PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THE PHILIPPINES

POWER AND POLITICS

What are the differences and similarities between power and politics?
Harry Truman, who as president presided over the creation of modern American foreign relations, once
wryly observed that a statesman was merely a dead politician. He in turn defined a successful politician
as someone who got other people to do what they should have done all along. From this perspective,
politics is simply the process of getting people to do the right thing. But even under this seemingly
benign formulation, politics involves power—the power to move people in a particular direction, toward
a particular end. It begs the questions of who decides what direction, to what end, and what the right
thing to do might be. In domestic politics the answers to such questions are often contested. The range
of political discourse and debate is still broader in international relations. What to one party is obviously
the proper or right course can be to another not only wrong but a threat to well-being or perhaps even
survival. At the international level, politics and power, so obviously interrelated, are not so easily
reconciled.

THE CRISIS OF PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THE PHILIPPINES

By Ronald Meinardus

According to the human capital theory, the economic development of a nation is a function of the
quality of its education. In other words: the more and better educated a people, the greater the chances
of economic development.

The modern world in which we live is often termed a "knowledge society"; education and information
have become production factors potentially more valuable than labor and capital. Thus, in a globalized
setting, investment in human capital has become a condition for international competitiveness.

In the Philippines, I often hear harsh criticism against the politics of globalization. At the same time,
regarding the labor markets, I can hardly think of another nation that is so much a part of a globalized
economy than the Philippines with nearly ten per cent of the overall population working beyond the
shores of the native land.

Brain drain. Apart from the much debated political, social and psychological aspects, this ongoing mass
emigration constitutes an unparalleled brain drain with serious economic implications.

Arguably, the phenomenon also has an educational dimension, as the Philippine society is footing the
bill for the education of millions of people, who then spend the better part of their productive years
abroad. In effect, the poor Philippine educational system is indirectly subsidizing the affluent economies
hosting the OFWs.

With 95 per cent of all elementary students attending public schools, the educational crisis in the
Philippines is basically a crisis of public education. The wealthy can easily send their offspring to private
schools, many of which offer first-class education to the privileged class of pupils.

Social divide. Still, the distinct social cleavage regarding educational opportunities remains problematic
for more than one reason. Historically, in most modern societies, education has had an equalizing effect.
In Germany, for instance, the educational system has helped overcome the gender gap, and later also
the social divide. Today, the major challenge confronting the educational system in the country I come
from is the integration of millions of mostly non-European, in most cases Muslim, immigrants.
Importantly, this leveling out in the context of schooling has not occurred in this part of the world. On
the contrary, as one Filipino columnist wrote a while ago, "Education has become part of the
institutional mechanism that divides the poor and the rich."

Let me add an ideological note to the educational debate: Liberals are often accused of standing in the
way of reforms that help overcome social inequalities. While, indeed, liberals value personal freedom
higher than social equality, they actively promote equality of opportunities in two distinct policy areas:
education and basic heath care.

For this reason, educational reform tends to have a high ranking on the agenda of most liberal political
parties in many parts of the world.

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 PUBLIC EDUCATION IN THE PHILIPPINES

This said, it is probably no coincidence that the National Institute for Policy Studies (NIPS), liberal think-
tank of the Philippines, invited me the other day to a public forum on the "Challenges on Educational
Reform." With the school year having just started and the media filled with reports on the all but happy
state of public education in the country, this was a very timely and welcome event. I was impressed by
the inputs from Representative Edmundo O. Reyes, Jr, the Chairman of the Committee on Education of
the House of Representatives, and DepEd Undersecretary Juan Miguel Luz. Both gave imposing
presentations on the state of Philippine education.

Although I have been in this country for over a year now, I am still astonished again and again by the
frankness and directness with which people here address problems in public debates. "The quality of
Philippine education has been declining continuously for roughly 25 years," said the Undersecretary --
and no one in the audience disagreed. This, I may add, is a devastating report card for the politicians
who governed this nation in the said period. From a liberal and democratic angle, it is particularly
depressing as this has been the period that coincides with democratic rule that was so triumphantly and
impressively reinstalled after the dark years of dictatorship in 1986! Describing the quality of Philippine
school education today, the senior DepEd official stated the following: "Our schools are failing to teach
the competence the average citizen needs to become responsible, productive and self-fulfilling. We are
graduating people who are learning less and less."

