Guiding Principles

on Developing
Political Attitude on
Students
 Topic: Guiding Principles on Developing Political Attitude on
Students.

I. Introduction

II. Exploring Political Values of Filipinos Using an Etic Approach

A. Social Psychological Studies on Values and Political Behaviors
B. Values and Political Phenomena in the Philippines

III. Philippine Political Culture and Governance

A. Defining Filipino Political Culture
a) Subjective components of Filipino political culture
b) Objective components of Filipino political culture
B. Political Culture in Context: Time-Sensitive, Peer-Bound and Structure-
Embedded
C. Suggestions for Future Research Questions on Filipino Political
Culture and Governance
a) Suggested Research Methods on Political Culture

IV. The Philippine Experience In Values Development

A. Problems And Issues
B. Early Efforts In The Field Of Religious, Ethical And Moral Education
C. Official Policies On Moral Education In The National Education System

V. Civic Political Culture/ Interest Groups

VI. The politics of ‘public opinion’ in the Philippines

VII. Guiding Principles on Young People’s Participation in Peace building

VIII. Conclusions

IX. References
INTRODUCTION
Months after the violence of "EDSA Tres," debate continues as to what
triggered this bloody event. How did a seemingly ragtag crowd turn into an angry
mob? Some say the uprising was a class war that drew its power from the class
divide in society, with the arrest of the masses' idol Joseph "Erap" Estrada as the
spark that spread the wildfire (De Quiros, 2001). Others saw the siege of
Malacañang as the handiwork of a small and currently disenfranchised elite, who
after exploiting the poor, disowned responsibility for inflaming the mob (Doronila,
2001). This variety of interpretations could confuse the layperson, not only about
EDSA Tres, but more so about the daily-life relations between Filipino politicians
and their followers. This chapter probes the source of this confusion.

An exploratory study was conducted to study political values of Filipinos.

An etic approach was adopted using as starting point the theory of core political
values (Schwartz, Caprara, & Vecchione, 2010) to explore the political values of
a sample of 699 Filipinos who participated in an online survey. The results of
exploratory and confirmatory factor analytic procedures suggest three core
political values – conservation, globalism, equal rights – that have distinct
motivational directions. Regression analysis revealed distinct patterns of
relationships with social axioms, which indicate beliefs about the processes that
lead to desired social outcomes. Finally, cluster analysis and MANOVAs
indicated four groups of participants that show distinct profiles in terms of
endorsement of political values and related social axioms. The results are
discussed in terms of the limits of the etic approach, but also in terms of the
potential usefulness of core political values in understanding different political
attitudes and behaviors of Filipinos.

Political attitudes and behaviors of individuals play an important role in

shaping social movements in any society. These attitudes and behaviors
contribute to the election of specific types of leaders, to support for particular
policies, and to strengthening social movements. Political attitudes and behaviors
partly determine whether a person engages political processes or turns away
from anything political, and also whether political and social institutions are
transformed or whether the status quo is maintained. In any society, individuals
may hold diverse political attitudes and engage political processes in differing
and possibly opposing ways; political scientists (e.g., Evans, Heath, & Lalljee,
1996) and sociologists (e.g., Judd, Krosnick & Milburn, 1981) have long
attempted to understand the structure and dimensions of such attitudes. There
has not been as much work done on trying to understand the underlying
processes that would explain the differences in political attitudes (see Peffley &
Hurwitz, 1995, for an early exception), and it was Feldman (2003) who suggested
that “one potentially valuable approach…that has not received sufficient
attention…is based on the value construct” (p. 479). Since then, proposals have
been made regarding the structure of core political values (e.g., Goren, 2005;
Gunther & Kuan, 2007) that explain differences in political attitudes and
behaviors. The assumption is that core political values help reduce complexity in
political information (Jacoby, 2006) and aid individuals in deciding their positions
on a wide range of issues in a coherent manner (Converse, 1964). Political
scientists infer people’s core political values from people’s agreement with
statements about how political institutions or government should function, which
political scientists typically constrain in terms of ideological constructs. Social
psychologists (e.g., Schwartz, Caprara, & Vecchione, 2010) propose that
people’s more basic personal values constrain their core political values, and that
there are a set of eight core political values that can account for political
behaviors across different social contexts (Schwartz et al., 2010; 2014). The
current study explores political values of Filipinos by using the core political
values defined in the literature. This approach for exploration is an etic approach
to research, as it uses theory and measures developed in one culture to measure
and compare the construct in other cultures (Berry, 1989). The approach is in
contrast to the more particularistic emic approach that focuses on meanings of
constructs that emerge from specific cultural contexts, and cultural social
psychologists have encouraged that etic and emic approaches be combined to
get a fuller understanding of psychological constructs across cultures. However,
we use the etic approach as a starting point to re-engage in a discussion of
political values in the Philippine social context. The term “re- engage” is used
here because there have been previous attempts by Philippine social
psychologists to use the concept of values in trying to understand Philippine
political phenomena. These studies will be reviewed later, after more recent
foreign studies that observe the usefulness of values in exploring differences in
political attitudes and behaviors are discussed.

Exploring Political Values of Filipinos

Using an Etic Approach

Social Psychological Studies on Values and Political Behaviors

As noted earlier, political scientists attribute differences in political

attitudes and behaviors to differences in values that they infer from the former.
Social psychologists refer to different theories of basic human values to try to
understand political behaviors. Studies in recent decades refer to Schwartz’
theory of basic human values, and examine how they relate to specific political
attitudes or orientations (Caprara, Schwartz, Capanna, Vecchione, &
Barbaranelli, 2006; Piurko, Schwartz, & Davidov, 2011) and political behaviors
such as voting (Barnea & Schwartz, 1998) and political activism (Vecchione et
al., 2015). More recently, social psychologists propose a set of eight core political
values that seem to be valid in various cultures (Schwartz et al., 2014) and relate
to political behaviors such as voting (Schwartz et al., 2010; Vecchione, Caprara,
Dentale, & Schwartz, 2013) and politically motivated consumer behaviors
(Kotzur, Torres, Kedzior, & Boehnke, 2015). Note that basic human values are
conceptually distinct from political values. Basic values are typically defined as
important goals that an individual pursues and that guide the individual’s many
life decisions (Rokeach, 1973; Schwartz, 1992). As such, basic values are
abstract or context free, but are expressed in various attitudes and behaviors in
many different domains of a person’s life. In contrast, political values are specific
to the political domain and refer to “attitudes, beliefs, or preferences about the
ways government, citizenship, and society should function” (Schwartz et al.,
2014, p. 905; see also McCann, 1997). Thus, political values can be seen as
being less abstract than basic human values because their expressions are
limited to the domain of politics. However, political values could still be seen as
being derived from the basic set of human values, and can be interpreted as
expressing the same motives that underlie basic human values but applying
them to the political domain (Schwartz et al., 2010). The eight core political
values studied in other cultures are as follows, as defined in Schwartz et al.
(2014, p. 903): “Traditional morality: society should protect traditional religious,
moral, and family values; Blind patriotism: people should support and never
criticize their country; Law and order: government should forbid disruptive
activities and enforce obedience to law; Free enterprise: government should not
be involved in the economy; Equality: society should distribute opportunities and
resources equally; Civil liberties: everyone should be free to act and think as they
deem most appropriate; Foreign military intervention: nations should use military
means to deal with international problems if necessary; Accepting immigrants:
foreign immigrants contribute positively to our country.” These eight core political
values have been validated in 15 countries (Schwartz et al., 2014) using an 18-
item scale, which is used in the current study as a starting point of the
exploration. It is possible that the eight-factor model described in the theory may
not be validated with a Filipino sample, and the identification of a more valid
structure of political values could be a starting point in re-engaging the study of
political values in the Philippine context.

Values and Political Phenomena in the Philippines

As noted earlier, the construct of values has been referred to in studies on
political behaviors and political developments in the Philippines; some of these
studies are briefly reviewed in this subsection. In their review of Philippine
political psychology research, Montiel and Chiongbian (1991) observe that values
were the focus of research in relation to attempts to understand the political
transitions from dictatorship and democracy after EDSA 1986. For example, a
moral recovery program was proposed as part of social development efforts
toward nation-building. Although much of the focus of the program was on the
“Filipino character,” some of the key goals explicitly refer to values, such as
discipline, hard work, a sense of patriotism and national pride, among others
(Licuanan, 1994). Although this program does not explicitly link values to specific
political behaviors, the implication was that values held by Filipinos have an
impact on the nation’s wellbeing, and that some values may require
transformation in order to strengthen nationbuilding. A similar implication seems
to be assumed in Enriquez’s (1992; 1994) proposals to construct an alternative
value system of Filipinos. His proposed value system identified, among other
values, pakikibaka (resistance) and social values of karangalan (dignity),
katarungan (justice), and kalayaan (freedom), which can be considered to be
explicitly political values. These attempts to articulate values that might be
relevant in nation-building or in national social development took a more emic
approach to studying values. Montiel (1995) adopted similar emic approaches in
her discussion of political conflict resolution in the Philippines. Her study
indicated that smooth interpersonal harmony was one key characteristic, and that
this is likely related to the Filipino value of saving face. Although their study did
not explicitly refer to values, Montiel and Macapagal’s (2006) study on Christians’
and Muslims’ attributions of the Mindanao conflict identified contrasting sets of
attributions that seem to implicitly assume distinct sets of values. In particular,
attributions of marginalized Muslims tended to be associated with structural
problems that implicitly refer to values of justice and self-determination, whereas
attributions of the dominant Christian group tended to focus on person-centered
factors that implicitly referred to weaker moral values. There were some attempts
to explore political values using etic approaches. A series of studies (Montiel,
1985; 1991) adopted an etic approach to explore values and changes in values
of generations of Filipino student activists. The etic approach used Rokeach’s
(1973) theory of values that relate to political orientation. Note that these studies,
as well as the more emic studies, mostly refer to general values, and not to
specific political values. Interestingly, in the review of political psychology
research in the Philippines, Montiel and Chiongbian (1991) also referred to some
unpublished studies in the 1970s (Appleton, 1975; Sicat, 1970; Youngblood,
1972) that suggest that civics education in the Philippines tends to focus more on
teaching the ideals of democracy and not underlying political values. These
studies were noted in their discussion of political socialization among Filipinos,
and seem to be invoked to explain the value system pervasive during the Martial
Law period.

Philippine Political Culture and Governance

Defining Filipino Political Culture

Politics involves the production, allocation and use of decision-making
powers among large groups of individuals. In stable and strong states, political
activities usually refer to the powers of the state to govern. In unstable and weak
states, politics encompasses social power issues within and outside the
boundaries of the 'legitimate' state. Culture refers to everything socially created
(Fiske, 1996). One essential characteristic of culture is that it is shared by
different groups of interacting humans. Culture includes both subjective and
objective elements (Aretxaga, 1993; Barnard, 1969; Clark, 1991; Cole, 1996;
Diamond, 1989; Gibbins and Reimer, 1999; Hobart, 1986; Kamrava, 1995; Myers
and Martz, 1997; Nesbitt-Larking, 1992; Norbu, 1992; Wood, 1993; Warren,
1993). Subjective elements cover shared group mentalities -- thoughts and
feelings. Objective cultural elements include material symbols, artifacts, and
group-accepted practices. The subjective and objective elements of culture have
a two-way relationship. For example, material symbols acquire meaning as
particular thoughts and feelings become associated with these symbols (the Nazi
swastika, for instance). Likewise, cultural practices evoke specific feelings when
carried out by society members. Filipino political culture is a systematically
related set of mental and concrete constructions. It includes but is not limited to
beliefs, feelings, group-accepted practices, language and paraphernalia shared
by large groups of Filipinos as they produce, allocate and use political powers
within, outside, and in interaction with the state. Table 1 lists some subjective
components of Filipino political culture and gives examples to illustrate how
group subjectivities are activated during political exercises. These subjective
components are psychological, although they do not pertain to specific
individuals but to interacting groups.

