Rebuilding the structure of opportunities

Recent data from the National Statistical Coordinating Board indicating huge disparities between the rich and poor income levels present the alarming state of poverty in the Philippines. The data show that the income level of the first 15 percent of top-earning families is more than 10 times the income of those in the lowest 8 percent. In theory, such a situation is not politically sustainable. No society can ever sustain a scenario where the majority of the people are locked in poverty, the middle class is thinning, and the rest of the population are leaving for greener pastures abroad.

But how does one make sense of poverty in the Philippine context?

First, let us make a distinction between “personal troubles” and “public issues.” The American sociologist C. Wright Mills said: “When, in a city of 100,000, only one is unemployed, that is his personal trouble, and for its relief we properly look to the character of the individual, his skills and his immediate opportunities. But when in a nation of 50 million employees, 15 million people are unemployed, that is an issue, and we may not hope to find its solution within the range of opportunities open to any one individual. The very structure of opportunities has collapsed.” In this case, the statement of the problem and the range of possible remedies require us to consider the economic and political institutions of the society, and not merely the personal character of the poor.

“Poverty in the Philippines,” notes Inquirer columnist Randy David, “is the result of this breakdown in the structure of opportunities” where you have more than half of your people living along poverty lines. It is an issue that involves crisis in institutional arrangements. I think that we are dealing primarily here with the need for an effective asset reform and a rights-based empowerment of the poor. The process of mobilizing the poor to meaningfully participate in institutionalizing lasting political change can only be achieved if we can carry this out effectively.

In the Bondoc Peninsula in Quezon, the most contentious area of land reform struggle in the country, politically powerful families like the Matiases, Reyeses and Uys—the owners of the biggest landholdings in the area—are the same family groups holding local key elective positions. They derive their political legitimacy solely from the economic influence that comes with having vast tracts of land in basically agricultural communities. Hence, patronage and clientism have so often stripped the poor of the chance to elect leaders who will lead the cause of rebuilding the society’s structure of opportunities.

In the town of Sariaya, the struggle for land reform has taken a totally different route. Famous for its Vigan-like antique houses, the town’s landscapes speak of the old social relations prevalent during colonial times. They belonged to the Gala-Rodriguez families whose ancestors served as intermediaries between the colonial power and the masses. Gladiola Cabunag, who descended from the Rodriguez line, is believed to be the richest individual in the province. She owns the contested 44-hectare property in Barangays Tumbaga Uno and Tumbaga Dos.

In the late 1990s, these landholdings were distributed to farmer-beneficiaries under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program. Subsequently, however, Cabunag filed an application for exemption from CARP coverage based on the Department of Justice’s Opinion No. 44, which held that lands classified as nonagricultural prior to June 10, 1988, will be exempted from CARP coverage. The farmer-beneficiaries were not made parties to the exemption cases, and before they knew it their lands had been exempted from CARP coverage and their certificates of land ownership award cancelled.

While we have successfully tapped into the Conditional Cash Transfer program as a stopgap measure meant to correct the breakneck pace of a highly-stratified society, long-term visions must be translated into concrete programs toward an efficient redistribution of wealth and a more inclusive growth. On top of this, the government must work with the poor and empower them to improve the quality of their lives by strengthening their capacities as direct participants and stakeholders in the formulation and implementation of antipoverty programs by the government.

The Empowerment Project initiated by the National Anti-Poverty Commission led by Secretary Joel Rocamora is a good starting point. It aims to: (1) establish and consolidate the organizations of basic sectors in the project sites and enable them to participate in government programs directly affecting them, (2) mobilize the basic sectors and other stakeholders to participate in antipoverty programs of the government such as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension with Reforms, coastal resource protection, and existing social protection programs of the government, and (3) engage local government units toward the adoption of a sectoral agenda and the institutionalization of people’s participation in governance.

This project envisions an environment where basic sectors actively claim their rights over productive assets through land reform and participate in the formulation and implementation of antipoverty and social protection programs. This is the only foundation by which we can rebuild the society’s structure of opportunities.

With less than three years left in his term, this is the greatest legacy that President Aquino can leave to his bosses.

Joseph Jadway “JJ” Marasigan chairs the Quezon Association for Rural Development and Democratization Services Inc.