofar as they will eventually grow up to become workers generating shareholder value for CEOs, to become fodder for the machine? Children are not cattle but why do they feel like they are? Even in a zoo, when the animals don't reproduce, the first thing to do is to fix the environment, not incentivise the animals with food or toys. People just don't feel secure and no amount of gaslighting will work. They are stressed about feeding themselves, let alone a completely helpless being that will hinder their ability to earn a livelihood. Right now, the equation is Having Kids = Income/ Mental Health/ Freedom in Peril. Of course people are uneasy. This unease is a gut feeling that not all is right, and people are listening to this feeling. No one can blame them.

Supplementary reading:
• 'Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution' by Adrienne Rich
• 'Every School a Good School' by Ng Ziqin
• 'Off Centre' and 'Those Who Can't, Teach' by Haresh Sharma
• and of course, 'This Is What Inequality Looks Like' by Teo You Yenn

[Cedric Chin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly remarkable. I thought this would be a book about parenting in Singapore. It was only at the ~60% mark that I realised that was a headfake. It becomes clear as the book progresses that this is a wholesale critique of Singaporean society — the way the state has set it up, combined with some broadly observed traits of capitalistic systems (all countries with capitalistic systems suffer from some work-life tension, also inequality), coupled with the consequences of social engineering decisions made decades ago. (Social engineering as a term has fallen out of fashion, but TYY reminds us that this was indeed done in Singapore in the 60s through the 80s.)

I will admit that while the societal critique is powerful and TYY accomplishes her goal of teaching us sociological analysis (as she says is one of her goals in her ST interview), if you are a parent, the most useful chapter might be chapter 4. (That’s the one on gender roles in parenting, and the deep costs it imposes on the mother).

TYY’s thesis is that inequality causes parenting to be an extremely fraught, highly unpleasant affair in Singapore. This is regardless of class (which is consistent with the government’s observation that monetary costs is not the prime mover for willingness to have more kids) and tied to education and gender roles in very complicated ways. It is an ambitious argument. If true, it goes some way to explain the broad decline in TFR in the developed world.

A layered book. I have some critiques but I’m still thinking them through. Anyway it doesn’t matter for this review; read the book.

[Danielle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick read because the language is so straightforward and void of the jargon one might expect academics to have. Similar to her first book, Teo You Yenn looks at another aspect of inequality - this time that of family and meritocracy - through the eyes of anecdotes and interviews. I liked how she made her arguments on specific topics like gendered work norms, policy choices, and this paragraph struck me as beautifully written but sobering:

"That is the metaphorical sound of people being the contradictions and tensions in everyday life: family should be a happy place but there is no time to enjoy it; work should be secondary but money from work is familial duty; children should "learn through play" and develop "holistically" but still need to take exams; kids are the highest priorities but some of their care must be outsourced; every school is a good school but some are better than others."

And the list goes on. We live in a highly contradictory society where people are constantly at odds with their common sense and policy.

[K1c · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was highly valuable in 3 ways:

1. It is an investigation of something hard to pin down in any place - its ambient environment. This is particularly true in a relatively moralistic and opaque society, where detail about what's going on in other lives doesn't come easy. Let alone from a voice which doesn't desperately want you to have kids.

2. It offers an elegant reading of the feelsbad nature of Singapore that nimbly weaves together structure and agency. It resists the national desire to atomise individual experiences, and 'collectivises' the problem by explicating the social costs of the way we live today as we hurdle into a prob worse future.

3. It establishes (births??) a generative concept. 'Unease' is a resonant way of articulating the ambivalence of living here. The text was probably too elementary/101 whenever it did theory. But fair enough, accessibility is a worthy goal. So giving rise to more questions than answers, you can imagine 'unease' as a concept being taken forward in many rich directions. For example, I would love a deep ethnography of one day in an uneasy life that teases out the contours of this genre of living.

[Esther · Rating 5 out of 5]

i agree with all the other positive reviews on how this book brings a much needed perspective on the palpable tension and unease in singapore today. but beyond the insights shared, i am grateful for teo you yenn's time and effort in crafting this book, and her commitment to bringing her views and ideas to a wider audience, and building the type of society she wants to see.

there is so much personal and professional cost to embarking on this type of work, as she alludes to in a 2024 personal essay, and it's very admirable and commendable that despite the challenges involved she's decided to bring her scholarship and expertise to bear in service of enabling this public discourse about the unarticulated ideologies embedded in our society, how it affects everyone across class, gender, age divides, and the society we want to build and how to get there.

[Janne Hu · Rating 5 out of 5]

TYY is doing important work for Singapore. in her clear and accessible writing, she uses the familiar feeling of ‘unease’/ discomfort/ ambivalence to probe the tensions in the representations (in ‘culture’, state narratives) and the lived experiences of family life (which are conditioned by real policies, institutions). it also seems like TYY is trying to teach Singaporeans the basics of social science - she often explains why a question is worth asking in the first place and then takes us through each step of her logic - which is a worthy endeavour towards building an engaged society.

most of the book is ostensibly about the challenges of parenting and family life in Singapore, but it is undergirded by TYY’s central preoccupation - inequality. i found her expansive definition to be very productive - inequality is not only about inputs and outcomes in terms (e.g. in resource distribution), but it is context, the way that ranking and competitive sorting are embedded in everyday interactions with people and institutions. based on state narratives (e.g. 2019 COS response to TYY’s TIWILL), inequality is conceived as discrete, concrete problems to be mostly addressed by subsidies and transfers. this is not wrong in itself but misses out on broader experiences structured by socioeconomic hierarchy, which are also deserving of policy thinking and space.

the conclusion propounds a version of society that is built on ethical action, community solidarity and respect for all regardless of conventional success. even though Singapore is swept along the global neoliberal capitalistic trends which further entrench inequality, i’m slightly optimistic. we know that ‘culture’ is not static, that policy positions can evolve; we must believe that individuals can participate in shaping the society we want.