Subjective components of Filipino political culture

Subjective components of Filipino political culture Examples of how group
subjectivities are activated during political exercises Ideology-inspired shared
interpretations of political events During the Visiting Forces Agreement debate,
one ideological view saw the VFA as a new form of US colonial intervention
Shared mental scripts "Volunteer" campaigners carry a widely accepted mental
script that those who help in a candidate's campaign get rewarded with a job
and/or government contracts if the candidate wins Negative emotions toward
outgroup members Members of one faction in Malacañang Palace carry in their
mind (sometimes exaggerated) narratives of what the rival camp is scheming and
plotting against them Collective memories The anti-Marcos group still hold
memories of how constitutional changes can be used to rationalize the
declaration of martial law Religious beliefs Religious faith includes working for
social justice and working in favor of issues such as land distribution Objective
components of political culture include directly observable political practices,
language, and artifacts. Some care is needed in studying objective political
culture. What is observable could contain latent or symbolic meanings that are
not outwardly obvious to a person who merely relies on external evidence to
obtain cultural information. Objective political culture is usually context-
dependent and meaning-sensitive (Cole, 1996). Table 2 presents a few objective
aspects of Filipino political culture and examples of objective culture. It also
shows how objective political culture can take on manifest and latent meanings.
Objective components of Filipino political culture.
Objective components of Filipino political culture Examples of objective
political culture Manifest meaning: what is directly observed Latent meaning:
what is symbolized or implied Political practice House Representative is asked by
a local leader to act as the godfather at the wedding of the leader's daughter
Invitation to be the daughter's wedding godfather In the future, the local leader's
family can expect to be given employment opportunities and other special
politico-economic favors by this powerful politician. In turn, the Representative
can expect the leader's family to help during the campaign period (Hollnsteiner,
1963) A top general of the Philippine National Police (PNP) is transferred out of
Metro Manila to a far-away provincial post This is part of the regular cycle of
post-changing among military officials. The general is not favored by the new
PNP chief and is now politically impotent within the PNP influence hierarchy...
Political language "Huwag n'yo akong subukan." ("Don't challenge me.") "Don't
challenge me." I am powerful and you are not. Don't threaten me, or I will hit back
at you. "Doon tayo mag-usap" – from a traffic policeman to a traffic violator "Let's
talk over there (far from the eyes of other people)." Hand over some bribe money
and I won't give you a violation ticket this time. Political artifact ERAP car plate,
during Erap's presidency I like President Erap enough to use his name as my car
plate. I have powerful connections with the President, so don't charge me with
any traffic violation or you may get into trouble yourself. Red-colored streamers,
banners during street rallies Content of whatever is printed on the streamers,
banners Groups with red-colored streamers/ banners are associated with left-of-
center political beliefs and political formations.

Political Culture in Context: Time-Sensitive, Peer-Bound and Structure-

Embedded.
Political cultures and orientations thrive in specific contexts, particularly
conditions of historical time, peergroup associations, and social structures.
Inevitably, political practices and shared beliefs interact with historical con-
ditions, including prevailing technologies of information. For example, with the
onset of the digital age, the 2001 EDSA Dos mobilizations used email and
cellphone texting as effective communication channels. The 1986 EDSA Uno
uprising depended on telephone brigades, printed manifestos and videotapes.
The peer group also plays a vital role in political orientations since the individual
tends to be groupsensitive, especially in collectivist cultures like the Philippines.
Studies show that collectivist cultures emphasize groups as the basic unit of
social perception (Triandis, 1994). Individuals in these cultures tend to define
themselves terms of in-group relations (Triandis, McCusker, and Hui, 1990).
Usually, they will alter the self in favor of the situation rather than the situation in
favor of the self (Diaz-Guerrero, 1979). Philippine collectivist culture provides
fertile ground for traditional political influence based on patronage (Hollnsteiner,
1963; Kerkvliet, 1990; Lande, 1965; Lynch, 1979), kinship (Canieso-Doronila,
1997; Lande, 1958; Roces, 1998; Timberman, 1991; Zialcita, 1997), and
personalistic leadership styles (Hollnsteiner, 1970; Kerkvliet, 1990; Roces, 1998).
In addition, Sidel (1999) points out that a new type of political influence called
"bossism" is emerging in Philippine politics. This draws power from money,
coercion and criminal networks. Case studies of bosstype politics can be found in
the book Boss: 5 Case Studies of Local Politics in the Philippines, published by
the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism in 1995. The Senate
investigation into narco-political scandals in 2001, suggest how drug syndicates
may intertwine with kidnappings, military involvement in crime, and political
campaigns. Finally, political culture is structure-embedded (Aretxaga, 1993;
Myers and Martz, 1997; Pye, 1985; Warren, 1993). The political mentalities,
practices, and material symbols vary according to a group's position in the social
structures of Philippine society. Social structures refer to the relatively permanent
arrangements of power and wealth, where resources are concentrated in the
hands of a small elite, while the majority remains marginalized. "Structure-
embeddedness" implies that an individual or group's position in the arrangement
of Philippine social power is associated with different political cultures. There
exists a political culture among those who hold power and a political culture
among the marginalized majority. On the one hand, these two political cultures
could complement each other; as each feeds on the other's set of political
expectations and practices. On the other hand, these two political cultures could
contain opposing interests. For example, Schaffer (in press) points out how
electoral reforms on the agenda of modern social influential in new democracies
might keep a majority of voters away from electoral exercises through legal
disenfranchisement, costly go-betweens, and absenteeism-for-sale.

Suggestions for Future Research Questions on Filipino Political Culture

and Governance.
This book describes political culture from the subjective lens of those in
power -- politicians and their spouses, chiefs-of-staff, and other members of the
politicians' personal and family circles. This is a unique presentation of four views
from the inner corridors of Philippine State power. Of course, the study begs for
further explorations into the vast reservoir of political culture. I suggest four
general queries that a research agenda on Filipino political culture might
address: How does political culture operate in the executive and judiciary
branches? What is the political culture on various levels of Philippine social
structure? Among anti-state movements? Among the "ordinary, non-politicized
majority"? How do ongoing global transformations in technology, economies,
crime networks and media coverage interface with Philippine political culture?
Are there concrete examples of successful alternative political cultures operating
within contemporary Philippine politics? What are the stories behind these
alternatives? Table 3 lists some of the research methods that can be used to
study political culture. It contains a brief description of each method or subtypes
of quantitative/qualitative research methods and examples of political-culture
researches that used this particular approach. Although each procedure is
presented separately, the reader is encouraged to think in terms of combining a
variety of techniques in a single research, in order to increase the validity of the
study, and enrich the knowledge that the research can generate.
Suggested Research Methods on Political Culture
Research Method Brief description of method Example of a political
culture research 1. Theoretical Research A conceptual essay about fundamental
ideas regarding political culture Between facts and norms (Habermas, 1996)
Survey of literature, to summarize the state of past researches on political culture
Political culture and democracy in developing countries (Diamond, 1993) 2.
Empirical Research A study of political culture based on primary data Please see
all the examples below 2.a Quantitative methods Nationwide public opinion
surveys Glimpses into Philippine political culture (Carroll, 1994) Smaller-sample
surveys on political attitudes Political socialization in the Philippines today: An
empirical study (Sicat, 1976) Political culture theory and the role of professionals:
Data from Venezuela (Myers & Martz, 1997) Election returns and census data
Social cleavage and political parties in the post-Marcos Philippines (Lande &
Cigler, 1990) Congressional voting patterns Monitoring Congress: A cluster
analysis of legislative voting patterns during the Aquino Administration (Montiel,
1990) 2.b Qualitative methods Content analysis (Silverman, 1993) The bishops
and the new politics (Concepcion, 1992) Pastoral letters during the
MarcosAquino transition period (Montiel, 1988) Ethnography and participant
observation (Atkinson & Hammersley, 1994) The dynamics of power in a
Philippine municipality (Hollnsteiner, 1963) In-depth interviews (Fontana & Frey,
1994) of political elites and radicals Leaders, factions, and parties: The structure
of Philippine politics (Lande, 1965) Asian power and politics (Pye, 1985)
Biographical method (Smith, 1994) Imelda Marcos (Pedrosa, 1987) Film and
visual analysis (Harper 1994) Bargaining for peaceful termination of unsuccessful
coup attempts in the Philippines (Montiel, 1995) Conversation analysis
(Silverman, 1993) (I did not find any research example on political culture that
used conversation analysis.) Literary works analysis "Good omens" versus
"worth": The poetic dialogue between Ton Tho Tuong and Phan Van Tri
(Davidson, 1986) The deliberate use of foreign vocabulary by the Khmer:
Changing fashions, methods and sources (Jacob, 1986) Historical study of
political culture (Tuchman, 1994) President Marcos and the Philippine political
culture (Gleeck, 1987) Case studies (Stake, 1994) Boss: Five case studies of
local politics in the Philippines (Lacaba & Coronel, 1995) The next section looks
into everyday practices and perceptions from the standpoint of individuals who
run for office and/or manage electoral campaigns.

The Philippine Experience In Values Development

After the four-day non-violent revolt in February 1986 which toppled the
twentyyear old Marcos dictatorship and restored democracy in the Philippines,
the Aquino government realized that rebuilding a nation was more difficult than
ousting a dictator. A social revolution was required to guide the country through
its transition to re-establish democratic institutions, freedom and dignity for the
Filipino people. Thus, the Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS)
identified "Social Transformation through Education" as its priority, and began a
Values Education Programme for all levels of the school system. Values
education is the process by which values, attitudes and habits are formed as the
learner interacts with the environment under the guidance of a teacher. Studying
values will not necessarily influence behaviour. Behaviour can only be influenced
when a value is experienced and a commitment made to it in belief and attitude.
A continuing upsurge of crime, violence and corruption is causing public alarm
in :le Philippines. Concerned citizens are demanding government action against
the breakdown of morality. The Moral Recovery Programme, submitted by
Senator Leticia Ramos-Shahani to the Senate in 1988, and the DECS Values
Education Program launched that same year, both emphasize social reform
through the inner transformation of the individual. This study will present the
DECS Values Education Programme at the primary, secondary and tertiary
levels of education. The first comprehensive review of the Values Education
Programme was undertaken by researchers sponsored by the Southeast Asian
Research Review and Advisory Group (SEARRAG). Their findings were
published in a book entitled, State-of-the-Practice Review of Values Education in
the Philippines (April 1987). Before proceeding, we must recognize that values
measurement relies heavily on non-quantitative indicators and on observing
individual and societal behaviours. These behaviours do not change in a
predictable time frame.
Problems And Issues
Instituting values education in a multicultural and pluralistic society is a
controversial issue. The geographic Mi ke- up of the Philippines includes three
large islands: Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, and more than 7,000 small ones.
There are eight major language groups to which most people in the lowlands
belong and about 100 minor languages and dialects spoken by people in the
uplands and archipelago. The Philippines is predominantly Christian: Catholics
comprise 82.92% cf the population; several Protestant groups combine to form
3.9% and local Christian churches like the Aglipayans and the Iglesia ni Kristo
have considerable followings. Born-Again Christians and Fundamentalists make
up a small portion of the Christian population, yet the largest cultural minority
group remains Muslim. About 100 other cultural communities are spread
throughout the country, and interestingly, studies by behavioral scientists show
that there are recognizable values, beliefs and attitudes that bind all these
Filipino people together. Designing a common values education framework
acceptable tc these groups and mindful of their cultural, linguistic and religious
differences was a difficult. task. The framework had to be flexible enough to allow
differences in priorities, expression and behaviour. Programme activities had to
strengthen commonalities and respect differences in order to develop a spirit of
tolerance, appreciation and mutual acceptance. Teaching desirable values and
responsible behaviour requires educating the whole society - a fact which may
overwhelm educators and discourage them. And, integrating values education
into the school system has been controversial, because religious, moral and
spiritual values are thought to w is' as a result of free choice, acceptance and
internalization by an individual.
Early Efforts In The Field Of Religious, Ethical And Moral Education
 Many publications on the Philippines focus on Catholicism introduced by
sixteenth-century Spanish colonization. This paper will deal only with the first
decades of the twentieth-century, after the establishment of the Department of
Education. During this time, ethical and moral values were emphasized in public
elementary schools through activities which taught "good manners", "right
conduct" and "character building". In public high schools values education was
part of the curriculum. The concept of integrating values into Social Studies was
adopted in 1974; but not systematically implemented. In accordance with the
separation between Church and State, contained in the Philippine Constitution of
1935, the Philippine educational authorities took care not to include the teaching
of religion in public schools or to allow public school-teachers to teach religion
outside regular classes. However, catechism classes were allowed once a week
for about forty minutes after the regular class day. Most of the participating
students were from Catholic schools or colleges. Private Catholic schools and
colleges included religion in the curriculum from kindergarten to college. Each
year, retreats were held for students and faculty, and many religious
organizations such as Social Action and the Children of Mary, helped mould
students socially, morally and spiritually. Protestant schools emphasized Bible
study and Muslim schools (madaris), located mostly in the south, taught the
Koran. The 1987 Ccnstitution provides for national religious instruction during
regular class hours; the choice of the particular religion to be taught is left to the
parents, while teachers are to be provided by the religious authorities concerned.
Other groups which helped mould desirable values and behaviour were: the Boy
Scouts/Girl Scouts, human rights advocates, the UNESCO Associated Schools
and Clubs and local grassroots organizations working with street children, the
military, prisoners and cultural minorities.
Official Policies On Moral Education In The National Education System
The 1935 Philippine Constitution contains the first official policy statement
on values education. Article XiV, Sec. 8, states: All educational institutions shall
aim to develop moral character, personal discipline, civic conscience and
vocational efficiency, and teach the duties of citizenship. The 1973 Constitution,
Article XIV, Sec. 4, made the following additions: All educational institutions shall
aim to inculcate love of country, teach the duties of citizenship and develop moral
character, personal discipline and scientific, technological and vocational
efficiency. The present 1987 Constitution starts with a preamble clearly affirming
religious, spiritual and moral values: We, the sovereign Filipino people, imploring
the aid of Almighty God in order to build a just and humane society and establish
a government that will embody our ideals and aspirations, promote the common
good, conserve and develop our patrimony, and secure to ourselves and our
posterity the blessings of independence and democracy under the rule of law and
regime of truth, justice, freedom, love, equity and peace, do ordain and
promulgate this Constitution. The following articles likewise emphasize moral and
spiritual values: Article II, Sec. 13: The State recognizes the vital role of the youth
in nation-building and shall promote and protect their physical, moral, spiritual,
intellectual and social well-being. It shall inculcate in the youth: patriotism and
nationalism, and encourage their involvement in public and civic affairs. Article II,
Sec. 17: The state shall give priority to education, science and technology, arts,
culture and sports to foster patriotism and nationalism, accelerate social
progress, and promote total human liberation and development. Article II, Sec 2:
All educational institutions shall inculcate patriotism and nationalism, foster love
of humanity, respect of human rights, appreciation of the role of national heroes
in the historical development of the country, teach the rights and duties of
citizenship, strengthen ethical and spiritual values, develop moral character and
personal discipline, encourage critical and 6 7 creative thinking, broaden
scientific and technological knowledge, and promote vocational efficiency. The
expressed intent to develop an enlightened, nationalistic, creative, productive
and disciplined citizenry, with strong ethical and spiritual values, calls educators
to consider values education as an integral part of the curriculum.
Civic Political Culture/ Interest Groups
There appears to be a prevailing perception that the generation of young
people today are uninterested if not apathetic to politics. But is that really the
case? Are today’s young generation truly disengaged from politics? This paper
focuses on this question, drawing from a democracy project in the Philippines
that involved young university students as volunteers in an election monitoring
exercise. A content analysis of focus group data and reflection papers of
students about their subjective experiences, feelings, insights and views
regarding their participation in the project and politics in general belie the
conventional wisdom that the young are a politically impassive and indifferent
generation. The youths are interested in political life around them and hold critical
views about the behavior of politicians and political candidates. And even as they
recognize the weaknesses and deficits in the political system, the youths are
interested in political participation not just in voting but in other engagements that
support democracy and good government. The paper concludes that today’s
youths are a promising generation of political activists whose energies,
enthusiasm and aspirations can be mobilized and harnessed to strengthen
democratic processes and achieve their aspirations for what they call ‘good
society,’ ‘good government’ and ‘good politics.’