While at the said forum, more than one speaker observed that the educational problems are structural
in nature, I missed propositions for reform that are so far-reaching to merit the attribute structural.

Gargantuan problems. While the Undersecretary very patiently and impressively charted out the four
policy directions of the political leadership of his ministry (taking teachers out of elections, establishing a
nationwide testing system, preserving private schools, raising subsidies for a voucher system), to me --
as a foreign observer -- these remedies sound technocratic considering, what one writer in this paper
has recently termed, "the gargantuan magnitude of the problems besetting Philippine basic education."

Let me highlight two figures: Reportedly, at last count more than 17 million students are enrolled in this
country's public schools.

At an annual population growth rate of 2.3 per cent, some 1.7 million babies are born every year. In a
short time, these individuals will claim their share of the limited educational provisions.

"We can't build classrooms fast enough to accommodate" all these people, said the DepEd
Undersecretary, who also recalled the much lamented lack of teachers, furniture and teaching materials.

In short, there are too little resources for too many students.

Two alternatives. In this situation, logically, there exist only two strategic alternatives: either, one
increases the resources, which is easier said than done considering the dramatic state of public finances,
or one reduces the number of students.

This second alternative presupposes a systematic population policy, aimed at reducing the number of
births considerably.

But this, too, is easier said than done, considering the politics in this country -- or to quote Congressman
Reyes: "Given the very aggressive and active intervention of the Church addressing the population
problem is very hard to tackle."

RATIONALIZING FAILURES:
THE PHILIPPINE GOVERNMENT IN THE EDUCATION SECTOR

THE INTENSE ECONOMIC CRISIS that the Philippines is currently undergoing has certainly buried the
sanguine and unreasonable hopes that the government had projected for the near future. The
triumphalism of Philippines 2000 has been shaken to the core and reduced to a laughable joke for the
history books. This crisis only confirms that the Philippines has yet to liberate itself from the age-old
problems, which have plagued it in the economic and political spheres.

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The much-trumpeted new epoch of free competition and borderless economies has not resulted in any
real development but only in a more intense form of economic domination and exploitation of the
poorer countries by the advanced capitalist countries. The seemingly neutral facade of Globalization has
turned out to be more of the same old Imperialism that just cannot be wished away.

Nevertheless, it would be too much of a simplification to arrive at the conclusion that the present global
order has not resulted in any significant changes. It would certainly be correct to say that for the
educational system, as in Philippine society as a whole, that "nothing of the essence has changed."
However, even if it is true that the essential traits and defining characteristics of Philippine education
has remained the same all throughout this so-called period of "Globalization," it is also equally
unavoidably true that certain changes have occurred and are still occurring that may not have actually
touched the "essence" of things as they are but still have important implications for the understanding
of the current situation and the various effective political responses that can lead to genuine social
transformation. One of the main tasks is to attempt to identify what these "changes" are without losing
sight of the "meaning" of these phenomena in relation to an essentially unchanged exploitative global
economic and political system which must be identified as "imperialism."

The changes in question can be identified by analyzing the so-called "three major areas of concern" in
education which have been underlined in the Medium Term Education Development Plan (MTEDP).
These are: "(1) increasing access to and improving of the quality of basic education; (2) liberalizing the
regulation of private schools, and; (3) rationalizing the programs of State Universities and Colleges
(SUCs)."

The question of "increasing access to" and "improving the quality of" education have been constant
themes since even before the intricate and obfuscatory jargon of "globalization" entered the scene. It
cannot even be asserted that these ideas have changed in the sense that they previously had an
altruistic meaning which has currently been lost in this period of technocratic appeals to "efficiency"
rather than "morality."