[Subra Nara · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always found Teo You Yenn's (TYY) writing to be approachable, heartfelt and straightforward. And this was no different.

I think the biggest strength of Unease lies in its ability to cohesively sew a narrative thread across the personal stories heard from other parents, experiences that echo similar conversations that we've had in our lives with friends and family members. In all of these chats about raising a family in Singapore, there is often a bubbling sense of discontentment, an internal monologue which whispers that something is not quite right about the way things are set up in our society.

Yet our response is often to interpret this unease as a sign of our ungratefulness. How dare we question a society that has world-leading test scores, high standards of living and social mobility? If we are stressed out as a parent, then we should simply worry less about our kids and not be so kiasu, right?

The faustian bargain of a national narrative that emphasizes individual choices as the defining meritocratic pillar of your self-worth is that while you can claim that your successes are the result of your own hard work, so are your failures. If you don't succeed within the confines of Singapore Inc., it is your fault for not having tried enough/made the ‘wrong’ choices/'escaped' to move overseas. And when the success/failure in question is your child, how can you not take their result in national examinations as an indictment of your ability as a parent?

Teo's analysis makes the (somewhat controversial but shouldn't be) claim that parents don't make choices about their children in a vacuum and their agentic capacity is greatly constrained by the competitive sorting of the Singapore education system, a race that starts from as young as 18 months old. Teo doesn’t absolve the choices of parents who fill their children’s timetable with tuition and enrichment classes in the educational arms-race, but suggests that we need examine the social structures and policies that led to this point. It's one thing to say "you have the agency to not to send your kid to tuition." It's another to actually do that, especially when your kid's future is at stake.

“Kiasu parents are not born, they are made”, says Teo, a premise that is sure to rankle some feathers. If parents of all social classes seem to come to the same conclusion that giving up their individual aspirations and signing their children up for tuition is the only real option for them to have a fighting chance, then perhaps its worth asking serious questions about why the governmental narrative of happy families is so cognitively dissonant from the actual lived experiences on the ground.

There’s also often a tendency by policy makers and those of a higher socio-economic status to dismiss individual stories and outframe it as exceptions to the norm. Our obsession with data driven and discrete evidentiary metrics also mean any kind of individual stories are rebutted with “ok but this is your story, where is your data?”

Additionally, parents may not have the right economic or political language and can only draw from their own lives when they explain frustrations with the system. As a result, their experiences are far too often ignored as “over complaining” and “taking our government for granted”. What Teo does here brilliantly is to scaffold these individual stories with plenty of data and give them the collective rigour that cannot simply be ignored as “kopitiam talk” or “parental gossip” but must be accepted as symptoms which indicate a larger systemic problem.

When so many individual stories across different backgrounds utilise the same type of language, express similar frustrations and lament their inability to freely dislodge from social mores about what parenting is like in Singapore, motherhood statements and glib platitudes about the joy of family just doesn’t cut it. As the government assembles the umpteenth taskforce to figure out how to increase our total fertility rate and encourage more families to bear children, Teo’s book could not be more timely. The only question is if the powers that be are prepared to hear the “hard truths” undergirding the parental experience in Singapore and take decisive action.

[d9fqdfnka · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do not think that the author managed to draw surprising insights from her interviews with parents. To put it another way, even many laypeople on online forums might be able to draw the conclusions she did. I was reading this at the same time as Dan Goodley's Introduction to Disability Studies (3rd edition), and in just a few pages he paints an incisive critique of neoliberalism and what it means for education. Unfortunately, I felt that Unease could not really link the theory to her data. That is not to disparage what the author does, as she challenges readers to imagine alternatives to the unease Singaporeans face in the final pages. She has succeeded in getting Singaporeans to bring this to discussions, discussions we sorely need.

I originally chose not to write a review because as a Singaporean, being bombarded by embodied knowledge about the subject on a daily basis, I felt there was too much to think about and too many emotions to grapple with.

The author addresses Singaporeans directly in this book, so it might be just a little strange for a foreigner to read this.

[W · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again TYY has come up with a banger of a book which looks at Singapore society as a whole. There are so many parts of it that I would like to quote in my review but alas I have to return the library book and have not had time to go buy an actual physical copy myself.

As she rightly points out there are issues with how the Singapore society has evolved. Once upon a time, the daughter of a taxi driver could go to university and get a decent job, now I’m really not sure that can be done anymore.

Our leaders like to say we are meritocratic and pro family but don’t do anything to make it actually happen when increasingly we are no longer that way. Society is getting more and more fragmented but what are we actually doing to resolve the issue? We say we are pro family but in reality we are only pro family in a narrow sense, you have to be a straight couple and please make sure you have one boy and one girl. If you’re a woman you better make sure you belong to the higher SES so you can outsource some of the care work but even then you are expected to carry the majority of the load.