Youth and Political Participation in the Philippines: Voices and Themes

from a Democracy Project
A pattern of apathy and disengagement with politics among the youth
exists across much of the world (Youniss et al 2002). In the Philippines, the
traditional perception that the Filipino youths are uninterested if not apathetic to
politics remains unchallenged. Some studies in fact tend to confirm this view. A
survey of Filipino youths showed that the young consider being politically
involved as least important in their life compared to having a good marriage,
family life, steady job and good education(Sandoval, Mangahas and Guerrero,
1998). Another study noted that the youths’ less than positive attitude towards
being responsible voters, minimal social involvement and being uninformed
about government have not improved over the years (Velasco n.d. as cited by
Sta. Maria and Diestro, 2009). Still another study (Trends-MBL for Global Filipino
Foundation 2001 as cited by Sta. Maria and Diestro, 2009) claimed that the
youth’s apathy and cyncism towards cultural values and national affairs would
extend to government, politics and life in general by the time 797 The 4th
International Conference on Magsaysay Awardees: Good Governance and
Transformative Leadership in Asia, 31 May 2016 they reach the age of 19; they
are cynical of government and the political institutions and processes in the
country (PSSC 2003). And even as they participate in elections, the youths prefer
being a follower and recipient of information and seldom act as activist-initiator or
leader on political issues (National Youth Commission, 2010). In contrast, some
studies noted that youths historically had been at the forefront of social
movements, widely practicing their political rights and figuring as one of the most
militant and active political groups for social change (Lanuza, 2004; Ogena,
1999). Whether or not the distinction of the political youth in the past is defined
by ‘period effect,’ thus distinguishing them from contemporary generation,
Deserves deeper analysis that a separate study can do. Today’s youth comprise
roughly one third of the country’s 100 million population with a median age of
23.5 As a distinct sector and critical component of societal change, they
constitute a major stakeholder and political actor in shaping the country’s present
and future. They also provide a valuable reservoir for the country’s future
leaders, policymakers, innovators and change agents. Trite as it may seem, how
the future will transform rests on the hands of the young. No less than the
Philippine national hero Jose Rizal extolled the youths as hope of motherland.
The crucial role of the youth in nation building has also been enshrined in
Philippine laws and in country’s governance structures and practices. It is by no
means relevant to know if today’s young generation, as the conventional wisdom
suggests, are apathetic and disengaged from politics for it poses profound
implications on the political life and future of the country. This paper attempts to
respond to the opening statement made above by examining what the Filipino
youths think about politics in the country and whether or not they are indeed
apathetic as commonly perceived. It is a preliminary exploration of the views and
attitudes of the youth toward politics and does so by drawing meanings and
nuances from the subjective experiences, insights, thoughts, feelings and
perspectives of young university students who participated as volunteer monitors
in a democracy project in the Philippines on campaign finance monitoring.

Youth and Political Participation

Defining who the youths are may draw different interpretations as this can
be bound by a society’s demographic, political, economic and socio-cultural
contexts. It can be fairly assumed that countries around the world conceive youth
differently. As a demographic concept (Atal, 2005), youth has biological and
sociological aspects. It relates to an age group that is transiting from childhood to
adulthood. Certain roles and expectations are associated with the youth,
however, these social constructions can vary from culture to culture. In social
research, conceptualizing youth invokes three notions: as a generation, as a life
stage and as a social group (Kovacheva, 2005). The concept of generation
locates the young as a specific age groupings or generations within socio-
historical contexts. Each generation is said to have developed its own brand of
habits and outlook, including political awareness, shaped and influenced as it
were by major historic and social change that happened during their formative
years. The second notion relates to young people’s search for self-identity and
the values that shape their consciousness. As a social group, youth is
understood as a transition stage when the young start to establish their
independence, seek a job after graduation and move out of parental home to live
autonomously and establish own family. Internationally, age is a common
approach to distinguish the youth. There is, however, no universal agreement on
what age cohort will be considered as youth or young people. What exist are age
groups that vary depending on who is making the definition. The United Nations,
for example, defines ‘youth’ as those persons between the ages of 15 and 24
years. Within the UN family itself, agencies use different age categories. The UN
Secretariat, UNESCO, and ILO identify the youth as belonging to the age group
15-34. For the UN Habitat, the youths are aged 15 to 32 years old. The UNICEF
uses the term adolescent to describe those in the age bracket of 10-19. WHO
groups the young people in the 10-24 range while UNFPA puts the youth in the
15-24 ages.(http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/documents/youth/fact-sheets/youth-
definition.pdf). In the Philippines, the youths are officially defined as those
persons with ages ranging from 15 to 30 years old, which the government
considers as a “critical period in a person’s growth and development from the
onset of adolescence towards the peak of mature, self-reliant and responsible
adulthood” (R.A. 8040). The definition is politically significant for it legally sets the
minimum age for the youth’s participation in youth councils. These youth councils
are mandated by national law and serve as platforms for the young to implement
socio-civic and community development activities that directly benefit their sector.
But to be able to vote in general elections, existing law sets the voting age at 18.
As a transition period between childhood and adulthood, youth is a challenging
stage when many significant events and decisions happen in a person’s life. It is
a phase when the young experience dramatic changes in their mental, emotional,
behavioral and relational processes, and begin to develop their self identities,
frames of mind and world views (Ogena, 2000), the period when the young
become politically aware (Kovacheva, 2005). Political participation is paramount
in making democracy work for people and societies. It enables citizens to
ventilate their views and concerns to government and officials and exert pressure
on them to act on these concerns. It involves political engagement and public
involement in decision making (Lamprianou, 2013). Political participation relates
to individual or collective action that supports or opposes state structures,
authorities, and/or decisions regarding allocation of public goods. It can happen
at the national or local level and can be expressed in verbal or written forms.
Political participation can be, violent or non-violent and can be of any intensity
(Conge, 1988). As a significant sector of society, the political involvement of the
young in the processes and institutions of democracy has assumed a particular
relevance. Youth involvement in politics makes government cater to their specific
needs as a sector and enables them to be co-author of transformation and
further evolution of democracy and its institutions (Forbig, 2005). A normative
conception of youth participation in politics is about engaging in forming opinions
and taking actions to bring about positive change in society Their participation
can take different forms such as voting in general elections, joining political
parties and events, participation in youth organisations or issue-based NGOs or
volunteering, participation in debates on youth or community issues, opinion-
shaping through written press or youth radio, participating in online discussion for
a writing or following blogs, and seeking information and learning about
democracy such as participating in simulations of political processes, attending
training or learning at school, engaging in youth organisations (EACEA, 2013).
New forms of social and political involvement in public life are emerging
particularly among the young suggesting that youth politics is not confined solely
to actions that aim to influence government policy but encompasses issues of
wider social concerns (Kovacheva, 2005). Their political participation is
expressed not necessarily through the conventional democratic politics like
elections and campaigns but through novel modes such as leisure activities,
volunteering and social work, boycotts, lifestyle politics, protest demonstrations
and new social movements. From this point of view, the young of today are
creating new forms of political engagement that are more appealing to them than
those they inherited from their parents and grandparents (Forbig, 2005),
consistent with their interpretations of what politics means and likely more
attuned to their own needs, lifestyles and individuality (Sloam, 2007; Kovacheva,
2005). The work of Ekman and Amna (2012) on political participation typology is
instructive of how civic engagement is now construed as new form of political
behavior. Civic engagement and social involvement such as taking interest in
politics and society, discussing politics and societal issues with friends, writing to
editors, belonging to a group with societal focus, volunteering in social work, and
activity within community-based organizations arevenues by which citizens can
express their participation in political process. They categorize these as latent in
contrast to manifest political participation like voting in elections and referenda,
running for public office, contacting political representatives or civil servants,
donating money to political parties or organizations, protest actions like boycott,
signing petitions, demonstrations and strikes, even illegal protests such as civil
disobedience or participating in violent demonstration. Not voting in elections and
avoiding political discussion are forms of non-participation and disengagement
from politics. Political participation of the youth can thus take many forms ranging
from the conventional democratic politics to more creative, novel and remarkably
distinctive of contemporary generation, shaped and influenced as it is by their
specific sociopolitical contexts and global social movements. And with the
massive penetration of cellular phones, Internet, social networking sites, blogs
and other ICT inventions in the everyday life of Filipinos, politically active youths
have used these technologies in their engagements, civic and political wise
(David, 2013).

The Democracy Project: A Background

In the run up to the 2013 national elections for senators, the Association of
Schools of Public Administration in the Philippines (ASPAP Inc.) implemented a
project called STAMP Program Extension: Sustaining Advocacy for Campaign
Finance Awareness and Accountability1 within the broad framework and
objective of deepening democracy and advancing electoral reforms. Nine ASPAP
member universities2 from across the country participated in the project.
Parenthetically, the Filipino youth start their college education normally at the age
of 16 or 17 and spend four to five years to earn a baccalaureate degree. By the
time they leave the university, they are in their early 20’s. Three hundred thirty-
two female and 161 male college students volunteered to participate. As
monitors, the volunteers conducted field observation and inspection of printed
campaign materials of senatorial candidates such as posters and flyers that were
posted in public places in their respective communities. They also computed the
estimated costs of these election paraphernalia. A group of faculty members per
school coordinated and supervised the students for the duration of the project
(ASPAP, 2013). A series of meetings and consultative workshops with election
experts were organized by the project team ahead of the field monitoring to
discuss the design of the monitoring tool to be used by the student monitors.
Reviewing and distilling lessons from similar campaign finance monitoring
initiatives in the country informed the development of the tool. A crucial
component of the project involved preparing and capacitating the students for
their task as monitors. A two-day training was organized in each participating
university to orient the students about the project as a whole and the tools and
processes involved in monitoring. The training included presentations and open
discussions of topics such as democracy and citizenship, relevance and
contribution of citizen monitoring to clean elections, citizens’ rights and
responsibilities to monitor election spending, monitoring tools and processes,
electoral laws, regulation of election campaign spending, and enforcement issues
and constraints in the Philippines. During the training, the students organized
themselves into working teams and identified the areas that will be covered in
monitoring, specifically public places such as streets and parksthat usually were
used by politicians as staging grounds for their campaing materials. The students
were given a modest allowance for their transportation fares and meals (ASPAP,
2013). The actual monitoring covered the first 45 days of the senatorial campaign
period beginning from 12 February to 2 April 2013. The students used the
monitoring tool and price computation scheme that the project developed for
monitoring purposes. Apart from monitoring the election campaign paraphernalia,
the students also observed whether or not the candidates were following the
election rules on sizes and location for posting and displaying the posters, tarps
and related materials (ASPAP, 2013). As a caveat, it is worth repeating here that
the paper’s focus is on the political views of the students. It is not the objective of
the paper to analyze the campaign expenses of the candidates. That exercise is
worthy of a more thoughtful study than can be done here.