When, for example, the Department of Education Culture and Sports (DECS) declares that "one of the
bottlenecks to economic growth that the NICs of East and Southeast Asia are experiencing is the
shortage of skilled labor" and that the educational system simply needs to become more responsive
both in terms of quantity and quality, to the "manpower requirements for global competition." It is
manifest that there is no longer any obvious reference to the highly deplorable insufficiency of
educational resources that can service the needs of all children of school-age as a "moral issue" and as a
question of "universal rights" for which the state is responsible. Rather, that highly suspect discourse
which used to prop up the legitimacy of the state as a benevolent provider of social goods and defender
of human rights within its sphere of jurisdiction, has been replaced by the seemingly scientific and value-
free discourse of supply and demand.

The fact that so many youth and children should have no access to adequate educational resources is no
longer just offensive to "social morality" but simply offensive to the "ideal maximization of resources for
greater competitiveness." However, it is important to realize that even if the jargon of efficiency has
supplanted the sermons of morality in order of importance or that even if the concept of the universal
rights of humanity has likewise been edged out by the concept of "universal competition," it is only the
primary mode of "ideological legitimation" that has changed and not the interests which continue to
dictate the absolute measure of just how many skilled mental and manual laborers are needed or just
what things need to be studied in school and to what degree of competence these skills must be
practiced. It would be wrong to take the ideological smokescreen for reality itself, which in this case,
could lead to a "harking back to the good ol' days" where the heart rather than the market reigned
supreme and which never existed anyway.

In any case, for the majority of Filipinos perennially living in neglect and poverty, all these apologetics
whether clothed in the guise of the Ramos regime's Social Reform Agenda (SRA) in its "war against
poverty" and its "movement for people empowerment" or couched in more abstruse pseudo-scientific
regurgitations simply do not amount to anything concrete that could change their lives. The third "area
of concern" mentioned above regarding the "rationalization" of the SUCs means nothing other than a

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decrease in budget for this sector relative to the part, which goes to basic education. Perhaps the reason
for this juggling of funds is the double bind, which the government now finds itself trapped in.

One hand, it is undeniable that the educational system as a whole cannot even fulfill both the
requirements regarding quantity and quality which government technocrats themselves have
considered indispensable for the attainment of that ever-elusive state of NIChood.

On the other hand, the government has committed itself to the Structural Adjustment Program (SAP)
imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) geared towards the reduction of social spending and
privatization in order to ensure the payment of the massive foreign debt. The phrase "limited budget for
education" so often bandied about by government technocrats does not mean that this is all that could
conceivably be allotted for education, but instead means that this is all that could be allotted given the
degree of priority, or lack thereof, which the state assigns to education. The government budget reports
are consistent with one another that education "is the single biggest recipient of public funds excluding
debt service." While the government boasts that the "anti-poverty thrust" of the 1997 budget has
resulted in the increase of the education budget (DECS and SUCs) from 11.7 percent to 14.0 percent,
debt service payment in 1997 ate up to around forty percent of the national budget. All this in flagrant
violation of the constitutional provision requiring that education is given the highest priority. This fact, of
course, is extremely familiar by now. Indeed, rather too familiar in that it does not seem to excite as
much as public indignation as it used to in the 70s and 80s.

The easiest way out of the above-mentioned dilemma is making the most of what little there is left after
allocating debt payments. "Making the most of something" is how "rationalization" is defined. This
means that after the secondary priority of education after debt payments has been settled, then the
matter of distributing what little there is left within that particular sector in order to maximize results
must be determined. In accord with the logic of supply and demand, the government has opted to
"reallocate resources from the SUCs, which have high costs and absorb 16 percent of the total GoP
expenditures" and pour a greater proportion of the limited budget for education to "basic education"
which covers primary and secondary levels. The Asian Development Bank and the World Bank have
consistently (from their moral high horse) bewailed the "misprioritization" of scarce resources by the
government in the direction of tertiary education which they say should have been used for basic
education in the interests of equity and poverty alleviation. It is unbelievable how banks, engaged in a
cutthroat, dog-eat-dog business, can put on dour faces and shake their heads over children dying of
diarrhea and starvation, even when no one believes them.