Previously when This Is What Inequality Looks Like there were a lot of criticisms from the government, this time round it seems there is radio silence. I’m not sure if they are busy digesting the book to come up with counterpoints or if they hope by keeping silent they won’t draw attention to the book and Singaporeans don’t read this book at all.

This is definitely a book that requires multiple readings so you have time to sit with the issues raised. Please read this if you have not done so yet.

[Ning · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an important book that interrogates the widening gap between Singapore’s purported pronatalist stance and the harsh, practical realities of "doing" family. Much of the tension boils down to education. While politicians often nag parents to be less kiasu, TYY reminds us that culture is not innate but rather "forged under specific structural conditions." It is easy to say a parent can simply choose to be more "relaxed," yet there is a constant, agonising friction between the desire to give our children a happy childhood and the perceived duty to support them as they navigate the System.
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Ethical agency should not be thought of as merely an individual capacity or quality. It is something one truly has only when one's choices and values, when exercised, are also legible to others in the larger social context. That is, it is not good enough to say that people can do whatever they want, can go ahead and exercise their own rules even if against the grain ('no one is stopping you'; 'it's up to the individual'). True ethical agency is possible only when those choices, those values, and such lives have a dignified space to exist—acknowledged with respect, if not empathy—within a society.

[Jean · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am always impressed at how well Teo analyses and arranges various stories of her interviewees into coherent themes, and digest and present it in an accessible way for laypersons like myself. I also appreciated how she challenged state narratives such as how kiasu parents are the ones exacerbating the “education arms race”, and unpacked how that scapegoats and provides an easy way out of an otherwise extremely interwoven and complex social phenomenon of unease. Another part I appreciated was her analysis of how women “folded down” their ambitions, aspirations, and selves to support their children and families, and what ethical agency looks like for them (and parents more broadly).

[Kathleen Bu · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quotes that stayed with me:

1. “Everyday life is hectic and tense; life is stable but not quite secure; there is a pathway to follow but it does not always seem right; family is everything but family life feels off-kilter. The unease is subtle but persistent.”

2. “The picture I gathered of family lives is one dominated by labour— chores, tasks, checklists, schedules-and with scant room for play, rest, leisure, pleasure. It is also one where parents seem to bracket and suspend their own needs, aspirations, desires. The suspension of the self for children's potential and future was especially striking. Parents invoked this rhetoric with some frequency, referring to a shared script about parenting: sacrificing some of one's own happiness to enhance children's wellbeing is the right and expected thing to do. They expressed orientations towards the future: there was a sense that suffering in the now is acceptable, in exchange for some potential for a better life in the future. An orientation to the future might be aspirational, dreamy, about ambition and hope. But this is not the tone I observed. Instead, people's words were tinged with anxiety, worry, a look to the future more fearful than optimistic.”

3. “The Singapore story is frequently and repeatedly told as one of exceptionalism. Central to the exceptionalism narrative is that Singapore has successfully pursued economic growth and wealth-as 'the West' has—while maintaining a semblance of the best that 'traditional values' of'the East' or 'Asia' have to offer. Inside this box of 'best of East meets West' we find 'the family' as its most precious gem…Enough Singaporeans have been steered through idealised familial life pathways—from education to employment and accumulation of CPF savings, dating and heterosexual marriage to HDB flats, childbearing to supporting and caring for ageing parents-such that our collective footsteps have formed grooves of beliefs and meanings around contemporary Singapore as a 'pro-family' society…Yes, family ties and familial relationships are important to people. But listen closely to the rhythm of actual family lives, and things do not sit comfortably. Living in a place that calls itself 'pro-family' does not seem to mean that families have a great life. The actual doing of family in Singapore today is not easy, smooth, consistently fulfilling or joyful. 'Pro-family' is genius story-making, casting the state as protector of that which people value. But scratch the surface, and the valorisation of family-the relentless claim that this is what the Singapore state believes in and is committed to-begins to peel. Given how daily lives are described by people occupying the interior of families, we must confront the fact that this story obscures the full range of people's lives and the social conditions they are actually embedded in. If family life is so uneasy, is it reasonable to claim this to be a pro-family place?”

4. “Economy-getting the most optimal outcome with the fewest inputs—is a high priority. They looked for services that are "bang for the buck" and discussed how they try to figure out if certain services are "worth it" or "not worth it" ("it" being money). That this money is felt deeply-its spending treated with some heaviness-is especially clear when some wondered about their "returns on investment". Parents feel, intensely, the expense of raising children.They are conscious of needing to spend and yet not overspending-because there are other children in the household or because they need to save money for longer-term needs. Consequently, they try their best, essentially, to reduce "waste".”

5. “How do you solve a problem like a child who prefers play over work? This is an absurd question. Children of course prefer play over homework. Why is such a child a problem?”

6. “For example, for full-day childcare (7am to 7pm), PCF Sparkletots, one of the five current anchor operators, charges fees capped at S$680 per month for Singapore citizens. In contrast, Eton House, a private preschool, charges S$2,834 for nursery and kindergarten (8.30am to 3pm). On a per hour basis, that is nearly eight times more expensive…Preschool is not just a place for care-different preschools may lead to different 'results'. Inequality-the existence of uneven prices, quality and outcomes-is not an abstract idea but a concrete experience. The pressure to keep up, to not fall behind—i.e., to be kiasu—thus begins to be felt here.”