Exploring Themes, Meanings and Nuances: Voices of the Filipino Youth

This section discusses the attitudes of the student monitors towards
politics and democracy in the Philippines. It explores their general political
orientations by searching for meanings from the their subjective experiences,
insights, thoughts, feelings and perspectives that they shared in focus group
discussions and in the reflection essays that they submitted to the project. It
needs to be pointed out that the FGDs were organized as sharing sessions for
the monitors to give their feedback and general assessment of how the
monitoring was implemented. They were also asked to share how their
monitoring experience affected their thoughts and views about politics and
elections. A focus group discussion was each held in every participating
university after completing the monitoring activities. On the average, ten to fifteen
students participated in each focus group discussion. The essays were more
directed at capturing the general reflections of the students about their
experience, feelings, impressions, and learnings. It also asked a question about
how their learnings from their experience can be applied and carried forward.
Basically, content and thematic analysis of the focus group documentations and
reflection essays was done to capture the message and essence of the voices of
the youths who participated in the project. And having been directly involved in
the project, the author also drew from her own observations, insights and
analysis in writing the paper. Project documents such as concept proposals,
reports and pre- and post-training assessments were also used as additional
sources in describing the project background and elaborating on the themes.
Certain themes characterize the youths’ voices as the students participated in the
project and expressed their views and thoughts about politics. The themes
provide a window through which one can ‘see,’ understand and appreciate the
meanings and nuances of the subjective experiences, thoughts, feelings and
perspectives of the young about politics in the country. The analysis leads to a
certain characterization of the youth’s political outlook and attitudes, albeit it is
important to mention that it is only indicative and the emerging picture is not
necessarily representative of the country’s young people in this age group.

Interest to Engage and Participate in Politics and Public Sphere

Are today’s youth interested in politics and are they willing to participate?
Campaign finance monitoring is relatively unheard of among the students and,
likely in the whole country, especially as a distinct and specific advocacy for
electoral and democracy reform. It is noted that, based on the pre-training
diagnostic assessments that were done before the students were oriented on the
project, most students never heard about campaign finance monitoring nor had
they knowledge or idea what campaign finance was about until they joined the
project as monitors. But perhaps when presented the opportunity and support for
their engagement, the youth will take interest and participate. Indeed, the
monitoring project showed that contrary to being uninterested and apathetic, the
youths have interest in and inclinations to engage in political activities. A hearty
eagerness to participate generally characterized the engagement of the students
with the project. This is demonstrated by the number of students who joined,
which exceeded expectations that some had to be declined because of logistical
reasons, and their active attendance and participation throughout the project
implementation, beginning from the two-day training to subsequent team
meetings that they themselves organized to plan their activities and assignments,
to strategizing how best to do their field work, to actual field monitoring, to
processing of the data they collected and to the holding of focus group
discussions as a last activity. The actual monitoring entailed difficulties and to
some extent physical risks on the part of the students. Students described how
they walked the streets under the heat of sun, got lost, walked long distances,
painstakingly scanned the street so as not to miss any single poster, sought the
help of community elders/residents for safe mobility in the community, dodged
stray dogs, experienced exhaustion due to exposure and walking, avoided fast
moving vehicles in highways and, using a ladder that they ingeniously obtained
from someplace, climbed walls/trees in their desire to get the exact
measurements of posters. These were just some of the physical hurdles that the
students experienced as they conducted monitoring in their communities. Worth
mentioning, too, was how the students switched schedules and swapped places
among themselves so that neither their attendance in classes nor their
participation in monitoring would be sacrificed. It was natural to expect that, given
the difficulties they encountered, the students would prioritize their studies and
could have just put aside their involvement in monitoring. There was also no
pressure for them to continue as their involvement was on a voluntary basis. Yet,
the students chose to stay with the project, fulfilled their monitoring
responsibilities up to the last day and “shared their precious time to finish the
task without expecting anything in return.” That the students were interested in
political participation became evident in the posttraining evaluation. When asked
if there was an opportunity to apply the knowledge and skills they learned in
monitoring election campaign spending would they be willing to do it, the
students overwhelmingly responded in the affirmative. Their interest to participate
in political advocacy like the campaign finance monitoring was also apparent
throughout the focus groups and the essays. There was a general sentiment
among them that advocacies like monitoring should be continued. They
expressed their desire to participate again in future campaign finance monitoring.

Political Expectations and Behavioral Issues

Young as they may be, the youth have definite views about politics and
share common political issues of national importance. It was evident from the
focus groups and essays that the youths have clear expectations of how
politicians should behave not only when they are campaigning to win in elections
but also when they eventually assume their post as public officials. At the same
time they are aware and observant that politicians often stray from straight path
The students feel strongly about political corruption and seriously watch how
politicians behave. They think that election campaigns are a breeding ground for
corruption. They believe that the politicians will get back the “money invested on
campaign” when they win in the elections, recognizing as well that without ‘much
money,’ candidates can never win in elections, To them, this is a disturbing
scenario, and they consider this kind of political behavior as “threat to the
attainment of good public service.” Having been involved in the campaign
monitoring made them realize to be careful with their votes and to keenly watch
how politicians conduct themselves during elections.

There was a general sentiment among the students that they have to watch the
politicians if they were following the election laws and rules. They expect that
politicians should not be the first to violate the law because they are seeking
public office. It was important for them to know this because it will indicate
whether the politicians will be good followers of law especially when they are
already occupying public office. They were skeptical about politicians being good
leaders of the nation if they cannot abide first with the laws governing election
campaigns. The students also mentioned that citizens were unaware of the rules
and regulations about campaign spending. To them, this lack of knowledge on
the part of the citizens made it easy for politicians to violate the rules.

Volunteerism, Citizenship and Nationalism

If there is one thing that can be nuanced from the students’ thoughts and
feelings, it is about how the they felt that they were doing something for the
country and how the experience aroused the spirit of citizenship and
volunteerism within them. The focus groups and essays showed that students
connect their participation to political values such as volunteerism, citizenship
and nationalism. They expressed that they were serving the public in their own
little way when they served as volunteers for election monitoring. They
considered it a privilege to participate as election campaign monitors, an activity
that “positively fosters volunteerism, heightens awareness and critical thinking
about issues affecting the people and the nation.” The students stated that their
participation as monitors gave them a sense of awareness as a Filipino and that
what they were doing was a concrete expression of their citizenship, saying that
they were “happy and proud to be part of this patriotic activity.” They saw their
participation as a means of helping the country, a way for “paving the way for a
clean and honest elections.” It was also evident in the focus groups and written
reflections that the students recognize the importance of citizen involvement in
political activities. To them, citizen involvement in the election campaign
monitoring was a step forward in making “great changes” in the Philippines
because “citizens are being educated and made aware of reality.” As mentioned
in the focus groups, the students realized that there is need to increase citizen
involvement and awareness and expressed the hope that soon the citizens will
wake up to the call for changes. In a broader context, the students saw a bigger
picture of elections in terms of what politicians should do and not do during
elections, that “voters must not just be contented in casting their votes but should
be more concerned on how to assess candidates especially those running at the
national level. ” As voters the students recognized that they themselves must be
“mindful of whom they give their vote to,” that they should become “watchful
agent” of elections and campaign expenses of candidates. The students also
saw that their political participation and applying what they learned from their
experience can be expanded by sharing their knowledge to student organizations
that they are members of, and to their families and friends. Involvement in social
activities and not just election-related activities was also seen as way of
enhancing one’s awareness about social and political issues in the country.
These results belie public perception that the young are a disinterested and
apathetic group.

Awareness, Empowerment and Need for Political Participation

The students expressed that their experience and involvement in election
monitoring provided them with an increased awareness in Philippine politics.
They considered their engagement in the democracy project as enriching and
fulfilling for it gave them the opportunity to experience “real politics.” Being
involved in the project had afforded them to monitor how politicians spend to win
elections and identify those who follow and violate the election laws. Their
participation enabled them to assess whether a candidate can be considered
“good in office” based on their compliance with election rules and regulation.
They came to realize and became “aware that some national officials seeking re-
election were actually violators of election campaign rules and regulations.”
Because of this, the students said that they have become more careful and
“protective of whom they shall give their vote to.” Their participation served as an
eye-opener and made them realize how important it is to be vigilant during
election. They also saw the importance of having an educated electorate. As
monitors, the student became informed and abreast about what was happening
in the political arena. They had also become more conscious and their ‘critical
thinking was heightened’ especially about choosing the leaders of the country.
Among the first time voters, they considered their exposure to ‘real politics’ as
relevant and useful to them especially when they decide on their choice of
leaders. As one student said, “awareness about the kind of candidate that should
be selected during election must be given a lot of thinking.” There were also
expressions of sense of fulfilment among the students for having been involved
in the monitoring activity. They felt grateful that they were part of the advocacy.
They considered it a patriotic act and felt a sense of pride for doing it. The
students were happy that they had a chance, some called it a rare opportunity, to
help the country through their participation in the project. Their real life
participation in a political activity such as election monitoring has raised their
interest and most everyone agreed that more volunteers should be encouraged
and mobilized for future monitoring. Students’ articulations on how they can
‘discipline the politicians’ through their monitoring indicates a sense of power that
the youth have when they participate in democratic exercises like election
monitoring. The students believed that through their monitoring, politicians will be
more wary in their expenses because they are being watched and can be
reported to the country’s electoral body for violations. The students believe that
monitoring “gives the public the power to participate, encourage and take part in
the election process.”

Change and Faith in Democratic Process

Despite the many issues that the youth see in the behavior of politicians, the
students still expressed their faith in democracy. Many expressed the view that
the democratic way of life is still the best system for the country. It also surfaced
in the FGDs and essays that they still regard elections as the best way to select
the leaders of the country, even after having observed during their monitoring the
election violations committed by politicians. As pointed out by one student,
“elections are the cornerstone of creating a democratic political system.” And as
they continue to support elections, they also voiced out their aspiration for clean
and honest elections. In this regard, they look up to the Commission on
Elections, the country’s electoral body, to enforce the law and to ensure that
politicians obey the rules and laws of elections.

