New beginnings

A gifted, sensitive lady wishes her friends "new beginnings" for the coming year. Nothing could be more appropriate in a nation with far too many beginnings, nearly all of them re-runs historically flawed by the law of any recognizable closure. Nothing gets to be finished and so people start with the same old beginnings over and over again.

It makes no difference whether one speaks of the nation’s economy, polity, ethics or overall culture. An honest explorer of national histories must ruefully conclude that Filipinos – given their fair share of opportunities for development as a nation – have failed in over 100 years to make enough progress as to be able to start truly new and more challenging beginnings. This is the sole reason why despite having initiated many promising developments during this period, the Philippines increasingly fall behind other countries in the region.

The infirmity is easily documented using economic and political data. Per capita incomes, labor productivity, sustained growth rates and other economic indicators generally make for an embarrassing review of a country which at the turn of the century, at the end of the second world war, in the mid-60s and even in the first half of the 90s appeared to be posed for economic takeoff and sustained development.

The first republic in Asia, arguably the first commonwealth, the first to invoke a liberal democratic constitution to initiate a purportedly New Society, the first to activate "people power" to depose a tyrannical regime and also the first to attempt formal impeachment in unseating a ruling president – the Philippines politically records a string of "firsts" that other countries in the region, those with less colorful political histories, at times consider with wonder. Unfortunately, with senescent 2001 turning over his battered sceptre to a youthful 2002, none of the these firsts within the last 103 years had yielded a regime which one can properly call an enduring democratic republic, a New Society where "people power" might be the fundamental tenet of governance but where institutional processes like credible elections and procedurally unflawed public accountability exercise run their full constitutional or legal course. In politics as well as in life generally considered, multiple conceptions attended by convenient abortions hardly produce durable national development.

Ethically and culturally, the documentation is perhaps not as formally organized in proving a thesis of abortive development in the Philippines. Yet, who cannot acknowledge powerful impressions of a deteriorated ethical base, of a "morally damaged culture" increasingly embracing more and more Filipinos?

Mostly everyone wants to be a millionaire – even more so, given the depreciated currency, a billionaire – and mostly everyone cannot care less as regards how one makes his millions or billions in this country. Consequently, Philippine society and its dominant culture esteems anyone who may be among the lowest life forms but whose assets reflect the appropriate number of digits – at least nine and preferably even more before the crucial decimal point – legitimizing his claims to instant respectability and lasting adulation.

What culture is this which mistakes the enactment of laws with lawfulness itself, the presence of so-called agents of the law and law enforcers with law enforcement no less and the election and appointment of glib government authorities with authoritative governance? What kind of culture mistakes mere labels for hard realities, as when people keep harping on Filipinos as the only Christian nation in Asia? A soft culture is one where no effective demand is made for labels to be anchored on demonstrable realities.

A soft culture invariably makes for a soft state and a soft state makes for too many recurring – re-run – beginnings.

In 2002, a whole country benighted for decades has to learn that it cannot be less than serious if it truly wishes itself a Happy New Year! Since most of the people are politically unempowered, the greater responsibility for starting a definitely new, serious beginning must be situated among those who claim to lead this country, those who define political as well as other outcomes in Philippine society. The Macapagal-Arroyo administration’s more serious challenge is not simply jumpstarting an economy in the midst of global recession, nor is its properly most challenging concern working to enhance its chances of political resurgence in 2004.

The singular task of President Macapagal-Arroyo and the other authorities is to convince enough Filipinos about their seriousness in calling for better governance and then actually governing as to effectively exact discipline among the powerful and historically undisciplined elites in this country. By force of exemplary leadership, this administration could then also inspire the general public towards progressively disciplining themselves.

Failing this, no truly new beginnings await this country in 2002 or any other year beyond it. There would be only broken recordings of Christmases and New Years past, hollowly reiterating the nation’s best wishes and – once more for the record – regrettably foregoing its best efforts.

But why would the current political dispensation and the citizenry itself prefer to fail where they could so gloriously, collaboratively succeed? In 2002, this nation could have its glory and enjoy its gain, but there is no way it can be so blessed without suffering its necessary pain.