7. “The year a child turns 6, parents receive a letter from the Ministry of Education. The Compulsory Education Act requires parents to enrol their children in primary school the year they turn 7. Children are placed into a queue, with their turn for picking a (specific) school coming in 'phases. Phase 1 is for children with siblings already enrolled in the school. Phase 2A is for children whose parent or sibling is an alumnus of the school, or whose parent is a member of the School Advisory or Management Committee or a staff member of the school. Phase 2B is for children whose parent has been a volunteer at the school, or who is endorsed by a church or clan association connected to the school, or who is an active community leader. Phases 2C and 2C Supplementary are for children yet to have secured a place after the first phases. At each phase, if registrants outnumber vacancies, priority is given to Singapore citizens over Permanent Residents, and also first to those who reside within 1 kilometre, then 2 kilometres, of the school. A parent can apply to any school in Singapore, so all schools across the island are open to all children…One of the perverse outcomes of these primary school hierarchies is a degree of class segregation that parents are sensitive about; in explaining to me why they want to enrol their kids in good, or at least 'decent, schools, parents tell me that "who you mix with" matters. Precisely because it falls on parents to ensure that their children are in good environments, even trying to get kids into the 'normal' schools requires strategic parental action. Collective practices have thus evolved in response to these rules and procedures for allocating primary schools. In the national competition that occurs around 'top' schools, moving up in the queue (the 'phases') is one way of improving the chances of success. Some parents buy homes with the intention of being within 1 or 2 kilometres of their preferred school; others move house—in some cases renting in neighbourhoods they cannot afford to buy in—to qualify for higher priority. Some sign up, when their children are 5 or 6 years old, to serve as 'parent volunteers (PV)' in the schools they hope their children can enrol in, or join alumni or clan associations where these grant advantage; others serve as 'grassroots leaders’…. There are obvious class inequalities embedded in these acts.
Several 'good' schools are in neighbourhoods where housing is especially expensive and kept elevated precisely because of those schools and the policies that reward proximity to them. In high-demand schools, parent volunteers are so plentiful that schools are selective in the 'skillsets' that parents can offer; people in professional jobs are typically advantaged. To 'clock PV hours', moreover, requires time-either of parents who have jobs where they have control and flexibility, or of mothers in households where they can afford to be full-time caregivers.”

8. “The more things are done this way, the more it has to continue to be this way.“

9. “The phrase 'social engineering has gone out of fashion, but these metaphors remind us that these are efforts at bending society, polity and economy into certain shapes. And just as there are limits to how much land can be gardened and how much air can be cooled, there are limits to how much states can bend people to their will. I do not mean that people refuse to be ruled or openly defy rule-that has thus far not happened in Singapore. I mean that the endeavour of social engineering is bound to contain contradictions and tensions, and that the weight of these fall somewhere, on someone 'Pro-family. The obsession with defining and policing boundaries of 'family' —who it is made up of, who plays what role, who is responsible for whom-is not matched by attention to and appreciation for how people experience being givers and receivers of care throughout their lives, how people vary in aspirations and desires when it comes to relationships and what people need—structurally and culturally—to pursue their wide-ranging aspirations in life. You can hear the creaking of branches and leaves trying to grow beyond the cage. That is the metaphorical sound of people bearing the contradictions and tensions in everyday life: family should be a happy place but there is no time to enjoy it; work should be secondary but money from work is familial duty; children should learn through play' and develop 'holistically' but still need to take exams; kids are the highest priorities but some of their care must be outsourced; every school is a good school but some are better than others; everyone can have upward mobility if they work hard but some talents will be rewarded more richly than others; children's mental health matters but falling behind will harm as much as pushing them to do homework will; there are many pathways to success in life but some will lead to securitv and others will not; boys and girls can study, men and women should work, men and women can have the same dreams until they cannot; care is so priceless that no one wants to pay for it.”

10. “I see that the contrast to unease is not just ease, it is also agency. When we act in ways that are in line with what we think is right or good-that is, when we exercise some semblance of moral or ethical agency—we feel comfortable with ourselves and our choices. But when we act not because we think something is right but because we feel there is no other way, then the 'choice' sits uneasily.”

[jw · Rating 4 out of 5]

The starting point for Unease is the gap between the official narrative that Singapore is a "pro-family" society and the reality that "the actual doing of family in Singapore today is not easy, smooth, consistently fulfilling or joyful". Parenthood is stressful in Singapore, "a constant rush from one task to another…parents feel unable to do well both at work and at home - there is a perpetual sense of being on alert and slightly off-kilter. The unease is triggered not just by the demands of here and now, but also by anxieties about the future. They worry about money and security, for themselves, their children, their aging parents." In Unease, Teo You Yenn unpacks the factors and forces that shape family life in Singapore, in ways that run counter to the official narrative and espoused values.

A huge source of stress for parents in Singapore is education and much of Unease circles around education. In most countries, the early years of a child's life are perhaps the most demanding and stressful as the child depends entirely on their parent - for food, for toileting, for entertainment and comfort. Going to school eases some of these demands. Yet, in Singapore, new demands around the child's education and school performance arise, demands that are often borne by mothers and, unlike caregiving, cannot be delegated to grandparents, domestic helpers or other caregivers. This is one level of unease - that constant tension and stress of ensuring one's kids are able to stay ahead, or at least keep up. Then there is the sense of vague discomfort and wondering - does parenting have to be this hard, such a chore, so exhausting?

