There’s nothing really wrong with traditional politics. That is, if by “traditional” we mean politics shaped by the indigenous culture and honed by centuries of usage.

It is unfortunate that the word trapo has come to denote anything associated with past ways of doing politics. It is implied, for one thing, that the “modern” way is necessarily superior. Also, that those politicians who somehow connect with the masses by making use of traditional values like utang na loob and Kamag-anak Inc. are always dead wrong and have nothing to teach us about doing politics rightly. 

It is true of course that there is something wrong with an electoral process that tends to eliminate the best and the brightest and leaves us with corruptible clowns. It is as well disgusting the way our values are manipulated and put to wrong uses, like a politician who builds a network of support and enduring loyalties by a beguiling mix of showbiz charm and patronage.

Must Read

The Philippine Senate: From statesmen to showmen

It is worth noting, however, that a number of the features of what has come to be called “traditional politics” derive their force precisely from being rooted in ancient values. The preference for personality and not platform, utang na loob as a form of emotional banking through the subtle use of favors, the complex web of loyalties resulting from our sense of family and connectedness – all these are basic culture themes expressed in political terms.

Traditional politics is powerful precisely because as a system, it has some culture-fit with the cherished values of our people. Unfortunately, it is the unscrupulous politician who knows how to exploit these values. Those schooled in Western systems tend to devalue these, seeing them as problematic, or worse, hindrances to a really progressive political practice.

Anthropologically speaking, there are no wrong values. Values become such because through time, they have served some useful function deemed important by a people. Take our propensity for extending our network of personal relationships. The intricate, interlocking alliances made possible by our Kamag-Anak Inc. and padrino system may seem, at first glance, to be merely a convenient way of expanding a political base. But this, at bottom, is based on a primal instinct in the culture, a passion for connectedness that seeks and delights in discovering commonalities and ties.

Have you ever wondered, for instance, why we have this habit of asking, upon first acquaintance, questions that may seem too personal and even impertinent? We ask where one lives, what province, does one know so and so who comes from the same place, and by the time we are through we have found some common tie that allows us to proceed further, firming up some form of relationship no matter how unlikely or distant.

This kind of attention to personal detail, technically known as “contexting,” is important in a culture that sees people not merely as individuals but as inextricably tied up within a larger context of relationships. 

The Filipino sense of self has been defined as a large pan of multiple fried eggs. While the yolks are fairly distinct, the egg whites are so tied up together that you do not know where one egg begins and ends. Our sense of connectedness is such that even our identity is shared. To be able to place people, to define who they are, we do not merely look at their immediate context or professional profile but probe into their personal geography and the whole landscape of their social history. 

The phenomenon of Kamag-anak Inc. seems to me to be an extension of this sense of family and relatedness. When the disgraced president Joseph Estrada made that famous inaugural speech about “walang kamag-anak, walang kaibigan,” I thought that he was dreaming. While it was nice to hear, there was not a whiff of reality behind it. This is a culture where such central structures as governance and family life interconnect and flow into each other seamlessly. 

Sure enough, it did not take long before this became evident, and quite shamelessly. Not only were we virtually ruled by a “conjugal dictatorship” or a “midnight Cabinet” of drunken cronies. We are treated to a tasteless show of power by ambitious wives, daughters and mistresses, pairs of siblings and a mother-son tandem in the Senate, and a Congress that cannot be moved to enact an enabling law against political dynasties, for the simple reason that it is packed full of such dynasties.

Our cultural realities tell us that kinship cannot altogether be ruled out of politics. We do not live in a society of atomized individuals, like Western people whose sense of self has been described as that of a hard-boiled egg, quite separate and isolated and encased in a hard shell to boot. 

We live in a country where abstract formal systems like democratic processes are constantly subject to informal pressures, particularly the kind coming from the pull of our relational ties. We all know that in practice our politics is a family affair, a complex exchange of favors and patronage through porous boundaries of shifting alliances where parties prove to be less durable than political dynasties.

Play Video

Not that the sense of Kamag-anak Inc. is always a negative element in this. It is good that our families stand behind us in all that we do, or that we take care of those who belong to us, friends and queridas included. It is right that we feel some responsibility for our sakop, for those we deem part of our circle of significant relationships.

What is before us, it seems, is not a case of extreme family-centeredness as a study once misleadingly put it, as if one can ever come to a point where love for family becomes excessive. 

What confronts us is a value that has gained disproportionate power in a government that for centuries had been indifferent to public need such that we have to rely on our families and connections to make the system work. 

Must Read

[OPINION] What is needed is culture change, not charter change

One institution that is supposed to put guard rails to abuse of power and distortion of values is the church. With its long history of nurturing the faithful in its traditions, of making its values work in the public sphere, it remains as repository of a society’s ethical consensus. As guardian of public morals, it is tasked with seeing to it that notions of right and wrong continue to be held as binding in a given society. 

However, with the rise of secularism, particularly in western societies, the church has been sidelined as a moral force in the public sphere, reduced to mumbling in corners about the meaning of its own symbols.

In this country, the church has yet a door of opportunity to ensure continuity of our cherished values as a culture. As an institution, it still ranks higher than government in credibility.

As before, it needs to recover its ability to shape civic conscience. This is important, for we live in a time when globalization is eroding cultures and the internet is replacing the church and the school as sources of facts and values.

The church needs to speak a prophetic voice to those who overrun the limits of  power, while reinforcing all that is good about us as a people. As T.S. Eliot once put it, “The Church’s message to the world must to be expanded to mean the Church’s business to interfere with the world.” – Rappler.com

Melba Padilla Maggay, a social anthropologist, is president of the Institute for Studies in Asian Church and Culture (ISACC). Founded in 1978, ISACC is a nonprofit organization that aims for social transformation in Asia.