chapter 8 (pos102)

• Martial Law


  Suspension of normal civil liberties and rule of law, with the military taking control of the government
• Constitutional Authoritarianism


  A form of authoritarian rule that claims to be based on and justified by the constitution
• Marcos Administration


  The rule of Ferdinand E. Marcos as President of the Philippines from 1965 to 1986
• Marcos declared martial law


  September 21, 1972
• EDSA People Power Revolution (EDSA 1) overthrew Marcos

  February 1986
• Marcos described his rule as constitutional authoritarianism while critics and oppositionists dubbed his rule as a dictatorship
• The fourteen years of the Marcos regime marked a highly crucial period in Philippine political history, democracy, and development
• Marcos consolidated and exercised the executive powers of the 1935 Philippine Constitution and the 1973 Constitution with corresponding amendments in 1976 and 1981
• Marcos ruled the Philippines by his executive orders and presidential decrees
• In 1981, Marcos lifted martial law and proclaimed the New Society but the dynamics of his political rule epitomized not only a dominant executive but a dictator who encroached on democratic institutions the legislature "judiciary "bureaucracy, military-and who caused the plunder of the economy disguised in the rhetoric of development
• The 1986 People Power Revolution ended the Marcos period and started the process of democratic restoration in the Philippines with a new constitution drafted in 1986 and ratified in 1987
• The effects of the Marcos era on Philippine democracy and development are salient elements in the analysis of the Philippine executive
• The analysis of the Philippine executive during the Marcos era from 1972-1986 must necessarily encompass a complexity of variables
• The chapter demonstrates the interactive confluence of various factors that account for the dominant executive-Marcos as dictator
• Marcos himself provided the human agency by his leadership style, personal motivations, skills and competencies that takes much of political analysis to explain his imposition of Martial Law, his control of political forces, and his strategic maneuvers to amass personal wealth
• The constitution, with its stipulations on the system of government and executive powers, sets the framework for empirical analysis of executive behavior
• Constitution making during the Marcos regime was influenced by those who sought to hold power or who held power at the time
• Even the constitutional and institutional analysis of executive powers must necessarily traverse the behavioral analysis of Marcos as the main individual political actor
• Marcos's preferences, influences, and control encroached on constitution making and configured the powers, structure, and functions of government
• The underlying factors of the Philippine economy, social system, and political culture, and related to these the dynamics of political elites and the masses, the rightist and leftist ideological groups, even the Muslim separatist groups, constitute the wide political screen in which to locate Marcos's political behavior
• The Marcos era was set in a global backdrop of ideological ferment between democracy and communism, the politics of the US, USSR and China; and the concerns about Third World economic, social, and political development in Asia, Africa, and Latin America
• Marcos's political career began when he became technical assistant to President Manuel Roxas and member of the Philippine Veterans Commission
• Marcos topped the senatorial elections in 1959 and distinguished himself; then he became Senate president while Macapagal was president
• Marcos jumped to the Nacionalista Party when it became certain that the Liberal Party would support Macapagal's reelection bid
• Marcos's marriage to Imelda Romualdez Marcos at the time he was congressman (1954) was politically opportune in his climb to the presidency
• Marcos achieved a feat no other president had done before, but reportedly by irregular means, to secure his victory for a second term in 1969
• Marcos's bold statement at his first inaugural address was "This nation can be great again", and was the theme of the political promises that boosted his electoral victory for his first presidential term in 1965
• The second term was hard won by all possible tactics; the elections reportedly attended by mass vote buying, use of government resources, intimidation, terrorism, and fraud
• Marcos launched programs for agricultural productivity, infrastructure, community development, and attempted to streamline the bureaucracy in his first term
• By the second term, Philippine politics had become intense with social discontent articulated through mass actions, demonstrations, and street rallies
• Student activism was on the rise and the demonstrations at Malacañang on January 30, 1970, and at Congress on February 3, 1970, caused the Senate to create an investigating committee
• The core issues identified by the Senate committee and decried by mobilized groups included the economic crisis, unemployment, devaluation, government extravagance, and high prices of commodities
• There was opposition to Marcos's government policies, to graft and corruption in government, and ideological ferment evidenced by the rise of left-leaning groups and communist insurgency
• The August 21, 1971, bombing at the Liberal Party proclamation rally held in Plaza Miranda causing death and injury had shaken the nation
• The victory of opposition candidates in the 1971 elections signaled the challenge to Marcos
• Invoking the 1935 Constitution's provisions on martial law (Article 6, Section 10), Marcos finally signed Proclamation 1081 on September 21,1972, but which was publicly announced and executed on September 22, 1972
• In his writings, Marcos offered his perceptions and analysis of the Philippine political situations that propelled him to declare martial law and to rule in what he called the New Society
• Marcos proposed a "revolution from the center" as a peaceful way to engage in deep and far-ranging changes in the country, claiming such political framework and regime to be constitutional
• Marcos argued that the people gave consent by ratifying the constitution with such provisions on martial law, and presented his political regime as democratic, with the imposition of Martial Law as inherent in any democracy for its protection
• Marcos rationalized that given the dangers from communism, the liberal approach to rebellion had become imprudent, and that the rightist conspiracy and the communist rebellion had almost succeeded in rendering the government impotent