It is not uncommon to hear criticisms of kiasu parents in Singapore, that they are the source of stress in the Singapore education system. No matter what reforms the Ministry of Education has rolled out - creating more pathways for students to grow and progress, blunting streaming, etc - competitive parents undermine these efforts by trying to secure new advantages under a revamped system. But Teo reminds us not to focus only on micro dynamics and factors, such as the mindsets and behaviours of individuals, but to also look at the meso layer of institutions and their practices, the macro layer of policies, regulations and laws, and global forces at play. By engaging at these different levels, we can "overcome our tendencies to see individual lives as driven purely by 'personal' acts and idiosyncratic choices….[while] people have agency and make choices…these are never in a social vacuum - the options people have are shaped by numerous social, economic, political forces beyond a given person."

Teo points out that "the demands and logics of the education system generate needs and tensions [that] intensify care labour and parental obligations", with the PSLE being seen as the start of a narrowing vertical funnel that has an outsize impact on a child's subsequent pathway in life. She argues school choice becomes a high stakes, high investment process for parents, given that that parents are the ones who can and must choose among all possible schools (vs being assigned, say, to the closest school) and given the significant differences between schools in terms of academic outcomes and the consequential nature of these outcome. Parental behaviour is influenced by "the structural-cultural forms disproportionately shaped by how the state organises education and its rewards." Parents in Singapore feel compelled to engage in kiasu behaviour because they see what is at stake in an unequal society. Fall off the mainstream path and your child will struggle to earn a decent living; "the parent in Singapore today has been steered, over the years and through multiple structural and cultural forces, into two options: be (some version of) kiasu or be a neglectful, irresponsible parent".

And while "schools replace parents' care labour in some ways and for some hours of the day, they also generate tasks and responsibilities for parents, compelling them - women especially - to rethink and reorganise their paid work."

I don't know how Teo's critique of the Singapore system, with the education system being a large part of it, will be received. But I think the stories Teo shares from her interviews with parents, the sentiments they expressed, will not be unfamiliar to readers who are parents. I was acutely conscious, reading this book after the children had gone to bed, that I had spent the evening - during the June holidays! - making sure that they were on track with their Student Learning Space submissions, reading their eZhishi assignments, doing their Chinese worksheets for enrichment class and what have you. And I had a newly acquired assessment book - recommended by the school teacher to help my son lock down the MCQ section of the exams - sitting on the table. Because I am a good parent who is an active participant in the school-parent partnership (who dutifully checks Parents Gateway, SLS and Class Dojo).

Teo asks the question, does parenting have to be this way in Singapore? Does it have to be so tiring, so uneasy? Can we not change the script? Yet, part of me wonders why it should be surprising that parenting in Singapore be viewed through the lens of sacrifice, constant struggle and effort. After all, our very national narrative is based on the notion of constant, relentless effort to remain exceptional (or perish).

Teo argues that there are bigger issues at stake here that require us to address this unease head on. She points out that "three sets of values matter to Singaporeans - meritocracy and mobility, familial connections, inclusive community. Our way of doing work and family contradicts the things we care about - we want people to be able to fulfil their dreams and potentials, but our systems orient towards constricted pathways; we value family ties, but the hectic and tense realities inside familial lives make living lovingly together difficult; we would like to be an inclusive society, but hierarchy and competition make clear to us that belonging is heavily conditional on credentials, employment and money". Teo warns that we risk developing these characteristics instead:
- "independence without ethical agency" when we focus on taking care of our own family's problems and our children's needs, but fail to intentionally consider why we do what we do;
- "conformism without solidarity" when we act uniformly, obeying rules and following procedures well but without a sense of mutual obligation to others in society, which is a "politics of thin solidarity and limited imagination"; and
- "valorisation of success without deep respect for human worth" where we look at particular, individualised and narrowly defined success and not broader notions of human worth.

I preferred Teo's earlier book, This is What Inequality Looks Like. It was eye-opening and thought provoking, and I learned to see differently with each chapter that examined a different aspect of the low-income experience - their every day life in rental flats, how they juggle work and family commitments, parenting, etc. Unease moves at a different pace and along a different path; it circles the topic of parenthood, and in particular how mothers modify their approach to work and life and "fold down" once their children enter school, examining it from different angles, through the micro, meso and macro layers. It's still an excellent read, just quite different in style from TIWILL. 4 stars overall.