The politics of ‘public opinion’ in the Philippines

In May 2010, national elections in the Philippines saw front-runner
presidential candidate Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III win a landslide victory which
set the stage for an orderly transition of power from the administration of Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo. This article argues that Aquino’s victory, rather than signalling
a clear departure from the old ways of doing politics or the mere reproduction of
established patterns of oligarchical politics, points towards a more gradual and
limited change in the mobilisation of voters in the Philippines. This change, it is
further argued, reflects in part the rise of “public opinion” as a social fact in
Philippine politics and society in the period since the resurrection of formal
democratic institutions and regular elections. The article identifies the broad
parameters of the rise in polls and surveys in the Philippines, and, drawing on the
critical insights of Pierre Bourdieu, examines the nature and significance of
“public opinion” itself. However, the argument advanced here is a cautionary one,
indicating that, while the emergence of public opinion as a social fact alters
political calculations and dynamics associated with voter mobilisation, the politics
of public opinion may only have limited transformative potential for democracy in
the Philippines.
In May 2010, national elections in the Philippines saw front-runner presidential
candidate Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III win a landslide victory which set the stage
for an orderly transition of power from the incumbent administration of Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo. To many observers, this election also signalled a larger
triumph over the “guns, goons, and gold” long associated with voter mobilisation
in the Philippines, with Aquino’s polltested popularity translated directly into
presidential victory through the country’s first fully automated and computerized
national ballot count. To others, the election instead confirmed the staying power
of an oligarchy of old political families and patronage-based coalitions of personal
allegiance and political convenience, with the son of a former president and the
scion of an established dynasty resurrecting the political machine built up by his
late father, Senator Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino, Jr. in the late 1960s and early
1970s and then redeployed by his mother, Corazon Aquino, in the “snap”
presidential campaign of 1986. Like his mother a scion of the Cojuangco family,
the new president not only inherited shares of vast landholdings and in a range of
companies and commercial banks, but counted among his relatives such
luminaries of the business establishment as long-time San Miguel Corporation
chairman Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco, Jr. and former Philippine Long Distance
Telephone Company chairman Antonio “Tonyboy” Cojuangco, Jr. In short, from
this perspective, Aquino’s victory confirms the Philippines as an essentially
oligarchical democracy. Against such standard interpretations of the 2010
elections, this paper argues that Aquino’s victory, rather than signalling a clear
departure from the old ways of doing politics or the mere reproduction of
established patterns of oligarchical politics, points towards a more gradual and
limited change in the mobilisation of voters in the Philippines. This change, it is
further argued, reflects in part the rise of “public opinion” as a social fact in
Philippine politics and society in the period since the resurrection of formal
democratic institutions and regular elections. In drawing analytical attention to the
emergence of this new social imaginary of an opinionated public, the argument
advanced here thus departs from much of the existing literature, which tends to
posit an electorate instead largely inscribed within the constraints of clientelism,
coercion or machine politics in the Philippines. Rather than questioning the
extent of such change, and whether it warrants an upgrade, as it were, from a
glass half-empty to a glass half-full rating, this article focuses instead on the
changing nature of voter mobilisation in the Philippines, and the processes
through which they have unfolded in the quarter century separating the first and
the second Aquino presidency. To that end, the present analysis takes as its
point of departure already well- established scholarly research and theoretically-
informed arguments about oligarchical democracy found in the existing literature
on politics and society in the Philippines, and elsewhere (Scott 1972; McCoy
1993; Sidel 1999). Having rehearsed key arguments and findings in this
impressive body of scholarship which, in combination, offers a kind of baseline
against which to identify and assess change, the article turns to a theoretically-
informed examination into the nature and the processes of changing forms of
voter mobilisation. In focusing on the nature and processes of such change, the
present analysis draws on early research focused on clientelism and machine
politics in the Philippines (Nowak and Snyder 1974, but also mobilises fresh
insights into the shifting dynamics of voter mobilisation from the critical sociology
of Pierre Bourdieu about what is commonly referred to as “public opinion”
(Bourdieu 1979). Drawing on Bourdieu and others writing in a similar vein, this
article argues that an important and under-theorised aspect of the changing
dynamics of voter mobilisation stems from the emergence of public opinion as a
social fact, or political discourse, in the Philippines. This argument points beyond
the more commonplace concern, in the Philippines and elsewhere, with the
“problems” associated with “public opinion”, that tend to be of a more “technical”
kind, including whether individual polls or polling outfits are sufficiently scientific
in their approach (e.g., Jacobs and Shapiro 2005). As Bourdieu argued more
than thirty years ago, “public opinion” is “a pure and simple artefact whose
function is to dissimulate the fact that the state of the opinion at a given moment
is a system of forces, of tensions” (Bourdieu 1979). Viewed from this perspective,
polls and surveys are themselves mechanisms of re-presentations, which,
through a “formally equalitarian aggregative logic,” anticipate the emergence of a
certain “public” and its preferences, over and against other forms of collectives
and politics rooted in conditions of deprivation, poverty and social inequality
(Champagne 1990). The argument advanced here is thus a cautionary one,
indicating that, while the emergence of “public opinion” as a social fact alters
political calculations and dynamics associated with voter mobilisation, the politics
of public opinion may only have limited transformative potential for democracy in
the Philippines. This article thus seeks to offer the following contributions to
existing research and publications on Philippine elections and politics. First of all,
it identifies the broad parameters of the overall growth trajectory of the
phenomenon commonly referred to as “public opinion” in the Philippines after
Marcos. Second, it redirects attention beyond the common preoccupation with
the outcomes, design and accuracy of polls and surveys, and towards a critical
reflection upon the nature and significance of “public opin- ion” itself, and, in
particular, the effects of its increasing circulation and traction, as such, in
Philippine politics and society. Third, it shows how, with the rise of “public
opinion” as a social fact in the Philippines, it is also possible to discern an –
admittedly slow and limited – effect upon voter mobilisation and, more generally,
electoral campaigns. Fourth and finally, this article cautions that such effects may
serve to mediate or to amplify already familiar dynamics and patterns observed in
Philippine election campaigns, notably bandwagoning and political branding, and
that the transformative potential of “public opinion” remains highly circumscribed
and compromised in a number of ways. The article is organised as follows: The
first section identifies more long-term social and economic changes in the
country, as well as the new institutional framework for electoral politics
introduced with the 1987 Constitution. It argues that, even as money and
machinery have remained essential elements of election campaigning and voter
mobilization after the resurrection of democratic institutions and practices,
established patterns of voter brokerage have thus become more attenuated and
unreliable compared to pre-martial law politics. The second section turns to the
rise of “public opinion” in Philippine politics and society, offering a brief
introduction to the practice of polling since the resurrection of democratic
institutions. The third section sketches the ebb and flow of public opinion in the
context of the three presidential election campaigns to have been held between
the first and the second Aquino presidency. The fourth and final section probes
beyond commonplace concerns with “technical” problems of polling, or attempts
at restricting the practice, and instead draws on Pierre Bourdieu, and others
writing in a similar vein, to question the effect of surveys upon the very notion of
“the public” and indeed, democracy.

Something Old, Something New: Voter Mobilisation in the Philippines

 Democracy in the Philippines has been described variously in terms of
“factionalism” and “clientelism”, “caciquism” and “bossism” but the overall pattern
has been clear (Landé 1964; Scott 1972; Anderson 1988; Sidel 1999). Elected
politicians have been drawn from the landowning, commercial and industrial
oligarchy of the archipelago, representing its interests both directly and through
delegation. Competition for political office has revolved around contestation for
the spoils of state power between rival families and factions within this ruling
class. Poverty and economic insecurity have combined with a highly
decentralized political structure to render the majority of Filipinos susceptible to
clientelist, coercive, and monetary inducements and pres- sures during elections.
Meanwhile, the prominent role of money in Philippine elections – for buying
votes, bribing officials, and otherwise oiling the machinery – has created a
structural imperative of fund-raising that guarantees politicians’ continuing use of
state powers and resources for personal and particularistic benefit and their
abiding reliance on landowners, merchants, bankers, and industrialists for
financial backing. Small wonder that observers have been most impressed by the
continuities in this seemingly seamless system of oligarchical democracy in the
Philippines, as seen in the close attention paid to “political dynasties” that have
dominated municipalities, congressional districts, and in some cases entire
provinces across several generations and many decades (McCoy 1993). Of
course, efforts aimed at challenging or circumventing such established political
dynamics through alternative forms of voter mobilisation are not new to the
Philippines. During what may be termed “critical elections,” the mobilisation of –
voluntarist, non-partisan, patriotic – national citizens campaigns for “free and fair
elections” have helped to energise opposition bids for the presidency against a
continuista incumbent with seemingly authoritarian tendencies and ambitions.
Such campaigns accompanied the 1953, 1969, and 1986 elections. These
“critical elections” have enjoyed a close affinity with the demonstrations of
“People Power” that helped to unseat a president in 1986 and, again, in 2001
(Hedman 2001; 2006). Since the restoration of formal democratic institutions and
practices in 1986, however, the Philippines has seen a more gradual and limited
transformation in the mobilisation of voters. This change is inextricably linked
with the increasing circulation in Philippine politics and society of what is
commonly referred to as “public opinion.” As argued in this paper, the sheer
accumulation and anticipation of surveys, reflecting back to the (disaggregated)
public their (aggregated) opinion, have become inextricably linked to dynamics of
bandwagoning, as well as to efforts at what scholars have described as “political
branding” (Pasotti 2009). Before turning to a closer analysis of the rise of public
opinion as such in Philippine politics and society, it is useful to situate this
development against the backdrop of more long-term social and economic
changes in the country, as well as the new institutional framework for electoral
politics introduced with the new Constitution of 1987. First of all, it is worth
recalling that in the Philippines, as elsewhere, the structural decline of patron-
client relations has been linked to demographic change. Since the late 1960s, the
expansion of a segment of urban poor and, in absolute terms, a growing urban
middle class has anticipated an overall decline in the “integrative capacity of
political machines” (Nowak and Snyder 1974: 1165; Scott 1972). With
urbanization, industrialization, and eco- nomic differentiation, the interpersonal
linkages between ordinary Filipinos and the brokers of their votes became
increasingly attenuated, enabling new forms of electoral and extra-electoral
mobilisation in the tumultuous years leading up to the declaration of martial law in
1972. The resurrection of formal democratic institutions in the post-Marcos
period, moreover, unfolded against the backdrop of a resumption of economic
growth, with the spread and transformation of many urban and peri-urban
landscapes across the Philippines, resurrecting the spectre of alternative social
imaginaries and political possibilities to those associated with the politics of
machinery and money (Hedman 2000; 2001). Second, shifts in the political party
and voting system in the Philippines have followed changes to the electoral rules
in the post-Marcos period enacted since the new Philippine Constitution of 1987.
The new electoral rules introduced with the resurrection of formal democratic
institutions spelled the end of the two-party system and the associated zero-sum
logic of Philippine elections that prevailed from Independence in 1946 to martial
law in 1972, when the Liberal and Nacionalista machines alternated in power
without serious challenges from third parties. As the new rules put in place since
1987 abolished the pre-martial law system of limiting party representation on
boards of election inspectors and canvassers to the incumbent administration
and dominant opposition parties, they eliminated the party disciplining effects
upon candidates whose Liberal or Nacionalista affiliation offered much-needed
influence over the ballot-counting process on election day. This adjustment in the
electoral rules prefigured a shift to multi-party electoral competition that has
characterised Philippine politics and society in the post-authoritarian period. This
shift, in turn, has opened up new possibilities for a more variegated and “flexible”
array of political parties and coalitions to field candidates in the contestation for
an unprecedented number of elected seats at municipal, provincial, and national
level. Local candidates for municipal and congressional offices now strike deals
with the national campaign managers of senatorial and presidential candidates
from across multiple party divides, without fear that betraying formal party
affiliations might jeopardize their influence over local vote-counting on election
day. With this greater flexibility has come increasing unreliability of votebrokering
arrangements and uncertainty of electoral outcomes, with the old multi-tiered
party-based system of machine mobilization considerably undermined. Third, in
class terms, the configuration of elected representatives has changed in tandem
with the expansion and differentiation of the Philippine economy over the past
several decades. At the local level, empires built on large landholdings, control
over agricultural processing, and other forms of control over the workings of the
rural economy have become dwarfed by national and international agro-business
interests, foreign and Manila-based mining companies, and large-scale banking,
construction, and real-estate concerns radiating out of the national capital.
Municipal mayors and provincial governors from around the archipelago have
joined congressmen in establishing residences in Metro Manila and in
diversifying the geographical reach and sectoral breadth of their business
interests far beyond the localities they ostensibly serve but often use in part as
vote banks to help leverage business deals far from their offices in municipal
halls and provincial capitols. Meanwhile, at the national level, the diversification
of major conglomerates across economic sectors and their spread across the
archipelago has anticipated new forms of brokerage to replace the pre-martial
law pattern of more direct representation of “the Sugar Bloc” and other national
economic interests. Today, the owners of the largest conglomerates in the
Philippines lend support to a diverse range of corporate lawyers, veteran
machine politicians, and celebrities in the – nationally elected – Senate in
exchange for assistance in winning favourable treatment by regulatory and tax
authorities, privileged access to state concessions and contracts, and other
advantages. A similar dynamic has also been evident in the House of
Representatives, with the country’s leading magnates bankrolling clusters of
candidates in a given election, as well as lobbying campaigns on specific pieces
of legislation during sessions of Congress. As suggested elsewhere, this pattern
of brokerage indicates a shift in the relationship between the spheres of business
and politics, allowing for a new cast of candidates to “take the money and run”
(Sidel 1998). Overall, then, even as money and machinery have remained
essential elements of election campaigning and voter mobilization, the something
of the old “glue” that cemented pre-martial law politics has come unstuck.
Previously effective forms of vote brokerage have become more attenuated and
unreliable, with monetary inducements failing to guarantee loyalty. Established
patterns of interest representation have become more indirect, diffuse, and ad
hoc.