Certainly, behind all this cheap sentimentalizing, is a seemingly accidental accordance with the current
demands in the world market for cheap skilled labor in the Third World and for the immediate
gratification of "faster returns on investment." Incidentally, this emphasis on the production of skilled
labor as a commodity in the world market does not mean that the more expensive mental laborers
produced by higher education is not also consumed by the same gigantic transnational corporations.
Although the former is in greater demand than the latter, both share the same fate as mere items of
consumption by transnational corporations.

The relegation of SUCs to a marginal status within this scheme of things is definitely not surprising given
the aggressive emphasis on selling Philippine skilled labor to foreign capital. There may, and in fact, has
been absolute increases in amounts allocated to education overall and to SUCs in recent years, however,
deceptive figures do not disprove the progressive marginalization of SUCs since any absolute increase in
the budget of SUCS is mean to be accompanied by a decrease relative to that part allotted to basic
education. This is outrightly admitted with a disarming frankness and lack of double-talk in the 1997
Budget of Expenditures and Sources of Financing, where it is stated that: "In the last three years, the
educational system has been restructured into three main levels, namely: basic, higher and technical-
vocational education and therefore allow the greater participation of the private sector in these areas."
This means that the restructuration of the education sector into three institutions: DECS for primary and
secondary education, Commission on Higher Education (CHED) for tertiary level education, and
Technical Skills Development Authority (TESDA) for technical-vocational education is primarily directed
towards facilitating the reduction of "government intervention" (read as "financial support) in tertiary
and voc-tech education so that more can be allotted to basic education.

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The "deliberate" nature of this "state abandonment" of an area, which was previously considered its
province, must be underscored to differentiate the situation in SUCs from an earlier analysis of "mere
government neglect." The political implication of this openly avowed withdrawal is that the state can no
longer be called to task for not fulfilling its promises in tertiary education because it, in fact, no longer
promises anything. For all that it's worth (which isn't much), this directly violates the Constitutional
provision stating that the government shall "protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality
education at all levels and shall take appropriate steps to make education accessible to all."

The "Rationalization" of SUCs entails that the very nature and classification of these institutions shall
undergo certain significant changes, so that they shall "move away from their treatment as national
agencies but as income earning entities performing socially oriented activities and hence entitled to
government subsidy contributions." Rationalization, therefore means that SUCs must from now on learn
to earn their keep to justify their continued existence. They must "increase their self-financing capacity
through income generation and cost-recovery programs." And shall accordingly receive "incentives of
entrepreneurial activities." This means that those institutions, which are already making money, shall
receive incentives on top of this, while poorer institutions cannot expect any additional incentive
thereby proving the thesis that "money attracts money." "Rationalization" translates into the
"commercialization" of SUCs in three important aspects:

1) That the previously non-profit public institution shall now be turned into a profit-generating public
agency. The "Higher Education Modernization Act of 1997" (RA 8292) permits the SUCs to "enter into
joint ventures with business and industry for the profitable development and management of the
college or institution, the proceeds from which are to be used for the development and strengthening of
the college and the university..." This has been called the corporatization of SUCs.

No stone shall be left unturned in the search for juicy business prospects and big profits. The ways that a
public educational agency engages in entrepreneurial activities can take many forms: from regular
tuition fee increases combined with the removal or reduction of automatic subsidies for the "iskolar ng
bayan" to the commercialization" of the so-called "idle assets." The "idle assets" referred to simply
consist of lands and other properties allocated for educational use but which have not been developed
for such a use despite the crying need for facilities because of the chronic lack of funds.
"Commercialization" means the leasing out of the lands and other properties of SUCs meant for
educational use to private commercial interests. The most notorious case of "commercialization of idle
assets" is occurring in the University of the Philippines at Diliman with the joint ventures being entered
into by the UP Development Corporation with the private sector. The UP administration is intent upon
leasing one hundred hectares of its land for as long as a hundred years (or three generations of Filipinos)
in order to gain the maximum possible profits.

