Presidential candidate Lito Osmena calls it "universal neutrality." Nationalist People's Coalition Chair Danding Cojuangco calls it "political flexibility." The Liberal Party, in campaigning for standard bearers without a senatorial slate, describes their strategy as "focused campaigning."
These new terms appear to illustrate an emerging innovation in Philippine elections. Rather than organizing and negotiating wholesale political deals, these politicians are now essentially bargaining and haggling for retail choices - or piecemeal, relatively easier to trade chips in political wheeling and dealing. Osmena's strategy is to sell only himself and not to support local candidates. Cojuangco enjoined his party-mates to support only the candidate for president. Support for the rest of the slate will depend on their own individual negotiations. The Liberal Party is focusing their campaign only on their standard bearers.
Under the pre-martial law two-party system, elections almost always involved wholesale politics. Whole slates had to be formed, and the dynamics of the contest centered around the elite who brokered, negotiated and traded the deals. Local candidates were limited to choosing between joining either the Liberal or Nacionalista Party. Those who dared run as independents, especially for national positions, were often easily clobbered at the polls. The two major parties dictated the trend. And those who controlled these parties, more accurately described as "political vehicles," determined the access of local politicians to the state.
The structure of politics is characterized by a curious interdependence. During the election season, the president and national parties rely on local leaders to deliver the votes. In between elections, local leaders rely on their national bosses to sustain them with patronage and state resources that would help them keep their political bases intact. Such a system limited the emergence of local leaders to a select few within the elite who had access to the parties.
There appear to have been two climaxes of wholesale politics. First in the 1930s when Quezon was able to consolidate his political leadership and started to advocate a "partyless democracy." And next was during martial law, when a political career meant affiliation with the Marcos superparty Kilusang Bagong Lipunan. The two-party system often led to deadlocks in policy among competing factions of the elite, aside from being perpetually in conflict at the local level. The solution of both Quezon and Marcos was to strengthen the executive even more, and install themselves as all-powerful decision-makers.
The Marcos experience led to the creation of a Constitution that opened the system to the emergence of a multitude of local leaders. The 1987 Constitution provided for a multi-party system, term limitations that call for a periodic change in local leadership, synchronized elections, devolution, and the forthcoming party-list representation. Conditions on the ground also made it impossible to return to the old system of limited local leaders. New social forces have been organized and mobilized, from leftist underground organizations to middle class organizations concerned with a variety of causes.
Changes in technology, education and growing media influence also allow national candidates to campaign directly to the voter, without passing through local leaders who functioned as gatekeepers. The result is retailed politics, where grand political projects like big political machines have ceased from being the guarantee of election victory and continued local dominance.
The retailing of politics goes beyond elections. For instance, the major political projects of both left and right social forces are moving from state-centered approaches to power to local piecemeal engagements. Dictatorship has become passe', giving way to a system of elections which, while often far from being perfect, liberalizes political competition convincingly. Revolution, to overthrow the state is fast being replaced by "civil society" approaches, where no one group controls the agenda and where a myriad of engagements are seen.
The retailing of slates and candidates for national positions has a profound impact on politics at both local and national level. In many provinces, it appears that retailing has turned everyone directly involved in the elections into entrepreneurs trading deals in an open political market. Almost anyone who commands or claims to command some number of votes can haggle and negotiate with national candidates for mutually beneficial arrangements.
Local candidates shop around for national politicians of their choice who can provide campaign financing, a political vehicle, and local allies that can boost their own chances in the local races. The left-wing Akbayan party for instance, is not supporting national candidates. But its local chapters can decide on aligning themselves with presidential or senatorial candidates.
What emerges thus, are complex local configurations. Akbayan's 28 mayoral, 4 congressional and 2 gubernatorial candidates are supporting different national candidates. Some will campaign for presidential candidate Renato De Villa, others for Jose De Venecia, and some for Joseph Estrada. The choice is dictated by the situation of local contests.
Even mainstream traditional parties are similarly situated. The Nationalist People's Coalition is officially aligned with the opposition coalition Laban ng Makabayang Masang Pilipino (LAMMP), which is fielding Joseph Estrada for President, Edgardo Angara for Vice-President and 12 senatorial candidates. But NPC Chair Danding Cojuangco has announced a policy of "political flexibility" by supporting only Estrada. NPCs local leaders thus, which include 20 congressmen and 7 governors, are expected to crisscross party lines in their choice of vice-presidential and senatorial candidates depending on their deals, as long as they keep Estrada on top. Cojuangco explained that he was forced into this arrangement because he does not have the money to pour into the campaign of his local candidates.
