When talking about Philippine Administrative System, first thing that comes to mind is about the government and its political divisions in the country. It is about the nations’s political hierarchy such as the central government, provinces, municipalities and barangay. However, these divisions and subdivisions can be attributed to our past history. It is not a plant that simply blooms from nowhere. The Philippine Administrative System is dynamic, shaped and evolved through time.
From Spanish colonial period to the present administration, the mode of bureacracy is adopted, patterned and improved depending on the needs and wants of the administration.
Needs, in terms of the welfare of the society. Wants, in terms of what do the current administration wanted, personally, for his society. We already learned our history from the first time we set our feet in the school. We learned that we were colonized for over 300 years by the Spaniards and that our heroes fought for a long time just to bring back our freedom.
After 1896, we had a short-lived independence before we were colonized by the Americans.
The Philippines was colonized indirectly as opposed to the direct control of Spaniards during the Spanish period. Americans had its strategies to control us. They allowed the Filipinos to oversee the government with their help without us knowing that they still controlled us. Then, we had our independence in 1946 which was the start of what we can be called Filipino independence. Filipinos started to spearhead and governed our country.
Past Philippine presidents had their own way of governance though they are still embracing the American’s bureacracy.
Those things were learned and studied however, more indepth realization regarding the administration was not discussed. Upon reading modules 1-3, I am enlightened that the Philippines Administrative System is not only about learning our history and strengtening our sense of nationalism but it also understanding the notions behind our administrative system. It is about the how’s and why’s unlike the what, where and who concepts back in our elementary days. It allows us to distinguish and differentiate the past from the present enabling us to apply for the betterment of the future administrative systems.
These modules put emphasis on the organization, planning, implementation in a bureacratic form of government and indepth meaning of national identity and national consciousness. National identity is the sense of belonging to the country. It can strengthen the nation through tough times. However, the Philippine Administrative System lacks its own identity. We only let a group of people to control us. According to Prof. Felipe M. De Leon, Jr. (2011), a small elite minority has always governed our country and controlled our economy and resources that resulted to to a mutual distrust and hostility between the elite-led government and the people.
A good examples is the traditional politicians, also know as “trapo”, because most of them belong to the elite class. Elite theory explains that the economic elite holds the most power in public policy making. Filipino masses do not have the connection with the government. The elite class is the ruler while the other variable is the masses who are the one being ruled. Elites cannot simply identify the needs of the masses if they will not go down to the norms of the masses. This only shows that colonial mentality is still in our roots. Colonial mentality can destroy our national identity. It only proves that we are still in a captive state.
Captive by the elite class. Even the elite performs their duties and responsibilties, without connection to the masses, Filipinos do not feel that they belong in the society. Thus, national identity cannot be certainly identified. National consciousness started the during the Spanish period when the GOMBURZA was executed in 1872. Filipinos started to realize that they were just on same boat and they should be treated fairly. Unity of the people led the independence of the nation. Unity of elite and masses resulted to the Philippine independence in 1896 as well as freedom from authoritarian rule in 1986 EDSA revolution.
The abovementioned national identity can be attributed to the unity of the elites and the masses since they only have one goal and that is freedom. According to Fartz Fanon (1961), national consciousness should embrace the innermost hopes of the whole people. Hence, it is only compared to any case of an empty shell. An idea of what it might have been. It is considered as traditional weakness which is present in most under-developed country. It cannot only be attributed to the result of the colonization period but also to the intellectual laziness of the nation.
Ignorance and lack of information can be a good example. History teaches us to appreciate the past and learned from them. However, it was ignored and the process of enlightenment was not revealed. Spaniards and Americans ruled us through bureacracy thereby bureaucratic form of government was instilled in the minds of the Filipinos. Centralization connotes bureacracy. Centralization, as stated in various readings about the administrative system, started during the Spanish period. There is a need for the Spaniards to centralize the country for the purpose of consolidation of their power.
Only the governors-general had the political authority to rule the nation. During the post-colonial period, several bureacratic reforms were implemented however, most of it failed or not implemented as planned. One of the reforms was the decentralization. Decentralization per se is the process of dispersing the decision making in a nation. Considering that the Philippines is an archipelago, decentralization is the strongest form of linkage and coordination between regions and provinces. I remember during one of the debates I had in college. It is about the reasons why the Philippines is lagging behind in terms of economy.
Our group’s strongest claim is that Philippines is composed of 1,700 islands. Having 1,700 leaders and let them communicate for the benefit of the whole country is difficult. Our country needs one leader to oversee and spearhead the whatabouts of the government. At present, the president assigns who will be the Cabinet members and the society will elect the president up to the lowest rank in each municipality. The issue of centralization is shaped at the time of crisis. Centralization can benefit the nation if the issue of corruption is not injected in the minds of the Filipino people.
Corruption also started during the Spanish era. Spaniards used their political powers for their personal advantage. It plagued the minds of the Filipino that power through politics can bring them wealth and fame. The Emilio Aguinaldo-and-Andres Bonifacio issue can be addressed as non-sense politics which led to corruption. Though I am not aware of the Aguinaldo-Bonifacio set-up and I only rely on the written history, the issue can be attributed as political intrigue which causes the ravage and destroy of society. Politics can take advantage the situation and exploit the system.
Corruption, as the state of mind, is inherited until now. Nepotism is a form of corruption and is present in some of the government and private offices. Nepotism can be attributed to close bonds of the Fiilipino families. Political cronies during the authoritarian regime of former Pres. Marcos can be clearly viewed as nepotism. Though, nepotism is prohibited by law and still government offices tolerate it. Millenniums have past and corruption is still alive in the minds of the people thus, it will be difficult to eradicate in our minds that not all political leaders are corrupt.
Another thing that we inherited from the colonized system is the invisible power of the church. During the Spanish period, Catholic Church through Spanish friars influenced the Filipinos. It was only in the later part of the Spanish colonial period that Filipinos began to contravene the “words of God”. From the Spanish era, let us jump to 1986 EDSA Revolution. Cardinal Jaime Sin was one of the leaders who brought EDSA I possible. He was also one of the responsible leaders to make EDSA II possible. At present, church intervenes with the on-goings in the political system.
Iglesia ni Cristo, for example, announces who will they support in the upcoming election. The famous Reproductive Health Bill cannot be endorsed to become a law because most people, especially, the Catholic Church is opposed to the passing of the bill. Separation of the church and the state is as old as the Public Administration discipline. However, until now, it can be difficult to isolate one from another since freedom of expression is widely spread in the country. The abovementioned areas of concerns also occur around the globe and in all historical eras.
Those were only adopted, structured and instutionalized. Therefore, Philippines can be viewed as weak form of post-colonized state since we keep on embracing the injected colonizers’ culture and bureacratic form. We are the product of our own history however, we keep on reorganizing the adopted ideas and yet we cannot polish the flaws in our nation. Corruption is still rampant. Elite still dominates the country. Church still mingles with the political issues. The relevance of history was not absorbed.
The present generation should not repeat the mistakes and that the future generations should be freed from the bondage of colonial mentality. The sense of nationalism is still weak. What we were before is what we are at present. As George Santayana said: “Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do not remember their past are condemned to repeat their mistakes. Those who do not read history are doomed to repeat it. Those who fail to learn from the mistakes of their predecessors are destined to repeat them. Those who do not know history’s mistakes are doomed to repeat them. ”
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