Modern Singapore has been a focus of contact between the three culture blocs of China, India, and Indonesia, and between Orient and Occident. Asian migrants came as labourers, artizans, and entrepreneurs; the much smaller European migrant group introduced Western economic and administrative institutions. Subsequent modernization and development, necessitating improved coordination and development of all resources has been hampered by substantial cultural divergences relating to economic and social practice and attitude. Contrasting cultural patterns are commonly identified with ethnic differences and can most readily be analyzed on this basis; but even ethnic groups are culturally heterogeneous and the complexities introduces by this diversity are of the utmost significance in the economic and social development of Singapore. Integration at all levels and in all areas of life is essential id this small city state is to be a viable entity maintaining its role in the modern world. An examination of demographic, economic and social aspects demonstrates an increasing stability during the postwar era and analyzes the main strengths and weaknesses of many facets of development in a plural society in which common identity has been based mainly on locational contiguity and the unity deriving from political independence as a nation state.