[Jane · Rating 1 out of 5]

yet again with the preachy and moralistic tone. this book is one exaggeration after another.

the author is literally camping outside hdb tuition centres to interview waiting parents, and then she makes the conclusion that most parents are sending their kids for 'bang-for-buck' classes and claims that 'the whole system will collapse without tuition'. tyy, i have a suggestion, why don't you wait in a hospital and interview patients about their lifestyles to draw conclusions about the general population's health? or wait outside the tyy fan club meeting to conclude that all singaporeans share your views?

the craziest point was when she concluded that parents care so much about their kids' academics instead of their character, and parents only ask each other about their kids because they want to suss out the other kids' academic performance. her evidence: when she asked parents about their kids, they rarely offered expressions of joys, talents and strengths of their kids, instead, they talked about their kids' academic performance and schooling. ??? that's because you are a rando asking questions outside a tuition centre and parents are just sticking to safe facts??? where is the academic rigour??? you are entitled to your opinions, but don't masquerade this as research please.

in the last chapter about "virtues", "ethics", "equality", "common good" etc. etc. (with 'air-quotes'), she claimed that our current society judges parents and doesn't give them a dignified space to exist with their choices if they act based on their principles (i.e. parents are being forced by culture to send their kids for tuition, and we are out here SHAMING them implicitly if they don't). please. i recommend Richard Dawkins' "The Selfish Gene" for starters. sorry that life is a struggle for existence and people are trying their best for their kids in the most primal ways instead of taking the virtuous road. sociology is not a real science.

here's a quote i'll end with:
"We rarely have the space to ask why: why is life organised to prioritise work, money, 'the economy'? Why do children need to be able to read before primary school? Why is Mathematics a main tool for differentiating and categorising students? Why are educational credentials a main determinant of salaries? Why do we attach unequal value to people based on credentials and/or wealth?"

stop asking leading questions and pretending they are profound. to answer the first four, because why not? because food, housing, transport, healthcare, power and much of human progress simply do not come from vibes, leisure or singing kumbaya under the tree. society is built on science, industry and labour. and to the last question, you are the one who is devaluing humans to money, not us. speak for yourself.


1 star for chapter 4 about gendered unease.
-1000000 for the rest. not because i disagree with the points, but because this could have been a 500-word fb post. sad for the trees who had to have such banalities printed on their dead bodies.

[Alan Tao · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strangely enough about a book subtitled "life in Singapore families", my biggest critique of this book was that it did not feel specific enough to Singapore.

TYY's main argument in this book is that inequality is one of the main causes of the unease in Singapore families. Singapore families feel unease as their realities of family life clash with the ideals that are espoused by the state and in the popular imagination - family life is meant to be peaceful and fulfilling yet can feel stressful and oppressive, work is meant to be secondary, a means to an end to support the family yet often feels fundamental to a parent's role as a provider, family is meant to elevate and complete one as a person yet simultaneously demands the sacrifice of one's own personhood to function. Fundamentally, one of the big causes of this unease is the understanding that one has to raise children to be sorted into an extremely hierarchical and unequal world. These are all keenly observed insights that are quite frankly almost universal to the developed (and some developing) world. A quick glance at news and polls across any rich country will show these to be similar unease felt by parents all over.

TYY also delves into some of the Singapore-specific pressures which exacerbates these feelings of unease - the way the education system creates and reinforces sorting and hierarchy, the specific ways in which government policies reproduce gendered parental roles, and the ways different classes struggle in raising their children in response to inequality. The contradictions between these pressures and the official "pro-family" rhetoric of the Singapore state is concisely laid out - yet I felt that TYY could have delved much deeper into explaining why these policies exist in such specific configurations in Singapore. These, after all, are the Singapore-specific patterns of unease that the book is about. While discussed briefly and indirectly, an accounting of how Singapore's political economy and place in the world economy produces such policy configurations would in my opinion have strengthened this book's analysis of the unease present specifically in Singapore parents.

Nevertheless, this is a very well written and approachable book about what is becoming one of the largest global issues of the 21st century, and should be read by anyone interested in how our societies function. There are many footnotes explaining Singapore specific terminology like HDB and PSLE (we are a nation in love with acronyms) so non-Singaporeans will find this book easy to understand as well.

[Trang Ngo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked up this book during my first trip to Singapore, where I spent four days wandering through its diverse neighborhoods - from the vibrant streets of Chinatown and Little India to the quiet charm of Tiong Bahru and Joo Chiat, even into the local HDBs and bustling hawker centers like Maxwell and Golden Mile. Walking through Kampong Glam, Tanglin, and Nassim, I began to sense the country’s pulse: a generally incredible quiet, a seamless efficiency, and a deep-rooted discipline. It felt profoundly safe, yet there was a quiet realization that nothing "out of the crowd" was ever supposed to happen. This predictability is both a blessing and a constraint. I bought Unease because I wanted to understand the internal reality behind this perfect order.

Teo You Yenn’s Unease is a courageous challenge to the efficiency-driven narrative of Singapore. As a Vietnamese reader, I felt a strong connection to her analysis of a society that prioritizes the "most efficient trajectory" at the cost of internal peace.

The book captures the silent FOMO and the rigid social orbits that define the transition from Third World to First. While the takeaways were largely what I anticipated, the book’s strength lies in its ability to give a name to the invisible anxieties of Singaporean residents, especially mothers. It is an essential read for anyone wanting to feel "seen" in an over-structured world and a hopeful first step toward systemic change.

[Rong Hui · Rating 5 out of 5]

"What is a good society, and how will we get there? These are genuine questions only if they are everybody's right and duty to ask and answer."

Definitely a more challenging read than TIWILL (at times it felt like a Sociology textbook / literature review), but a rewarding one. Instead of being prescriptive with approaches to policy that can foster greater inclusivity, TYY instead leaves us with questions to ponder (What is a good society? What values should we value?), which then shape the principles that underpin the lens we adopt when evaluating our education and political system. I appreciated the balance she struck between her drive to give voice to women / lower-income families as a sociologist, and the privilege she recognised she had as an academic.

