Episode 24: Yellow Alert: Why democratic forces have fallen out of favour in the Philippines (and how they can win it back)

It’s important at the start of the program to define key terms. I’d like to do this, by way of question and answer, so...

Duterte's Social Contract comes from Thomas Hobbes

This May a political milestone will be reached without anyone noticing. It will be twenty one years since Erap Estrada’s election as president. He won with the largest plurality ever attained up until then, using a populist slogan, “Erap para sa mahirap” (Erap for the poor).

Estrada’s presidency was brief, cut short by his own doing. Had it continued, Erap would have designated Fernando Poe, Jr (FPJ) to succeed him. Both were dispatched by the iron lady Gloria Arroyo who toppled Erap and out-maneuvered FPJ in a subsequent election.

Despite his brief stint as president, one lasting legacy of Erap is the present disdain for civil society. If his rise was fuelled by a populism, exploiting class resentments, his fall was marked by a response equally resentful of elite condescension toward those whose values are deemed primitive.

Fast-forward twenty years and we are ruled by another populist in Rodrigo Duterte who has revived the culture wars stoked in Erap’s wake.

This war is directed at those who claim to uphold democratic values, but undermine duly elected officials whose views run counter to theirs. Support comes from large swathes of our population who support his illiberal governance style.

An illiberal democracy is a state where free elections determine who rules, but where democratic mandates are used to violate constitutional rights of certain citizens, normally belonging to minority, ethnic groups. In the Philippines, the focus has been on suspected drug offenders.

Anyone who presses for the protection of their civil rights is tarred with the same brush, treated as an enemy of the state.

Duterte’s electoral victory is used to justify a deadly anti-narcotics operation nationwide. This has resulted in thousands of deaths, under questionable circumstances, according to human rights advocates.

Duterte and his followers have adopted a Hobbesian view where citizens enter a social contract for mutual preservation. In exchange for sacrifices made by citizens, like paying taxes and surrendering some freedoms, rulers establish order, using the terror of violence to punish those who trespass the rights of others within the community.

Post-EDSA administrations prior to Duterte seemed unable to uphold this part of the bargain. This is why voters saw it fit to throw out of office the so-called “yellow forces” for paying too much respect to civil liberties, not enough to establishing civic responsibilities.

Extrajudicial killings (EJK) carried out in full view are not meant to render justice. They are purposefully done to provide irrefutable proof that the ruler is performing his end of the deal. That is why Duterte has publicly owned up to the “sin” of EJKs.

This isn’t Erap’s populism anchored on class antagonism. It harks back to a pre-Enlightenment era where the legitimacy of rulers was based on their ability to preserve the peace.

The opposition may harp on about his dictatorial tendencies to de-legitimize him. But, majority of Filipinos, as indicated in opinion polls disagree with his methods, but see them as necessary. Those who oppose Duterte will have to provide viable alternatives.

That means demonstrating somewhere that liberal governments can protect communities from social ills. This is why Duterte’s labeling of Naga a haven for drugs needs to be addressed by the Liberal Party led by Vice President Leni Robredo who hails from there.

The tag “coddler of drug lords” sticks in a post-facts world. Robredo who showed an openness to the Portuguese model of decriminalizing drug use to deal with addiction, has not effectively laid out a solid case for it.

Her “Ahon Laylayan Koalisyon” (Rise up from the fringes coalition) isn’t creating a bandwagon effect like “Jeep ni Erap” (Erap’s Jeep). Other Liberals like Senator Bam Aquino seem more interested in taking pot shots at Duterte’s tax reforms. Bam, who previously banked on his “aquino-ness”, now suffers a drag in the polls due to that association.

Until the opposition addresses its law and order deficit, none of its appeals to economic populism will cut through. This is a war fought on cultural grounds. It will have to win the argument on Duterte’s turf, before it can regain legitimacy in people’s eyes to be entrusted with the reins of power again.

Corrupt Yet So Popular

It is quite surprising a phenomenon to witness how that in many countries around the world corrupt leaders often retain public support.

In a recent poll conducted in the Philippines, the late fromer president Corazon Aquino was rated highest by her countrymen among their most loved political leaders (no surprise there), but the man she toppled in a bloodless revolution, Ferdinand Marcos ranked second.

Following in fourth place was the actor turned politician former president Joseph Estrada who was ousted and convicted for his involvement in illegal racketeering. The latter two figured in the top ten most corrupt leaders of the world compiled by the corruption watchdog Transparency International.

The man who topped that list, Mr Suharto, the late former dictator of Indonesia is still widely held in good esteem by his countrymen despite what current media reports suggest about the successful drive against corruption there. What makes these crooked leaders so well-loved among their poor countrymen long after their demise? Is it their charisma? Perhaps. Is it a sense of nostalgia? For what? Is there something that these corrupt leaders attend to quite effectively that honest leaders fail to do?

The answer to that last question is most definitely a yes. What they do is support a system of clientelism to enough of their constituents so that in their eyes, the means through which such patronage is dispensed becomes irrelevant in a country where governments fail to provide an adequate level of support to their populace.

The phenomenon is in no way limited to developing countries. In an advanced economy such as Italy where people still prefer to contract with each other based on personal ties rather than through impersonal markets, their current prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who has been hit by sex and corruption scandals, seems to retain wide popular support.

It took the global recession for the long-dominant ruling party of Japan to be booted out in last year's election. The new government vowed to take down the all-powerful triad led by the civil service along with members of the political and business elite who in the past have so successfully colluded to steer the economy in the right direction, but whose complacency was now holding the country back, so it claimed.

Even in countries where impersonal contracting has taken over as a result of a strong judicial system and where governments are adequately resourced, political parties are often found to engage in unsavoury practices. In Illinois for instance, the former governor tried to sell the vacated senate seat of President Barack Obama. One can find instances of such wheeling and dealing in local politics perhaps where such personalistic contracting can still be performed.

A recent Gallup poll in the US found trust in government to be at a low. Ever since the Vietnam War and Watergate scandal that toppled President Nixon, the trust rating has gone down from the previous highs registered since the “New Deal” era of President Franklin Roosevelt.

Many attribute this low rating to the gridlock and extreme partisanship that goes on in Washington. Yet despite these sentiments, polarising and highly partisan figures such as former Alaskan governor and vice presidential contender Sarah Palin retain immense popularity. This is probably due to the fact that they are able to connect with their party base by delivering the “red meat” in terms of policy prescriptions.

In other words, in Western democracies, instances of patron-client relations involving the exchange of tangible goods can still be found within governments and political parties, but it is replaced by and large with principle-based policy back-scratching that appeals to the lowest common denominator among their most loyal constituents.