The Rise of Public Opinion in Philippine Politics and Society

It is in the wider context of such social, economic and institutional change
that “public opinion” has gained greater circulation as political discourse and
social fact in Philippine politics and society, with the popularity and poll ratings of
candidates – rather than the construction and maintenance of machines – viewed
as an increasingly effective and decisive mode of voter mobilisation. This trend is
perhaps most evident in the close correspondence between pre-election surveys
and the performance of presidential contenders at the polls in the 2010 elections.
However, the rise of public opinion has also come to influence the process of
election campaigning itself, as seen in the floating and junking of candidates, the
party-switching of politicians, and the unravelling of coalitions, all developments
noted by informed observers of the presidential elections of May 2010. The issue
of public opinion and whether it plays a role in Philippine elections had been of
some interest to scholars already in the pre-martial law era (Meadows 1963).
Surveys on presidential elections were attempted by Philippine academic
researchers and print media in the 1950s and 1960s, but these were
comparatively few, isolated and limited in scope. While election surveys thus
date back to the 1950s in the Philippines, they remained largely confidential and
unpublished (Abad and Ramirez 2008). Such surveys were conducted in some
urban areas in the 1953, 1961 and 1965 presidential elections, for example, by a
marketing research company called Robot Statistics, founded by an American,
George Cohen, and identified as the first and, initially, the only, such outfit in
business in the country. By the 1970s, marketing and opinion research was
expanding in the Philippines, and a number of new such outfits backed the
foundation of MORES, or the Marketing & Opinion Research Society of the
Philippines in 1977. However, public opinion as political discourse in Philippine
politics and society is a phenomenon that began to emerge only in the context of
the deepening crisis and mounting opposition that marked the late authoritarian
period. This is perhaps best illustrated with reference to the Social Weather
Station (SWS), which was founded as early as August 1985 and remains among
the Philippines’ foremost public opinion survey outfits to date (e.g., Abad and
Ramirez 2008). Unlike marketing research business organisations, the SWS is a
non-profit institute that aims to conduct social surveys and survey-based social
science research with an aim to further education, awareness and analysis of
social problems in the Philippines. The SWS undertakes commissioned but not
proprietary or confidential surveys, and the uses of survey data and findings
cannot be permanently suppressed by research sponsors. While it may allow for
data and research findings that result from commissioned surveys on highly
sensitive topics to be temporarily embargoed, for a period of up to three years,
the SWS regularly reports on its data and findings to the mass media, and also
issues the quarterly Social Weather Survey (Mangahas 2009). Having captured
something of the zeitgeist of the late Marcos era, with its one-million signature
petition drive to draft Corazon C. Aquino as the opposition presidential candidate
in 1986, its national citizens’ campaign for free and fair elections, and its
spectacular People Power finale, the Social Weather Station has continued to
develop and expand its production of survey-based national statistics on public
opinion in the Philippines, thus becoming a fixture in the period since the
restoration of democracy. In the first regular presidential elections to be held after
martial law, for example, the SWS introduced so-called “exit polls” to the
Philippines in 1992 when surveying voters upon their return home after voting,
rather than outside poll centres, for ABS-CBN, the leading national television
network in the country. Such exit polls have been conducted nationally since the
1995 interim elections, with an aim to announce results within 24 hours,
compared to a period of up to two weeks typically required for the official
tabulation of votes. With the proliferation of political contenders, parties and
coalitions in the post-authoritarian period, the practice of “polling” has also gained
increasing traction, as seen in the number and frequency of public opinion
surveys conducted for wider dissemination by an expanding field of specialist
outfits such as the SWS, the break-away Pulse Asia, and others, but also by
media networks across the Philippines.1 Moreover, the commissioning of such
surveys by individual candidates and their campaign managers, as well as by
incumbent administrations, has also become widespread. This institutionalisation
of “polling” as a familiar and widespread practice has encouraged developments
in political marketing and “political branding” by candidates and their handlers,
while producing bandwagoning effects among local politicians eager for affiliation
with those presidential and senatorial candidates most likely to win national office
(e.g., Tabunda, Fonbuena, and Rufo 2008; cf. Pasotti 2009). Indeed, in the wider
context of multiple parties and candidates for office without political platforms or
programmes of any real distinction, the apparition of an opinionated public in
survey after survey is worthy of note as a phenomenon in its own right. That is,
aside from the specific content of any one survey, public opinion polling has
emerged as an institutionalised practice in the Philippines, an established social
fact. As already noted, the sheer increase in surveys is ample testimony to this
reality (Chua 2004). Beyond the increasing number and frequency of surveys,
moreover, there is mounting evidence of considerable media interest in and
political controversy over the “reported findings” of surveys, focused on the facts
and figures of specific polls, but also, importantly, on the very claims to profes
sional objectivity and scientific method that lie at the heart of the production of
public opinion for public consumption. As the accumulation and anticipation of
surveys have achieved both momentum and continuous reproduction and
circulation, the significance of public opinion as such thus extends well beyond
the (instrumental) uses and abuses of surveys to encompass (structural) effects
of a different order in Philippine politics and society. In terms of Philippine
elections, such effects have come to shape the life-cycle of political campaigns in
decisive ways. As noted above, for example, the early testing of the mood of
Filipino voters by “floating” possible contenders for elected office has become a
well established practice prior to the official start of an election campaign period,
as seen in late 2009 with the rise of “Noynoy” Aquino in the aftermath of his
mother’s funeral. As suggested by public opinion polls focused on national
elections, there is a strong correlation between those who top the often crowded
field of would be contenders in early pre-election surveys and those who actually
proceed to file for candidacy and to run for elected office in the official campaign
period. The growing practice of would-be-candidates and their handlers
commissioning their own surveys has also revealed an acute appreciation of the
significance of public opinion polls for influencing the prospects of any given
election campaign, by establishing candidates as genuinely “bankable” in the
eyes of prospective supporters. Underlining the importance of survey results four
weeks before the elections to financial backers, for example, one veteran political
analyst noted that a candidate who fares poorly in such surveys “may be
deprived of funding”.2 The bandwagoning effect of polling, in other words, may
set into motion the logic of a self-fulfilling prophecy, as public opinion combines
with money and machinery to determine election results, but the ebb and flow of
public opinion appear genuinely difficult to predict or to manage.

The Ebb and Flow of “Public Opinion” in Three Presidential Elections

Against this backdrop, the three presidential elections in the period
between the first and the second Aquino presidency provide instructive glimpses
of both the power and the limitations of “public opinion” since the resurrection of
democratic institutions in the Philippines. In 1992, for example, the first
presidential election since the fall of Marcos saw anti-graft and corruption
crusader Miriam Defensor-Santiago launch an electoral campaign characterised
by unprecedented reformist zeal and appeal, directed especially at younger
generations of voters who had begun to come of age in the postauthoritarian era
(Defensor-Santiago 1991). Having been forced to found her own electoral
vehicle, the People’s Reform Party, and lacking real financial backing or an
established political machine, she called on university students to campaign
house-to-house in support of her presidential bid, and to serve as her vote-
watchers at precinct level on election day. As her campaign picked up
momentum, Defensor-Santiago eventually caught up with the incumbent
administration’s anointed candidate, (Ret.) General Fidel V. Ramos, in a SWS
survey conducted in April 1992. Despite all the considerable advantages and
resources enjoyed by Ramos’ campaign compared to that of Defensor-Santiago,
he recovered only a very slight lead in the final such pre-election poll conducted
a few days prior to election day on 11 May 1992. The early random canvassing
of votes per province put Defensor-Santiago firmly in the lead for the first five
days after the elections, and she placed first among presidential candidates in
Metro Manila, and other regions with large voter populations. Only as the votes
began to trickle in from more distant regions of the archipelago, like Ramos’ vote-
rich home province of Pangasinan, his vicepresidential candidate’s populous
home province of Cebu, and the troubled provinces of Muslim Mindanao, where
much skulduggery and wholesale vote-rigging were reported, did Defensor-
Santiago fall to second place behind Ramos, who claimed victory and assumed
the presidency later that year. Allegations of wholesale election fraud, and
broader claims of advantages enjoyed thanks to the incumbent Aquino
administration’s support, raised serious questions regarding the accuracy,
integrity, and legitimacy of Ramos’ electoral victory. Indeed, Defensor-Santiago
launched an election protest that was eventually heard by the Supreme Court
(Defensor-Santiago 1994). But with Defensor-Santiago’s anti-corruption zeal
viewed with some discomfort in many quarters, the continuity and conservative
style represented by Ramos, and his role as a retired military officer in defeating
a series of coup attempts in the late 1980s, muted criticisms that a travesty of
democracy had been allowed to unfold in the first presidential turnover since the
forced ouster of Marcos in 1986. In the second post-Marcos presidential
elections of 1998, by contrast, the popular, pseudo-populist appeal of opposition
candidate and actionmovie star Joseph “Erap” Estrada succeeded in captivating
the electorate and capturing the presidency with a landslide victory in 1998.
Having won election first to the vice-presidency in 1992 and then the presidency
in 1998 with the largest vote margins in Philippine history, Estrada’s campaigns
seemed to confirm the seamless working of public opinion polls as self- fulfilling
prophecies. Millions of Filipino voters responded enthusiastically to Estrada’s
avowed identification with the poor – “Erap para sa Mahirap” – and the “masses”
– “Partido ng Masa” and were keen to identify themselves with a self-described
“underdog” winner-in-the-making. Meanwhile, machine politicians and
businessmen eager for inclusion and access in the impending Estrada
administration likewise bandwagoned en masse onto the Joseph E. Estrada for
President (JEEP) campaign (Hedman 2001). Yet the same pseudo-populist
appeal which had helped to elevate Estrada to the presidency with the support of
millions of ordinary Filipino voters also inspired scepticism and suspicion among
the urban middle class, the Catholic Church hierarchy, and the business
establishment whose interests had been serviced much more discreetly and
effectively under the preceding administrations of Aquino and Ramos. As with
Miriam DefensorSantiago, the short-circuiting of the established route to
presidential power through direct popular appeal to voters by a “wild-card”
candidate clearly carried dangers of its own, and once in office, the action-film
star Estrada’s personal excesses, abuses of office, and aggressive flaunting of
freedom from the established constraints of oligarchical democracy offended
sensibilities and, less than two years into his presidential term, inspired
journalistic exposés, urban middle-class protest campaigns, and congressional
investigations and in due course impeachment proceedings. With Estrada allies
obstructing confirmation of impeachment in the Senate, in early 2001, the “court
of public opinion” shifted venue to the streets of the national capital, where a
repeat performance of the “People Power Revolution” of 1986 eventually forced
Estrada out of office, allowing his vice-president, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, to
assume the presidency in his stead (Landé 2001). Subsequent protests
organized by backers of the ousted president and attended by many urban poor
Estrada enthusiasts were driven from the streets of Metro Manila and derided as
“rent-a-crowd” mob riots. “People Power”, it seemed, was allowed to stand in not
only for constitutional procedure but also for “public opinion” per se, even as
surveys continued to demonstrate abiding, if diminished, popular support for
Estrada across the country (Hedman 2003). Against this backdrop, the third post-
Marcos presidential elections held in 2004 stand out for their confirmation of this
implicit repudiation of the effective supremacy of “public opinion.” The 2004
presidential elections, after all, witnessed the seemingly inexplicable failure of
Philippine cinema’s all-time great, “FPJ” (Fernando Poe, Jr.), to translate his
long-standing and nation-wide iconic star status into presidential victory, much as
his long-time friend and fellow action-film hero Estrada had done in 1998. As in
1992, the presidential election was instead won by the candidate of the
incumbent administration, in this case the seated president Gloria Macapagal-
Arroyo, who unlike her predecessors was free to extend her term for another six
years thanks to her extra-electoral ascent to presidential office in 2001 (Gloria,
Tabunda, and Fonbuena 2004). As in 1992, the outcome of the presidential
elections in 2004 was accompanied by allegations of wholesale electoral fraud, in
this case vividly evidenced in congressional and court proceedings featuring
Commission of Elections officials clearly operating in cahoots with the President.
As in 1992, the losing opposition presidential candidate in 2004 filed an election
protest with the Supreme Court, which eventually dismissed the case and
allowed for Macapagal-Arroyo to serve out the remainder of her term (Hutchcroft
2008). Overall, then, the post-Marcos period has witnessed recurring efforts at
voter mobilisation which, in different ways and with varying success, have sought
to circumvent the established routes to presidential office through incumbent
administration patronage and the accumulation of massive campaign “war
chests” and nation-wide political machines. On the one hand, in two out of three
presidential contests during this period (1992, 2004), the electoral campaigns to
elect Miriam Defensor-Santiago and Ferdinand Poe Jr., suggested themselves
as significant instances of such alternative forms of voter mobilisation. At the
same time, they failed to translate the widespread support – for “Miriam” in 1992
and for “FPJ” in 2004 – into final victory at the polls in the face of incumbent
administrations fully committed to support for insider candidates, President
Aquino’s anointed successor Ramos in the first instance, and the seated
president Macapagal-Arroyo herself in the second. On the other hand, the
winning presidential campaign of Joseph Estrada succeeded in mobilising voters
in ways irreducible to machine or money politics in 1998, with the incumbent
Ramos administration torn between rival claimants to succession and thus
unable to finesse a manufactured electoral victory for a credible alternative
candidate. Yet Estrada’s unprecedented popular presidential campaign victory in
1998 proved problematic in ways which prefigured his forced ouster by extra-
electoral, and extra-constitutional, means in early 2001.

