Identify the rebel organizations that fought against the Marcos regime.

The rebel organizations that fought against the Marcos regime are the Communist Party of the
Philippines (CPP), Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP) and New People’s Army (NPA). The CPP was
also buoyed by the proliferation of “national democratic” organizations in schools throughout
Manila, by its capture of the nationally prominent UP student council, and by alliances with workers’
unions and peasant organizations. The Partido Komunista ng Pilipinas (PKP) renewed organizing for
“parliamentary struggle.” With its peasant and worker base still recovering from the Huk debacle,
the party recruited students at the UP and the Lyceum in Manila who were already attracted to
Marxism. Jose Maria Sison’s Kabataang Makabayan (KM, Nationalist Youth) became the most vocal
and dynamic of the PKP’s new front organizations. CPP “legal organizations” also attracted moderate
students who were essentially reformist. A newspaper columnist described the students’
radicalization: Whether radical or moderate, the activist view might be summed up in the words of
one: “Democracy should be for the whole population, not for the elite alone.” CPP organizations
went further, believing that violence was justified in fighting “feudalism (exemplified by land
tenancy, social injustice, the too wide a gap between the poor and the rich), fascism (or the use of
armed might to suppress civil liberties), and imperialism (the continued existence of US bases in the
Philippines, among other things).” In the countryside, Sison teamed up with a dissatisfied young Huk
commander, Bernabe Buscayno, through the mediation of anti-Marcos politicians Senator Benigno
Aquino Jr. and Congressman Jose Yap.Their meeting led to the formation in 1969 of the New
People’s Army (NPA), which began to receive young urban recruits ready to go to the mountains. the
entire network of anti-Marcos forces had disappeared from the public arena. Politicians were jailed,
their patronage machines adrift and private armies demobilized. Students, academics, journalists,
businessmen, and labor and peasant organizers had also been arrested, and many who had escaped
went underground with the CPP. This strained the limited resources and organizational capacity of
the party, which took more than a year to absorb the recruits and restore internal order. The rest of
Philippine society simply accepted the new order. This reaction, especially among weary and
stressed urbanites, is not surprising. After almost three years of political conflict, martial law was to
many a welcome respite. Others saw it as a way out of economic crisis. Popular acquiescence, a
unified military, and American consent enabled Marcos to consolidate swiftly.

What is crony capitalism? Did it help in achieving economic progress? Why or why not?

The crony capitalism it is the consolidation of wealth and power within a segment of country’s elite
and it was capitalism based not on competition but on monopoly, special access, and brute force. In
terms of achieving the economic progress it didn’t help because crony capitalism, in the main it was
also inefficient assured of government support and monopoly control, most crony corporations did
nothing to improve their business performance. Cronies had access to millions of dollars squeezed
out of small producers and billions in loans and credits from government finance institutions
ultimately from foreign lenders. Corporations set up by cronies received preference in issuing import
licenses, approving joint ventures with Japanese and American firms, and acting as agents for foreign
corporations. The perks extended to bribes and “commissions” paid to members of the crony
network. Example of this is that the sugar, automotive, hotel and entertainment, and construction
industries experienced growth, but soon faltered and fell into the red. Crony capitalism precluded
such reforms. But the crony companies began to collapse anyway and turned to Marcos for help. In
between 1981 and 1983, government capital outlay shifted from infrastructure to “corporate equity
investment,” a euphemism for rescuing failing companies. The plunder of the state for the benefit of
family and cronies was premised on the constant availability of funds to loot. However, various
internal and external forces combined to dry up the source of those funds. After the world price of
sugar collapsed, leaving the industry with worthless mills and tons of unexportable sugar,
government came to the rescue of Roberto Benedicto, absorbing losses of more than 14 billion
pesos. But the closed plantations and mills left thousands unemployed, and with no recourse to
subsistence farmland, many former sugar workers on Negros Island faced starvation. That is why
including the Marcos s couple’s conspicuous profligacy pointed to a breakdown. By 1980, the real
wages of skilled and unskilled workers in Manila had fallen to less than half their 1962 level; Marcos
responded by discontinuing the Central Bank series that tracked wages. World Bank and UP
economists watched unemployment rise from an estimated 14.7 percent in 1978 to more than 24
percent in 1982.51 In the face of this situation, Filipinos looked for work overseas to support families
at home.

What is the role of technocrats in the government of President Marcos?

The instrument at disposal were increased public spending, executive agencies staffed with
“apolitical” technocrats. Technocrats who believed in the “fundamental restructuring” of
governance were given a free hand in expanding executive power and technocrats who shared the
idea of national development. Marcos administration's technocrats, who went on to become the chief
economic planners during the martial law period, exhibited "political sensitiveness" in economic policy
making. This sensitivity helped pave the way for them to become part of the policy-making elite in the
country and the Marcos leadership. The technocrats were first concentrated in the new Central Bank
of the Philippines. A critical mass of technocrats was first concentrated in the government. The
technocrats had free rein and Marcos is quoted as saying that he would just lie back and let them
run the government. Technocratic management successfully accomplished this first phase through a
combination of legal compulsion and vastly improved delivery of support services to small farmers.
Another technocratic initiative was the creation of state corporations assigned to actively “interfere
in various markets or to compete directly with the private sector” in “strategic sectors” such as oil
and banking or where private sector participation was limited or half hearted. By the mid-1970s,
these corporations and their associated bureaucracies had established a dominant presence in oil
production, power, mass transportation, fertilizer production and new investment. Government
finance institutions and two state banks, the Philippine National Bank and the Development Bank of
the Philippines, infused with fresh funds, became new sources of credit to complement the Central
Bank.

Did farmers obtain better living conditions after President Marcos subjected the Philippines to
land reform? Explain.

Marcos could justifiably boast that he was the first to implement real agrarian reform, all but
eliminating the dominance of landed elites in the country’s rice production. But the shortcomings of
his program also highlighted the socioeconomic, legal, and coercive power of the landlord class:
Because nonrice lands were exempt, some landlords simply ordered their tenants to change crops.
Also exempt was land worked by wage labor, so some evicted their tenant/sharecroppers in favor of
hired workers. That is why it increased the ranks of landless peasants, another category excluded
from the program. Poor land title records and corruption also allowed the backdated division of legal
ownership to bring holdings below the seven-hectare cutoff. Many other strategies were employed
to simply prevent tenant participation in the program from physical intimidation to cutting off access
to irrigation. In terms of lasting economic benefits, the results were disappointing. Tenants who
participated received a fifteen-year leasehold essentially a mortgage, not a land deed and the terms
of leasehold were not necessarily better than those of tenancy. Land reform also inadvertently
promoted class differentiation within the peasantry: Consolidation of ownership by wealthier
peasants was accomplished despite the prohibition on buying and selling Certicates of Land Transfer.
The ostensible aim of land reform was to create more security for farmers, but these subversions
and side effects actually increased the number of landless laborers, the most vulnerable of the rural
poor.