Dilawan: Rise and fall of the EDSA regime - Duterte and the Next Wave

            

If Marcos was the logical conclusion of the Old Republic, which was built on a feudal society, where “a few enjoyed the fat of the land, and the many suffered”, then the natural extension of our post-EDSA republic, with its monopolistic capitalist model, is Duterte. The internal contradictions of each society ultimately brought about the conditions for the emergence of these leaders.

The lost opportunity of EDSA was that rather than building a more just and humane society, we simply re-incarnated the old one with the result of entrapping many Filipinos into a life of servitude to the vagaries of the market, as we pursued a neoliberal model of development.

Dilawan: Rise and Fall of the EDSA Regime - Another Aquino

“I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”

Those were the words of Pres. Noynoy Aquino at his valedictory State of the Nation Address to Congress in July of 2015 where he summed up his administration’s achievements and looked forward to “a new dawn of justice and opportunity” forged by “freedom from corruption” as he claimed, and I quote

My one and only interest is the well-being of my Bosses. I did all I could to forge a nation that is more just and more progressive—one that enjoys the fruits of meaningful change. I will let history decide.

And within 12 months of uttering those words, the era of the EDSA regime would draw to a close, with the rejection of Aquino’s hand-picked successor and the election of Rodrigo Duterte, whose approach to criminal justice was anathema to what the regime had stood for.

In this fourth part to the Rise and Fall of the EDSA Regime, we will look at the second Aquino presidency, its ambition, achievements and follies, and while five years is too short a time frame to have gained enough “distance” from those events, we will try to explain what led to the collapse in confidence in the yellow movement, which triggered their losses at the ballot in 2016 and since, and as to why it is unlikely that it will return any time soon. 

Dilawan: Rise and Fall of the EDSA Regime - Vision vs Reality

In this episode we are going to dissect the vision that Ninoy had offered for the Philippines, and delve more  deeply into the early days of the post-EDSA regime to see how this vision was corrupted by the yellow forces.

Dilawan: Rise and Fall of the EDSA Regime - Part 1

PART 1: ORIGIN STORY

From 1986 to 2016, the worldview of the yellow forces in our country dominated the thinking and actions of most Filipinos.

Yellowism or dilawan ideology is a system of moral, political and economic beliefs with normative prescriptions and modalities for regulating and regenerating Philippine society.

It provided a narrative, around which the life of the nation was structured. 

A whole new generation of young Filipinos has been brought up with this belief system.

In 2016, an epoch-making shift took place with the election of Pres. Rody Duterte. To many, this marked the end of the yellow orthodoxy.

In this episode of The Cusp, I’m gonna try to explain what happened. What led to the rise and collapse of the yellow doctrine and the ongoing search for something to replace it.

Videos referred to on the pitfalls of Marcos:
1. Lust for power https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW4vigtWp08
2-3 Greed and hubris https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxdvmHDV9cA
4. Might makes right https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwHLWWGGry8
5. Debt-driven growth strategy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbB3DyfFOVg&t=22s