Public Opinion and the Politics of Recognition

Unsurprisingly, it was in the wake of the unprecedented popularity – and
populism – of Estrada’s election campaign that the most concerted attack against
the practice, as well as the foremost practitioner, of election surveys in the
Philippines, was launched. As Estrada’s lead in the public opinion polls was
followed by his landslide victory in 1998, a number of privileged speeches from
the Senate floor began targeting “surveys in general and the SWS in particular”
(Mangahas 2007: 7). By 2000, a number of Philippine senators, including
(former) unsuccessful presidential and vice-presidential contenders in the 1998
elections, had proposed to amend a bill, the Fair Election Act, initially aimed to lift
election advertising in the media, in such ways as to incorporate a ban on
election surveys. The bill was passed by Congress, and subsequently signed by
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, in February 2001, despite efforts to stop it by
the Social Weather Station, as well as the Marketing and Opinion Research
Society of the Philippines. In April of the same year, the SWS and the newspaper
Manila Standard petitioned the Supreme Court, which subsequently ruled the
ban on publication of surveys 15 days before national elections, and 7 days
before local elections, a violation of the freedom of expression, and thus
unconstitutional (Social Weather Stations v Comelec, GR No. 147571, 5 May
2001). Despite this Supreme Court ruling, the same ban resurfaced in the new
Rules and Regulations by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) during the
2007 interim elections, prompting further controversy and protest to focus on the
uses and abuses of public opinion surveys in Philippine politics and society. The
move to ban pre-election surveys described above differs in important respects
from the more commonplace concern, in the Philippines and elsewhere, with the
“problems” associated with “public opinion”, that tend to be of a more “technical”
kind, including whether individual polls or polling outfits are sufficiently scientific
in their approach, thus inviting similarly technical solutions aimed at improving
the design, execution and reliability of surveys (e.g., Jacobs and Shapiro 2005).
Instead, attempts to restrict the very dissemination of survey results attest,
however implicitly, to the rise of public opinion as a social fact and the related
uncertainties and anxieties about its broader impact in the context of the
Philippines. In as far as such attacks on surveys tend to focus on election
campaigns, they also point towards a particular concern about the staying power
of money and machinery. More generally, such efforts to thwart the practices and
institutions that aim to (re)present to the public its own (collective) opinions
through polls and surveys suggest that the new social imaginary of “public
opinion” is one which can neither be safely ignored, nor seamlessly controlled, by
candidates for elected office or their election campaign managers in the
Philippines. Beyond the focus on technical problems and solutions associated
with polling, or the attempts at restricting the practice itself, the rise of “public
opinion,” as a phenomenon in its own right, appears in a very different light, as
do its purported effects, when viewed through the critical lens of the French
sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, and others writing in a similar vein. As argued by
Bourdieu more than thirty years ago, “public opinion” is “a pure and simple
artefact whose function is to dissimulate the fact that the state of the opinion at a
given moment is a system of forces, of tensions” (Bourdieu 1979). Polls and
surveys, it has been argued, are thus instruments “not of political knowledge but
of political action,” whose deployment inherently devalues other forms of
collective action – strikes, protests, social movements – and rests on a “formally
equalitarian aggregative logic” that ignores and obscures the profound realities of
deprivation, poverty, and social inequality in countries such as the Philippines
(Wacquant 2004; Champagne 1990). Viewed from this perspective, the rise of
public opinion can be more readily seen to have coincided, at the outset, with the
emergence of a new form of political action in the Philippines. This new political
activism was directed, not merely at Marcos’ ailing dictatorship, but also,
importantly, against the labour strikes, student protests and peasant movements
that surfaced in the factories, the campuses, and the haciendas of the country,
precisely at a time when the Communist Party of the Philippines, and its armed
wing, the New People’s Army, emerged the single largest such organisation (in
opposition, not in control, of state power) anywhere in the world. Long before the
institutionalisation of “public opinion” through polls and surveys after the
resurrection of democracy, it was this struggle for “hearts and minds” that
unleashed the “will of the people” into Philippine political discourse, as seen in
the high-profile campaigns to collect one million signatures on a petition for Cory
Aquino to run for president in 1985, to organise as many volunteers for Namfrel
(National Movement for Free Elections) in 1985-86, and, finally, to oust an
authoritarian regime by means of People Power in February 1986. Indeed, it is
perhaps worth recalling, however briefly, that the mother of all attempts at
“floating” a candidacy in the Philippines dates back a full quarter-century to 1985,
when a popular drive to collect one million signatures in support of then
housewife and widow Corazon “Cory” Aquino not only catapulted her into the
“snap” presidential race against Marcos, but also served to generate tremendous
momentum for her campaign. A similar drive also accompanied the presidential
bid of the next generation of the Aquino family nearly twenty-five years later, but
Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III’s candidacy probably owed more to the timing of his
mother’s death in August 2009, less than a year before the 2010 elections. With
hundreds of thousands of Filipinos lining the funeral cortege for his mother
“Cory”, and millions more joining in the virtual spectacle, “Noynoy” was thus
yanked out of relative senatorial obscurity and thrust into the lead role in a larger
meta-narrative of family and nation, the Aquinos and the Philippines, dating back
to his father’s imprisonment and exile in the 1970s and assassination in Manila in
1983. At first glance, it may appear that the funeral corteges and petition drives
which helped to jump-start the presidential campaigns of two generations of
Aquinos, a full quarter-century apart, remain a thing apart from the rise of public
opinion as political discourse. Indeed, in the case of “Cory”, the public spectacle
that propelled her into popular consciousness coincided with the first appearance
of the Philippines’ foremost polling institution, the Social Weather Station (SWS)
in 1985 and thus pre-dated the wider circulation of public opinion as political
discourse under post-Marcos conditions of democratic elections. By contrast,
public opinion surveys had already become firmly established aspects of
Philippine election campaigns by 2010, when Noynoy’s successful presidential
candidacy was acclaimed as something of a foundational moment and unique
repertoire in the rise of public opinion in the Philippines However, in each case,
the ostensibly private state of mourning for a departed family member and the
highly individuated act of signing a petition, were accompanied by large-scale
and widely publicised displays of sympathy and support. In each case, the
spectacle of grief at the loss of a national figure associated with victimhood –
whether assassination at the hands of Marcos in 1983 or repeated attempted
coups by the military in the late 1980s – spoke of aspirations to a higher form of
personal sacrifice and public morality than the machinations of what has been
described and decried as mere pulitika (Ileto 1985). Simultaneously public and
collective, such displays have reflected popular sentiments back onto participants
and observers alike, thus pointing to a deep structural affinity with the less
spectacular and more institutionalised practice of “polling.” The institutionalisation
of this practice has proceeded apace, slowly, gradually and to limited effect, in
the intervening years between the first and second Aquino presidency.

Guiding Principles on Young People’s Participation in

Peace Building
The United Nations Secretary-General highlighted, in his 2012 report on
Peacebuilding in the Aftermath of Conflict, that “a successful peacebuilding
process must be transformative and create space for a wider set of actors –
including, but not limited to, representatives of women, young people, victims and
marginalized communities; community and religious leaders; civil society actors;
and refugees and internally displaced persons – to participate in public decision-
making on all aspects of post-conflict governance and recovery.”1 Fostering
social cohesion and trust through an inclusive and participatory peacebuilding
process during and after a transition or conflict is a challenging but necessary
task. Many key stakeholders remain on the margins or excluded from the
process. In particular, the potential contribution and inclusion of young people2 to
effective peacebuilding has received little attention and support. Yet young
people’s leadership and roles in preventing and resolving conflict, violence and
extremism are rich resources essential to achieving sustainable peace. Young
people are valuable innovators and agents of change, and their contributions
should be actively supported, solicited and regarded as essential to building
peaceful communities and supporting democratic governance and transition.
Moreover, young people’s participation promotes civic engagement and active
citizenship. Promoting the participation of young people in peacebuilding requires
multiple approaches. These include: (1) A human rights-based approach,
grounded in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, the
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
(CEDAW) and the World Programme of Action on Youth; (2) An economic
approach that identifies young people as central to the economic development of
their country, and promotes their access to economic opportunities as essential
for their own development; (3) A socio-political approach that connects young
people to civil society and the political arena, and provides them with
opportunities, training and support for their active engagement and participation
in public life; and (4) A sociocultural approach that analyses the roles of young
people in existing structures and supports dialogue – including intergenerational
dialogue – about these structures. The principle of ‘do no harm’ is fundamental in
all instances, and requires an awareness and active avoidance of the negative
consequences that interventions can inadvertently create. In addition, all
participation should be based on free will. The principles listed below were
identified to offer guidance to key actors, including governments; United Nations
entities, funds and programmes; local, national and international non-
governmental organizations; civil society actors; and donors. The principles are
designed to inform participative, inclusive and intergenerational peacebuilding
strategies and programmes that systematically promote and ensure the
participation and contributions of young people in challenging contexts of conflict,
where violence has often become the norm. The principles are not listed in order
of priority and are each of equal importance.

Promote Young People’s Participation As An Essential Condition For

Successful Peace building.
1.1 Prioritize regular, systematic and meaningful participation of young
people as an essential condition for the sustainability, inclusiveness and success
of peacebuilding efforts. This is of particular importance when young people
constitute a majority of the population. 1.2 Promote and abide by the
understanding that the majority of young people strive for peace and stability and
that a number of them are actively engaged in peacebuilding efforts; only a
minority of young people engages in violence. 1.3 Link young people’s
participation in peacebuilding to all sectors (social, economic, cultural and
political) and to all levels (family, school, community, and local, regional and
national governance). 1.4 Promote sustainable, long-term and collaborative
initiatives for and with young people, including joint initiatives that build on
existing efforts and interventions at scale. Avoid short-term projects that will only
benefit a few.

Value And Build Upon Young People’s Diversity And Experiences

2.1 Acknowledge that definitions of ‘young people’ vary depending on
social, cultural and political contexts, and strive to understand the national and
local contexts that young people have grown up in. 2.2 Value diversity among
young people and develop targeted strategies to involve and include young
people from different backgrounds, taking into account differences in age,
gender, ethnicity, culture, religion, class, caste, education, social status, place of
residence (rural/urban), sexual orientation, physical and intellectual abilities,
interests, etc. 2.3 Involve hard-to-reach young people and those who belong to
groups often disproportionately affected by conflict, such as disabled young
people and young people from minority and indigenous groups. 2.4 Make specific
efforts to reach out to marginalized young people within all of these groups; do
not assume that elite youth leaders from civil society represent them. 2.5 Support
young people and youth-led organizations to reflect on patterns of inclusion and
exclusion and to work proactively to address discrimination, which is often one of
the root causes of conflict. 2.6 Respect the experiences of all, including those of
young people associated with conflict, and make special efforts to facilitate the
active participation of young people who are more vulnerable to recruitment by
armed groups and/or otherwise involved in violence.

Be Sensitive To Gender Dynamics

3.1 Avoid stereotypical assumptions about the roles and aspirations of
girls, boys, young women, young men and young transgender people in conflict.
3.2 Recognize the specific grievances or vulnerabilities that young people may
have as a result of conflict and violence, and that these experiences are often
gendered. 3.3 Identify strategies to reach out to young women, seek their
engagement, and create a safe space to raise their specific issues and concerns
and support their initiatives.

Enable Young People’s Ownership, Leadership And Accountability In

Peace building
4.1 Identify young people and youth led-organizations involved in
peacebuilding initiatives: find them, learn from them and support them. 4.2
Create opportunities for young people’s sustained participation, ownership and
leadership in local, national, regional and international mechanisms to prevent,
manage and resolve conflict and maintain peace. 4.3 Foster trust and support
power-sharing between decision makers and young people, especially through
intergenerational dialogue and youth-adult trust-building activities and trainings.
4.4 Work with young people who are influential among their peers and foster their
leadership skills, while simultaneously ensuring the participation of marginalized
young people. 4.5 Facilitate mechanisms, both physical and virtual, for feedback
and communication to enable young leaders to be accountable to their peers,
communities and partners.

Do No Harm
5.1 Provide a physically, socially and emotionally safe and supportive
environment for young people to participate in peacebuilding and post-conflict
activities. 5.2 Acknowledge the trauma that many young people have suffered,
and offer a safe space to share experiences, including access to psychosocial
support, justice and other support services for their rehabilitation and
reintegration. 5.3 Be sensitive to divides and inequalities among and between
young people, their peers and their communities, and avoid exacerbating these,
fomenting stereotypes, or creating potentially difficult or dangerous situations for
young people before, during and after their participation. 5.4 Ensure that
facilitators are specifically trained to handle difficult conversations and situations
and know where to refer young people who might need specialized services. 5.5
Be cautious about offering too many opportunities and services to young people
who have been involved in violence, to avoid incentivizing others to turn to
violence or engage with armed groups to receive money or support.

Involve Young People In All Stages Of Peace building And Post-Conflict

Programming
6.1 Involve diverse groups of young people in identifying critical
interventions that can change the dynamics of conflict and violence, and in
analysing the conflict and the roles of different actors. 6.2 Use tailored and age-
appropriate methodologies for young people to contribute directly to designing,
implementing, monitoring, evaluating and following up on peacebuilding and
post-conflict programmes and processes. 6.3 Advocate for and support
institutionalizing young people’s participation and representation in local and
national governance processes so that they can influence practices and policies
affecting them and ensure that youth have the appropriate training and support to
engage in these processes. 6.4 Promote and facilitate young people’s civic
engagement and volunteerism for peace. 6.5 Have relevant decision makers,
institutions and organizations commit to accountability to young people. Establish
mechanisms to communicate with and receive feedback from young people,
particularly as part of any youth-focused programme and policy framework. 6.6
Offer alternative sources of power to young people who have attained political,
social and economic power using violent mean.