Another change directly resulting from the retailing of politics is the increase in direct electoral participation. At least 25,000 elective positions will be up for grabs, from the position of president down to municipal councilor. If an average of ten persons will compete for each position, around 250,000 will be directly involved as candidates, and maybe, another 2.5 million as campaigners of these candidates.
The big number of candidates aspiring for positions has compelled the Commission on Elections to trim down the list of national candidates. For instance, 83 individuals filed certificates of candidacy for the presidency, and hundreds more for the senatorial seats. The Comelec has required these individuals to show proof that they can wage a no-nonsense national campaign. Otherwise they will be declared "nuisance candidates" and weeded out from the list.
Comelec has trimmed down the number of presidential candidates to 11, vice-presidential candidates to 9, and senatorial candidates to 36. In the local races though, the situation is very much different. In many municipalities in the 1995 elections, there were hundreds of candidates competing for 12 municipal councilor seats.
These developments have made big political machines not only superfluous, but have also rendered them useless as guarantees for election victory. In 1992, Ramon Mitra and Danding Cojuangco had the best political machines. In the official tallies, they were beaten by novice politician Miriam Defensor Santiago and the then fledgling Lakas-NUCD party of Fidel V. Ramos. Ramos' victory though, is attributed to the support he received from the central state machinery.
In the 1998 elections, candidate Speaker Jose De Venecia has built Lakas-NUCD into the best-stocked and best-funded machine. But for every one local politician it anoints as official candidate, there are two or three others who may be equally powerful who will be disappointed. The disanointed naturally moves to the other electoral vehicles, or aligns themselves with other national candidates. The only way for De Venecia to keep his machine as powerful as it seems is if he can offer something to placate displaced local leaders. Marcos was able to do that for a time when he had dictatorial powers. He simply created new positions in the bureaucracy, or formed new municipalities and provinces to accommodate displaced local leaders. De Venecia does not have this kind of prerogative.
The question is whether retailing, which has opened the electoral playing field to thousands of competitors, can lead to some kind of liberalization of political competition where power monopolies are slowly phased out of existence. Most analysts agree that political competition in most provinces and municipalities is limited to a powerful few. Political clans continue to dominate electoral contests in the country. And getting the support of these clans was the critical factor in gaining victory in national contests. Thus, election season was a time for political muscle flexing by clans like the Singsons of Ilocos Sur, the Josons of Nueva Ecija, the Osmenas of Cebu or the Dimaporos of Lanao. They are the indispensable local leaders needed by presidential and senatorial candidates.
But post-1986 elections changed the configurations. In the 1987 national elections, Cory Aquino's candidates won overwhelmingly over those associated with the Marcos regime. Many of these clans though, merely realigned themselves with Aquino. In the 1992 elections, Miriam Defensor Santiago almost made it to the presidency without political support from these clans, and without financial support from the usual kingmakers in Philippine politics. It can thus be argued that retailing has indeed liberalized political competition to some extent, but not to the point where electoral contests have become level playing fields. Those who hold huge resources (from legal or illegal means), and those who keep coercive instruments (like private armies) handy, will continue to dominate the field. But they face a changed situation, and many of them are adapting fast to the changing conditions.
A key constitutional provision that liberalizes political competition is the prohibition on local candidates to run for a fourth consecutive term. Eighty-three incumbent representatives, 26 governors and hundreds of local mayors can not run for reelection in May 1998. But already, this political elite have found many ways of keeping themselves in power.
In many areas, proxy candidates have been fielded to hold the seat until the incumbent can run again in 2001. Some, like Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay, Oriental Mindoro representative Jesus Punzalan, and Tarlac representative Jose Cojuangco are fielding their respective wives. Others, like representatives Rodolfo Albano of Isabela and Benjamin Bautista of Davao del Sur, are fielding their children to take over their seats.
In some areas, a rigodon of local officials will be seen. The congressman runs for governor, the governor runs for representative, the mayor runs for the provincial board, and so on. Some local politicians have prepared early to sidestep their term limits by reclassifying or redistricting political boundaries. Since 1987, Congress has changed many municipalities into cities, reapportioned legislative districts, and created new provinces and municipalities. For instance:
It appears thus that while the situation has generally liberalized political competition, progressive groups still need to engage and confront the political elite in local contests. Without this challenge, the elite would merely recycle themselves and end up holding local power and maintaining themselves as the indispensable middlemen that keep the political base intact for national politicians.
