Liberal Socialist Party

Not to be confused with Liberal Socialists Party or Liberal Socialist Action Party.

This article is about the defunct Chinese party. For the Angolan party, see Liberal Socialist Party (Angola).

Liberal Socialist Party Parti Liberal Sosialis
Chinese name	自由社会党
Founded	5 February 1956
Legalised	24 May 1961
Dissolved	10 September 1963
Merger of	Progressive Party Democratic Party
Ideology	Social-democracy Social-liberalism Progressivism Internal factions: Democratic socialism Civil libertarianism
Political position	Centre-left to Left Internal factions: Centre to Centre-left
Election symbol
Torch and hand
Politics of Singapore Political parties Elections

The Liberal Socialist Party (LSP) is a defunct political party in the politics of Singapore. It was formed in the 1950s from the merger of the Singapore Progressive Party (SPP) and the Democratic Party (DP), the latter not to be confused with the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP). The merger occurred in order to consolidate their relatively compatible and similar aims, that of gradual and nonradical progressivism implementing liberal policies.

The merger occurred because of the weak performance of both parties in the Singapore general election of 1955, but members started to merge with the Singapore People's Alliance (SPA) before the following general election of 1959. The LSP contested the general election of 1959 against the SPA, had a significant showing, gaining more than 8% of the popular vote and contesting 32 seats, but failed to win any of them. Following the election most of the LSP merged with the SPA and the rump of the LSP died out as the now ruling People's Action Party (PAP) gained dominance. The SPA faded away during the incidents of merger, ensuing heated PAP-UMNO relations, and a shifted political focus towards an additional struggle between the PAP and the Barisan Sosialis. The LSP ceased to exist by 1965, when Singapore became fully independent, and never stood candidates for election.

References

• http://www.singapore-elections.com/political-parties/lsp.html