While the book partly appeals to the public to be more inclusive towards others who do not conform to more conventional paths in SG, it is recognised that a large part of this change has to come from the system itself. Part of me does wonder if this book is enough to emphasise and push for this need for change, or if the struggles raised in the book will get swept under the rug as SG continues doing well on the surface. The growing online discourse on this book can only be the first step — we can only hope that it sends a signal that people do resonate with the narratives shared in her interviews, or at least, are interested in understanding or partaking in these conversations.

[Jonathan Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book is one that presents more questions than answers, that is transformative. This book is that. Don’t let the title deceive you, it isn’t all about family, but it is an introspective look into Singapore’s basic building block - families, to discuss their role in our society shaped by the micro, meso and macro lenses and to discover the little things that warp public perception vs reality.

The last chapter brings everything together, showing the sharp contrasts between policies, perceptions and everyday life and invites us to think of what we need to right the inequality “a feature in our society”.

The book provides some suggestions, some directly going against “what we have been told” but this phrase from the book keeps ringing in my head - “What’s the economy for, anyway, if not to help us realize our vision of a good society”. The competitiveness that has brought us up as a small nation has contributed to the aloofness where we are united in following because we are considerate to ourselves and not others.

Ultimately the book generates discussion, discussion that I will bring to my friends and close ones to say the “unsaid but known” and to drive further thoughts for the idea of our collective future society

[Kaamela Barvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finally finished reading this after attending a panel and listening to a podcast with the writer, You Yenn on them. I personally really appreciate her as a researcher and how thoughtfully she approaches her work. The book didn't surprise me and I don't think it intends to! (if you're Singaporean). It mainly, through anecdotes, demonstrates the impact of the education system on family life. It convincingly shows that asking parents to 'shift their mindset' or 'be less kiasu' is ridiculous (frankly gaslighting) because while the internal parts of the education system have been rearranged, the larger framework of sorting at a young age, hierarchy, elitism remains.

I think what's also commendable is her efforts to show that the impact of the education system is cross cutting - negatively impacting families across the socio-economic spectrum. To different degrees but cross cutting nonetheless. This is then a good rallying call. All of us should expect better and demand for better. It's not a problem of a 'poor minority'. There's power in that and frankly refreshing. It's calling attention to the structures and not letting people simply cast pity or boohoo statements while trudging along.

[Kelvin Lau · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author critically points out the state of tension that people living in Singapore experiences constantly, which she labels it as "unease". As a Singaporean who has lived his entire life here, reading this book draws out resonance and realisation which we do not typically reflect on. In particular, the apparent contradiction between the state's espoused state family first/friendly policies and the lack of individual agency experienced on the ground; ingrained mindset to conform to a state directed path yet a lack of solidarity in the society; the paternalistic and sometimes intrusive approach taken by the government in certain social policies yet the lack of interventionism in providing necessary safety nets and min basic income. All these policies result in this state of tension, or unease as the author points out, that needs active thinking and fresh ground up ideas to untangle this knot. A component of the unease comes from the lack of self agency, or "no choice", which we cannot allow to deepen over time in our much valorised and highly regarded by others society.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

copying what i put down earlier

a few early thoughts on unease:

- public sociology at its best takes everyday experience and links it to frameworks, connects the individual to the structural
-echoes of the first book: unpacking the cover of pro-family, how it’s caught up w the state’s intrusions/interventions and uncovering the discourse — it’s about individuals within families and leads back to wage work…
- the diagnosis is not new: the neoliberal, the k shaped economy
- our interventions are thus woefully under equipped because we are still carving up the pig into another way: work hours, on and off ramps. i haven’t processed it but the way it’s set up means taking apart we find an entirely different puzzle and diagnosis…

(also i wrote book review on this for my big big boss and i think i managed to both convey the main points as well as make it seem not too critical, though who is checking? i don’t think the clearance chain has read the book yet)

[jessie · Rating 5 out of 5]

i think it's wonderful that books like these can become bestsellers here :) singaporeans have known for a long time that parenting has become increasingly intense, and we know that our emphasis on academic credentials and how the education system is structured is a big part of the problem, but nonetheless it's still refreshing to see it all articulated so summarily here. it also made me reflect on the choices my parents had to make - selfishly i never questioned what it meant for my mum to have to give up on work to take care of us, and gosh it made me so sad when i asked and she said exactly what was in the book, that she had no choice and it was hard for her to not have her own money. there are so many things we take for granted and accept as the norm, and we don't always consider the costs behind them, even those that are paying those costs.