Another key feature of the changing political conditions is the entry of new and increasingly powerful players into the political arena. These players come from both the upper and lower end of the economic strata.
One group of "new players" are the fund managers - highly-skilled, highly-trained, well-placed and well-funded professionals who advise investors where money should be sunk in or bailed out. Their pronouncements are often quoted in the papers and their prognoses about the economy are taken as the final word. Their clients are multi-billion investors who make national boundaries superfluous, and they become the eyes and ears on the ground who scout for profits and raise warnings at the first sign of trouble. In the age of liberalized financial systems and mobile capital, fund managers handle the task of making money out of money for those who have money. The rich can just sit back and enjoy their affluence, while the fund managers do the dirty work of scanning the environment, cross-checking investment opportunities and preparing for threats.
During election season, fund managers are transformed from being movers of capital to movers of political power as well. The advise they provide to their clients can make or break candidates. Their vote of confidence in candidates can spell boom or doom. In the 1992 elections for instance, fund managers studied and analyzed the presidential candidates up close, knowing that investment opportunities in the country are tied to the economic philosophy and program of the incoming president. The head of research of a Hongkong-based securities group summarized the advise they gave then to clients: "If Fidel Ramos wins, buy (into the Philippine market); if Miriam Santiago wins, hold (your money); if Danding Cojuangco wins, sell (whatever interests you have in the Philippine market)." Ramos, the market reformer won, while Danding Cojuangco, the protectionist, was repudiated in the polls. Since then, the Philippine economy has been placed on a track that is in conformity with the economic philosphies and programs of the movers of capital.
Fund managers have since been very much alive and active in the Philippines. There are the ratings agencies like Moody's and Standard and Poors. Before them, there was Business International and the Salomon Brothers. There are also groups like Merill-Lynch, Jardine Davies and the James Capel Securities of the Hongkong-Shanghai Banking Corporation.
Some have openly advocated political initiatives, like SocGen Crosby UBP Securities which suggested that President Fidel Ramos run for vice-president in 1998. The firm estimates that having Ramos as a running mate would greatly raise the chances of any presidential candidate and would allay investors' fears that the next president might not be able to sustain the economic reforms Ramos has started.
The latent power of fund managers is seen in their relationship with presidential candidate Joesph Estrada. Many fund managers are known to generally fear a Joseph Estrada presidency because of the possibility that the popular actor-politician might reverse what Ramos has started. Last year, UBS's Corazon Guidote was reported to have said that businessmen remain apprehensive on Estrada's ability to handle sensitive economic issues. Estrada dismissed the fund managers, saying that, "Their opinions are important, but they don't have the numbers." But recent moves by Estrada show that he has prioritized winning them over to his side.
Estrada knows that if he doesn't get the vote of the fund managers, he may win the 1998 race only to be saddled by serious economic problems. The Philippines' recent growth has been based largely on portfolio investments - capital which may leave the country if the fund managers are not confident enough. Thus, Estrada has pitched himself to this powerful bloc by building a core of respected economists as advisers. Last June, he spoke before a forum of fund managers and investors in Hongkong. Similar fora will be held by other fund managers to size up the candidates and allow face-to-face meetings between their clients and presidential aspirants.
Banker Antonio Gatmaitan described fund managers as whiz kids who are relatively young (between 25 and 45 years old), results-driven, performance-oriented professionals who trained in economics and business but are skilled and adept in politics. "There are about 300 of them based in Makati now," continues Gatmaitan, "and they constitute a strong force that will demand the modernization of politics. These are individuals who will demand economic competence and managerial abilities from the country's next set of leaders."
The fund managers are now looking beyond the 1998 presidential elections. Their perceptions will definitely reverberate and make their influence felt throughout the entire structure of Philippine politics.
On the opposite end of the spectrum we find another group of new players. Their influence is generally limited to the local political arena and is less obvious, although arguably not necessarily less important in delineating the new face of Philippine politics.
During the Marcos and Aquino years, local communities in many areas of the country saw the emergence of new local leaders, often supplementing or even substituting those placed there as middlemen for the regional 'bigshots'. A weakening rural state apparatus, absenteeism, and the mobilization and organization of the community by the Church, NGOs and generally the left, shaped and enhanced the role of these new leaders. Rather than having reverted to their former positions of powerlessness, these organizers and leaders have often been able to maintain much of the authority and respect they had previously gained.