Enhance The Knowledge, Attitudes, Skills And Competencies Of Young

People For Peace building
7.1 Nurture young people’s skills in leadership, mediation, negotiation,
conflict resolution, communication, life skills and positive social norms. 7.2
Create opportunities for young people to share goals and aspirations with adults
in addition to one another; capitalize on their experiences and assets; and
engage in multiple areas, including social, emotional, moral, spiritual, civic,
vocational, physical, cognitive, personal and cultural development. 7.3 Identify
young people who can serve as positive role models and provide guidance to
younger individuals. 7.4 Promote positive relationships between young people
and adult mentors who can help guide them during life transitions and provide
them with the vision and confidence to realize their goals. 7.5 Develop violence-
prevention strategies that go beyond simple security responses and encompass
prevention of violence in the family, school and community, and which support
reinsertion and rehabilitation.

Invest In Intergenerational Partnerships In Young People’s Communities

8.1 Increase dialogue, understanding of and opportunities for cooperation
among children, young people, parents and elders, in order to act jointly to
prevent and resolve violence and transform conflicts. 8.2 Work with adults so that
they see the empowerment of young people as a positive change, and not as a
threat to their own power and position. 8.3 Recognize and promote the role of
local, regional and national governments to support young people’s participation
in processes and decisions that affect their lives.

Introduce And Support Policies That Address The Full Needs Of Young
People
9.1 Prioritize the development of youth-focused and youth-inclusive
policies as important peace dividends. 9.2 Contribute to the establishment of or
support existing local, regional and national forums and other appropriate
channels of communication that can enhance young people’s participation in the
development of public policies that affect their lives. 9.3 Support research on
youth and peacebuilding that can be used as a reference for policy. 9.4 Support
the development of inclusive national policies that address the needs and
aspirations of young people; contribute to young people’s participation,
development and empowerment; and fully align with international human rights
standards, regional instruments and key policy documents.
CONCLUSIONS
The paper starts by pointing out a common perception of youths as
uninterested and even apathetic with politics. But is that really the case,
particularly in the Philippines? Are today’s young generation truly disengaged
from politics? This paper tried to answer this question, drawing from a democracy
project in the Philippines that involved young university students as volunteers in
an election monitoring exercise. To capture the thoughts and voices of the
youths, a content analysis of focus groups and reflection papers of students
about their subjective experiences, feelings, insights and views and other project
documents was done. The results tend to belie what conventional wisdom
suggests about the young being politically disinterested and indifferent. In
summary, what do the youth’s voices tell us? It can be argued that, based on
results, the youths are not disconnected from the political affairs in the country.
They are interested in political life around them and have rather clear and
unequivocal views and ideas about politics and democracy in the country. They
hold critical views about the behavior of politicians and political candidates.
Notwithstanding, they continue to have faith in democracy and believe in
electoral process for installing leaders of the country. The youths recognize the
weaknesses and deficits in the political system. They express serious concern
about the political future of the country noting that politicians do not mind
violating election campaign rules to win elections. But even as they do, they
manifest interest in political participation not just in voting but in other
engagements that support democracy and good government. Their participation
has empowered them to believe that they can do something to help achieve or
influence social and political change, by watching closely how politicians behave,
being dutiful and conscientious voter and by sharing knowledge to families,
friends and their own organizations. The monitoring experience itself proved to
be an enlightening and worthy political awareness building process for the youths
themselves who soon were going to make choices about the nation’s political
leaders as they voted in the 2013 election. The experience and analysis showed
that involving and mobilizing young people in political processes affirms that the
youth can provide an encouraging and fresh reservoir of enthusiasm, nationalism
and idealism in having an active democracy. Their political experience with the
democracy project kindled their sense of citizenship, volunteerism and love for
the country. The democracy project suggests that direct engagement of the youth
can be an effective way of empowering the students. Participating in the project
enabled the students to realize the efficacy of their participation in political
process. Their experience in monitoring the campaign finances of the candidates
gave them a collective sense of power over the politicians. It has made them
realize to be careful and discriminating in entrusting their votes to politicians.
Engaging the youth to increase their interest and participation in political and
democratic processes may be a daunting exercise especially in a political
environment that is perceived as corrupt and the balance of power is dominated
by a few political and economic elite. But when given the opportunity and
support, and accompanied by adequate knowledge and skill building efforts, they
are enthused to participate and to get involved. Their sense of citizenship and
volunteerism, enthusiasm and energy can be mobilized and harnessed towards
such democratic ends and aspirations they identified as ‘good politics,’ ‘good
government,’ and ‘good society.’ Young as they are, and considering that that
they constitute a considerable segment of the population, they indeed can be a
potent force in influencing social and political change in the country.
Optimistically speaking, there is reason to hope that the youths of today can
become the country’s future political activists. Some implications for policy
(action) and research can also be drawn from the students’ experience and the
democracy project in general. In terms of policy and action, opportunities can be
created to encourage and enable the youth to realize the efficacy of their political
participation. These opportunities can be in the form, for example, of democracy
projects like the pre-electoral monitoring activity discussed in the paper. And with
the new lease of life given to the youth councils in the country, government can
lead in the creation of citizen initiatives for citizenship among the youths and
generally an environment that engenders citizenship as well as leadership
among the young. The academe and civil society including international
organizations can also be encouraged and tapped as partners in engendering a
culture of political participation among the youth in the country. In the area of
research, investigations can explore the trajectory of youth political participation
in the country, whether their ‘early’ involvement in politics will be carried forward
to adulthood as constructive political and civic participation. Modes of political
participation of the youth from the civic engagement perspective can also be
pursued, taking note especially of the popularity of the Internet and social media
among the young and how this is being used nowadays for self-expressions and
political participation. Whether involvement in civic and community life and
processes of political participation prepares the young to be good political
leaders also presents an interesting research inquiry to pursue. In this regard, it
will be instructive to know how the youth councils in the country are able to
contribute in the political maturation of the youth, particularly towards good
citizenship and political leadership.
As Southeast Asia entered the twenty-first century, the procedures and
practices associated with democracy had become established social facts in
many parts of the region. At the same time, however, the actual political
dynamics and lived experiences of such ostensibly democratic developments
have often remained at striking odds with the principles and promises of liberal
democracy. Indeed, democratisation in Southeast Asia, as elsewhere, has seen
mounting “democratic deficits” and even authoritarian relapses in the past
decade, as noted by many observers. Unsurprisingly perhaps, the optimism
evident in much scholarship and political commentary focused on
democratisation in the region has also given way to rather more weary, even
cynical, assessments of the political parties, party systems, and electoral
processes found in parts of the region today (e.g., Mietzner 2007; Montinola
1999; Ockey 1994; Tan 2006). By contrast with the proliferation of writings on the
celebrated role of the middle class, civil society, social movements and political
oppositions for processes of democratisation in the region, and elsewhere, the
subsequent turn to studying electoral procedures and related practices reflects a
preoccupation with institutional design and implementation for democratic
consolidation (MacIntyre 2003; Andrews and Montinola 2004; Hicken 2009). It
also suggests a snug fit with an internationally sponsored democratisation
industry underwriting a range of (quantifiable) measures aimed at strengthening
“good governance” in Southeast Asia, and elsewhere (World Bank 1997; UNDP
2002; IDEA 2007). Beyond simply mirroring new “realities” in the region, this
institutionalist shift in the study and promotion of democracy also points to a
wider pattern in the production of knowledge about electoral processes, political
parties and party systems. While the institutional frameworks and designs
associated with elections in (formerly) industrial democracies have been the
subject of studies for more than half a century, in recent decades, this subfield of
political science has become increasingly technical with advances in game
theory and mathematical modelling. As a result of the increased focus upon the
technologies of aggregating votes and building party systems, and the
possibilities for improving upon these, however, the society and politics within
which parties and elections are embedded in Southeast Asia, as elsewhere, have
tended to disappear from view. The Philippines is a case in point. On the one
hand, the importation of game theory and mathematical modelling has made
some recent inroads into the study of Philippine political parties and systems
(Montinola 1999; MacIntyre 2003; Hicken 2009). On the other hand, it remains
unclear what, if anything, such studies add to existing empirical research and
theory on the nature and direction of political dynamics and social change in the
Philippines over the past quarter-century since the fall of the Marcos dictatorship
in February 1986. Indeed, the conceptualisation of political parties, systems, and
elections as (technical) problems in need of (technical) solutions serves to
produce a cumulative effect akin to the “end of history” prophesized to follow in
the wake of liberal democracy. However, the “travails of democracy” are hardly a
thing of the past in the Philippines, or elsewhere (Therborn 1979), and the role
and significance of “politics” and “society” therein demand more, not less, careful
and critical analysis, as argued in this essay. Overall, as suggested by the
succession of presidential contests in the Philippines in the post-Marcos era, at
least two key constraining conditions have worked against the realisation of the
transformative potential of “public opinion” as it come to complement – and
compete with – the reconstituted and reconfigured system of money and
machine politics in the country. On the one hand, electoral fraud and undue
advantages enjoyed by candidates strongly favoured by incumbent
administrations have served to delimit the scope for “something new” to register
in the canvassing of votes during elections, as seen in 1992 and 2004. In this
regard, the changes in electoral rules and the pattern of brokerage described
above have also encouraged electoral fraud of a wholesale rather than “mere”
retail variety in the canvassing of votes across the archipelago (Tancangco
1992). Little surprise then, that the introduction of a relatively untested automated
vote count in the 2010 elections was viewed with great concern among many
Filipinos. According to one national survey, almost half of respondents (47%)
agreed that “[t]he machines that will be used to count the votes in the 2010
election can easily be sabotaged in order to fake the election results” (SWS
October 24-27, 2009). On the other hand, the 2001 mid-term ouster of a sitting
president who had won election through unprecedented direct popular – and
pseudopopulist – appeal to ordinary voters across the country represented a
new, unconstitutional precedent against the future inroads of “something new” in
Philippine politics and society. As opposition politicians, corporate executives,
and Catholic clergy returned to the parliament of the streets with calls for “civil
society” to support the “moral crusade” against Estrada, “People Power” spelled
the unceremonious and unprecedented end to a Philippine presidency in mid-
term. Having first changed the course of history in 1986, by helping to prevent
Marcos from sanitising his long-term authoritarian rule through a fraudulent
election victory, “People Power” regained circulation as political discourse, no
longer merely part of the repertoire of protest against the conduct and outcome of
elections, but also against an incumbent president whose election by the broad
mass of the Filipino people was established beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Whether “the end justified the means,” as argued by some in the aftermath of
Estrada’s ouster, this turn of events presented a departure from the
constitutionally prescribed procedures for presidential succession. As such, it
also left a set of arguably unfortunate lessons and precedents as far as further
democratization in the Philippines is concerned. As suggested in the pages
above, the post-Marcos period offers a rather mixed picture in terms of new
forms of voter mobilisation and, not least, the effects thereof for shrinking what
has been referred to as the “democratic deficit” in the Philippines (Hutchcroft and
Rocamora 2003). As argued above, underlying changes in the human geography
of voters, the institu- tional framework for elections, and the interests of the
business class have helped to expand the possibilities for new forms of voter
mobilisation in the country. At the same time, such possibilities and the promise
they hold for further democratisation in the Philippines have continued to struggle
against not only the old, familiar politics of clientelism, coercion and capital, but
also against the more recent permutations of certain kinds of wholesale electoral
fraud. While typically associated with progress and change, and, indeed, with
“new citizens-cum-voters”, “People Power,” as an – perhaps all too – familiar
repertoire of protest, may also have emerged as part of the obstacles to further
democratization in the Philippines. As for the new forms of voter mobilisation
themselves, the May 2010 presidential victory of Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III
also signals the limited transformative potential associated with the politics of
“public opinion”. Unsurprisingly, the nature of such change reflects, in key
respects, broader patterns in Philippine politics, as shown above. However, the
limits to the transformative potential of “public opinion” also stem from the very
deployment of polls and surveys, with their formally equalitarian aggregative
logic, and concomitant devaluation of other forms of collective action and
solidarities. “When used as a gauge of ‘public opinion’ [...] polls not only miss the
mark but shift the target,” and, thus, it has been argued, “offer at best a naïve
and narrow view of democracy” (Salmon and Glasser 1995: 449). In the context
of the Philippines, this shifting of the target and narrowing of the view of
democracy first came into its own during the widespread popular mobilisation
surrounding the rise of the first Aquino presidency. With a second Aquino elected
president of the country, “public opinion” may have emerged as social fact in
Philippine politics and society, but for all the countless quality of life surveys and
political polls conducted in the past quarter-century on a pluralistic one-person,
one-vote basis, it is difficult to dismiss the charge levelled by critics that the
practice of polling serves to obscure profound realities of deprivation, poverty,
and social inequality in the country today.

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