[Hou Ruomu · Rating 5 out of 5]

作为新加坡第一代移民，家长，我要以中文来写这本书的书评。首先这是一本好书，它用犀利的语言，真实的引用指出了在新加坡养娃的《别扭》，每一段对话都真实且刺痛。而且作者对于学术距离和个人观点的平衡把控的非常好，不平淡也不吵闹。

我最受用的是作者对moral agency和freedom之间的关系的讨论。按作者的语气这个并不是她的新观点，但她通过对新加坡真实生活的描绘，让这个关系生动地自然浮现了出来。有多少事情是我们认为对的，好的，我们做了；有多少事情是生活所迫才去做；甚至有多少事情我们认为不对，但生活所迫还是去做了 --- 这个确实可以标定我们生活的自由与否。

作者很强调inequality在这unease中的（负面）角色。我觉得有点牵强，有作者对自己研究方向的路径依赖在里面。比如说在女性养娃放弃工作导致与社会脱节这件事情上，男女角色不平等其实只是一个次要原因，但被过度强调了。如果养娃本身累，并且工作要求高时间投入，那么这个unease只是落在谁头上的问题，男女角色平等并不解决这个unease。inequality导致教育恐慌和超强度竞争我是同意的，只是不能一切都往inequality里面装，而且inequality本身维度太多，分开来讲具体inequality更有意义。

最后一章拔高度的时候，作者讨论human worth这件事情，说新加坡人判断worth是靠credentials，wealth，income什么的。这个和我实际体感不同。我认为worth这个概念在新加坡是被消解了的。作者把worth作为respect来讨论，但实际上新加坡人不太对他人持有任何respect，就没有worth这个概念。人们判断别人挣多少，学历，都是为了一些目的（他对我有没有用，他是否能做到abc）直接判断，并不会和worth这个概念挂钩。认为学历高的人或者有钱人就respectable的人其实不多。

[Khym Fong · Rating 4 out of 5]

i think this research is timely and needed but it suffers from the lack of directed focus (as i felt was the case in her other book as well) in terms of a “statement”

in particular, i wondered what new insights this book brought to the table - because it felt like a lot of the points are already unsaid/said truths that most families are acquainted with. i still think this research is important, but i didn’t quite see the new angle that she was bringing to the conversation on family building and child care in singapore.

then again (and similar to TWILL), i must still give it this score because we need more of this kinda non-fiction writing, and even if it’s an outline of the contours of unease in singaporean families rather than a pointed investigation of a new angle, it’s still important to do!

[Joshua · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well written book, that gave me flashback to when I was reading similar books during my Sociology classes many moons ago.

YY argues her case persuasively. Any Singaporean parent knows what she is taking about: the gnawing sense of unease. What struck me is that it cut across class lines - even the rich are not spared.

Hearing what YY says, and what the latest population group is aiming to do - not just throw money at the problem but address the enabling issues of work and care - gives me a glimpse of hope. YY did raise important questions at the last chapter, and if policymakers consider seriously what she says, change could happen.

But the cynic in me also thinks that it is almost impossible to change. “If it is not broke, why fix it”. So unless there is a broad acknowledgement that there is a problem (even getting there is a problem!), the status quo is the safe bet.

[Zack Lim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A sad book to read about the struggles of society. It reinforces why I think people should stop having children, or at least not in Singapore.

The book mentioned briefly about the Graduate Mother's Scheme. This probably played a part in how Singapore turned out today. But I could understand where he was coming from. If I had a choice, I would've chosen not to be born.

But since the conception of the book till today, AI has caused a massive paradigm shift for the outlook of children. Most kids will grow up to be prompters. Would be interesting to see what's YY's take on this.

The raw transcripts were a nice touch.

I didn't like how the book/YY kept referencing itself.. "this book is...", "in chapter X ...".

Chapter 6 was hard to read because the solutions and optimism doesn't sound realistic.

[Mirror4558 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Prof Teo writes incredibly: clear, easy to read, inspires reflection. This doesn't read like a sociological book at all because it's not dry or technical at all, but it'll leave you with the same effect of one - questioning what you believe to be norms and why.

Without spoiling it, all I have to say about this book is that it made me realise how Singaporean I truly am. Not that I ever thought I was super special, but I definitely have not followed the conventional path in any way whatsoever so I wouldn't have intuitively thought of myself as the quintessential Singaporean. I also closed this book with a deeper sense of appreciation for my mother.

I highly recommend this for all Singaporeans, or anybody who wants an insight into why Singaporeans are the way we are.

[henrie · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5

A book that encourages you to reflect upon family life in Singapore, and the pains and challenges that come with parenting. Would not go so far as to say it was "eye-opening" as most of the things she pointed out weren't entirely unknown ideas, but a good reminder of inequalities that exist in SG, even if you don't agree entirely with the author's suggestions and views.

Alot of concepts were quite repetitive (perhaps to emphasise a point, but I personally felt that sometimes I was reading the same thing over). While thought-provoking, it was also a little incomplete, some ideas that were touched on and then dropped.

[YiHui · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Describe. Explain, activate” - the activation of sociology. The imagination ! The looking beyond our immediate life, the not accepting of “it’s just like that lah”

“How we live is what we become”

A richer , expanded view of freedom in the sense of - Ethical agency - of doing what one believe to be good and right.

The fragmented social fabric laid bare the hollow nature of overt uniformity. We do the same things yet we don’t feel the sense of belonging.

Mobility - not just upward and downward but lateral too.

Gendered quagmire very much everywhere - mother’s mental load. Mother’s slashing pay cut. Dad’s nonchalance.

[Jeanette · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unease permeates all families regardless of class in a country that prides itself on its meritocratic system.

It's a timely book written at a time when our TFR is at its all time low, raising pertinent questions on what it means to bring a child into the world. I don't think this is necessarily just an issue that Singapore faces, but there are system specific pressures that has created an environment where parents feel like they're in a pressure cooker when all they seek is the best life for their offspring.