Elite politicians, seeking to return back 'to business as usual' now find themselves confronted with a new political landscape, especially on the local level, that now importantly includes these new leaders, as well as their communities, as possible contenders or at least as distinct voices of dissent.
There seems to be another contributing factor in reshaping Philippine politics, one which involve changes in the identities of key players. Even these can be described in terms of "retailization". Evidence of such changes can be found not only among those on the left and right of the political spectrum, but also among the voters in general. For instance, there is talk within the left today of "post-bloc politics," where ideological differences are minimized in importance for purposes of building broader political unity.
After a period of assessment, groups and NGOs on the left are coming together, not in the blocs that dominated in the past, but in alliances that are goal- rather than ideologially- oriented. Putting these 'post-bloc politics' into practice, a number of groups on the left have banded together to launch a political project intended to reassert the essentials of democracy. They have organized the Akbayan Citizens Action Party. Akbayan is a curious mix of former guerillas, academics, trade unionists, social democrats, peasant leaders, popdems and professionals, who, somehow, have closed ranks to reshape politics in (and from) the left.
Akbayan is still, basically, a party organized solely for electoral purposes. But the organizers are open to the idea that it will transform into a real party that provides responsible political leadership, complemented by different "civil society" organizations that have come to support it. Akbayan intends not only to challenge and confront the political elite in local contests, but also to prove that they can provide competent local leadership capable of redistributing wealth and power.
Akbayan's organizing starts from the ground by initially fielding only local candidates in the 1998 elections. Many of these local candidates will even have to join the other larger mainstream parties to gain support for their electoral bids. Some of its members have already won as mayors and municipal councilors. From these small victories, it intends to build itself into a credible national party in subsequent elections.
Identities in the mainstream political parties have changed as well. The diversification of the party landscape has inevitably changed alliances. Confronted with new allies and opponents, both within and outside the party arena, politicians are less able to present and maintain simple "us-against-the-rest" identities and platforms. The appearance of the new players has forced them to adopt not only a new vocabulary that is often borrowed (or appropriated) from the left, they have had to concurrently change their sense of self. It has become harder to see themselves as "patron" or "benefactor" or even as the "big boss who knows it all".
Voters identities are likewise changing. Two factors can be attributed with major importance in this respect: the greater integration of ordinary individuals into the state and nation-at-large, and the above-mentioned appearance of the new players in the political field, especially those originating from or purposely addressing the lower and middle strata. Especially in far-flung rural communities, the state was seen before as an alien, distant institution. Individuals got their security from their families or immediate community, not from institutions of the state. Under such conditions, it was easy for powerful local elite politicians to emerge, leaders who, come election time, can -via their middlemen - guarantee the votes of the community. The situation today has changed significantly. Family heads often find it difficult to influence even their own immediate family's voting behavior.
The greater penetration of both the state and the media into the countryside not only replaces (to a certain degree) former security and negotiating networks, but also reshapes local identities.
Furthermore, the continued and growing presence of leaders stemming from the community who had gained respect and loyalty during the Marcos and Aquino years, be it as guerilla, peasant or trade union organizer, is sure to change perceptions of both "authority" and the capabilities of the "karaniwang tao".
Changes in identities such as these reshape the imaginary political boundaries that define and divide groups. They are certain to have an important effect on the political structures in the Philippines in future years.
The year 1998 may thus have a far greater significance than being just an election and centennial year for the Philippines. Serious changes in the political environment may take place which, in one way or another, may permanently re-shape the conduct of Philippine politics.
The structures, laws and institutions of elections have changed, paving the way for retail politics to take root. Voting behaviors are evolving, along with traditions the country has grown up with. Campaigning has become a highly technical, and therefore an even more expensive enterprise. Technology, media and information is fast replacing the political machine as the competitive edge in the winner-take-all contest of elections. New, potentially more powerful players are stepping into the picture.
It is still too early to say if these changes will usher a new period of democratization or a still unchartered terrain where mobile capital lords over the slowly-withering nation-state. It is also not yet clear if the new players in the political field will be the anti-thesis of the traditional politician. But what is clear though is that in 1998, the written and unwritten rules of the contest for political power have become starkly different from what the country has seen in the past.
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