The Duterte crowd is everywhere

It brings to an end a debate provoked by Malcolm Gladwell when he wrote in New Yorker that revolutions could not be facebooked or twitted. I think that to him revolutions come from real life relationships – friends and relatives – all connected somehow not by printed word alone through postings.

I was ready to accept his theory because in the Philippines separated by more than a thousand islands it was next to impossible to create a huge physical crowd. That is what made Edsa exceptional. Even if there were less than a million that gathered to support the rebels in military camps headed by Fidel Ramos and Juan Ponce Enrile, it was a big crowd.

In those days, Edsa was the template for peaceful revolution. But it would not last long. Reformist Filipinos soon realized they had been duped and that they risked life and limb for one group of oligarchs for another. Corruption was back and worse. Unity was more elusive than ever with the oligarchy ruling the roost. Reformists became aware that something more lasting than massing a crowd was needed – constitutional change that would give us new politics and government.

In time, a new form of protest appeared, of all places in cold Iceland, that did well for a time in international banking. It was the darling of bankers out for the big bucks until recession broke out in 2008. As Icelanders told it, the elite and incumbent government were at a loss on what to do until a group of citizen reformers decided it was time to get involved.

Iceland is small and has a politically literate population. They called their movement crowdsourcing. They would bring in as many people representing diverse sectors of the community.

In Iceland, the first step was to organize a panel of experts (about 50) that would cull suggestions from the crowd. That’s how it came to be known as ‘crowdsourcing.’ Iceland would crowd source for a new Constitution. It was a combination of both real crowdsourcing and the use of the Internet for a political revolution. When its citizens decided to unite to challenge solutions from the bankers and government leaders, Iceland became a template for countries big and small on how to change government and reform through constitutional change. But in the Philippines?  It seemed impossible.

I knew nothing about Iceland. When social activism  first began there, we saw pictures of its citizens seated around bonfires in the streets where they talked about what they could do together to help survive the crisis.

I was into constitutional change for many years, fighting for it through several administrations but at the time I thought this could only be done through the usual means – either by constitutional assembly, that is, by Congress, a constitutional convention dominated by politicians, their relatives and friends, or by people’s initiative through a percentage of signatures.

So I had no listeners who cared to understand crowdsourcing using the modern tools of communication. To them, crowdsourcing with a hundred million people was not possible in a country with a political system that had been set for decades for the few. It was a strange word that had nothing to do with the Philippines.

I joined other groups and tried to explain the concept. It was about the few and the many. The few had the monopoly of resources while the many ate the crumbs that fell from their tables.

Friends and enemies wanted to stick to people’s initiative through which they would gather a percentage of signatures and force constitutional reform on a Congress dominated by the few.

In hindsight, the groups who tried this route learned the precious lesson that it was a trick – the sovereign people would never be allowed to change the oligarch-designed and authored 1987 Constitution. We had tried before with no success. It was then that I thought of doing what was done in Iceland in the Philippines. Why not gather the people together who would suggest and propose the changes needed?

That was when I read Malcolm Gladwell’s Small Change in the New Yorker that said “a revolution cannot be tweeted.” He cited the Million March and the unforgettable speech of Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream.’ The problem was we had no Martin Luther King in the Philippines.

To me that was the challenge. We did not have the crowds and no Martin Luther King around whom to organize.

Gladwell used the Million March from Alabama to Washington for his argument. He said the people came together because there were physical connections between them.

It happened so quickly they didn’t have time for political theories. The political theorist Michael Walzer wrote in Dissent, “The answer was always the same: It was like a fever. Everyone wanted to go.”

A Martin Luther King did not appear in our midst but a Heneral Luna did – Rodrigo Duterte.  He may not be as eloquent as Martin Luther but he could communicate to the crowds – the masses hungry for change – in the language of Heneral Luna. It became a fever. Wherever Duterte went, he was received with fervor and enthusiasm, with screams and clenched fists, signaling they were ready to fight for him.

I am writing this column from a Facebook posting that said “The presidency of the Philippines will be won in social media.”

Like any mass movement we do not know the formula of how and why it works. That was what Malcolm Gladwell missed. It is like a fever. So was the Duterte campaign. It became a fever and many caught it in towns and cities in most parts of the country.

The traditional politicians cannot overcome this fever. Friends of Duterte groups are spreading out over Facebook and Twitter, liking and sharing Duterte stuff.  These are crucial because it makes Duterte omnipresent to at least a third of the 100 million Filipinos who are connected by Internet everyday and every hour.

The posting in Facebook says, “Keep SHARING Duterte stuffs!” With the fever present online, it spills out outside social media into the real physical world.

Today, as the popularity and satisfaction ratings of Noynoy Aquino continue to fall with the Mamasapano massacre, the neglect of Yolanda victims, the PDAF and DAP pork declared unconstitutional, the Duterte crowds grow ever larger. All other candidates that connect to the Liberal Party or Noynoy Aquino are shunned or rejected. Instead Filipinos stream to the Duterte rallies all over the country. But pictures and videos of his huge crowds are not shown by mainstream media nor get television coverage.

Duterte was alone on stage…with his crowd. That is crowdsourcing Philippine style. The people have spoken through the Duterte crowds and it is clear whom they want as president.