2) That food and dormitory and other services within the University or College, which used to receive
subsidies, shall now be run by private concessionaires. This, on a narrower scale, is usually termed the
"privatization" of services within the public institution. RA 8292 states that the governing board shall
have the power to "privatize, where most advantageous to the institution, management and non-
academic services such as health, food, building or grounds or property maintenance and similar such
services..."

3) That the educational institution previously insulated from market forces due to relatively stronger
state support in the past must from now on bow to the "harsh discipline of the market." Ironically, it is
the state propaganda machinery itself and its hordes of technocrats which propagates the idea that any
state-run institution is bound to be inefficient and "undisciplined" as compared to a privately run, profit-
driven enterprise even as they assert that the state itself and its various functions must submit to the
logic of the marketplace. The state takes up this chorus in order to create an ideological basis for
reneging on what the public previously perceived to be its responsibilities, and also, in order to justify
selling off public assets redounding to the benefit of both the buyer and the corrupt bureaucrat
capitalist. By means of "privatizing" institutions of higher learning, the state must now "clamp down on
the proliferation of non-viable campuses and course offerings." Presumably, the ideal of "non-viability"
is not connected to any other concept than that of a "profitability" which harmonizes with the needs of
foreign monopoly capital.

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All campuses and courses that do not serve the "manpower requirements for global competition," or in
other words, do not serve the needs of the gigantic transnational corporations shall be deemed an
"irrational drain" on precious public funds and worthy of the scrapheap. Easy targets for this kind of
"rationalization" include the proposed reduction by the CHED of courses and subjects in the humanities,
social sciences and the national language.

Needless to say, transnational do not need employees who are well versed in Philippine history,
language and culture, rather, the reverse is true. What they need are Filipinos with only a scant
knowledge of themselves and a blind admiration for everything "imported." It's easy enough to see the
connection between the current emphasis being given to the teaching of English and that illusory image
"English competency" being touted by the government as a comparative advantage of the Filipino
employee or laborer in the Southeast Asian region. More insidious still, is the attempt to instill in young
pupils "values" that are doubtless meant to inculcate a respect for authority and property and an
acceptance of their "place in society." This is apparently an ideological offensive on the part of the state
to combat the militant unionism for which the Filipino labor is well known.

Furthermore, the seemingly positive concept of "life-long education" being proposed by the Asia Pacific
Economic Cooperation (APEC) Education Forum within the context of the human resources development
plans of APEC, belongs hand-in-hand with the labor "contractualization" and "flexibilization" policies
which serve as combined attacks upon the Filipino workers' job security and the right to form unions. All
"life-long education" means is that the worker must now accept the fact that she/he must continually
adapt herself/himself to the ever variable needs of transnational corporations and that the possibility of
holding on to any job for any period of time is continually imperiled.

Undoubtedly, funds from government are still going to tertiary education, but government will ensure
that these measly funds must unconditionally and maximally serve the needs of the market for human
resources. One of the most insidious effects of this kind of subjection to market forces is that the overall
direction of education is taken away from the sphere of public deliberation and hidden away in the
boardrooms and left to the hands of technocrats without the slightest public accountability. State
universities such as UP is starting to form "curriculum committees" made up of academics and
representatives from industry in order to pattern the priorities of the university after the needs of these
businesses. The demands imposed by such international bodies as APEC for such things as "Universal
Mobility" which means the standardization of curricula among all the member countries in order to
allow the free movement of engineers, scientists, doctors and other professionals across national
boundaries, not only facilitates the phenomenon of "brain drain," it also further limits the parameters
allowed for a country to decide on its own what kind of knowledge are relevant to the needs of the
people and the nation. What is and what is not "relevant" and therefore "rational" shall heretofore be
directly acted upon and decided by the private sector with hardly any mediation from the state. This
kind of supranational standardization reduces the freedom and initiative of teachers to determine the
content of their teaching and condemns them to the interminable repetition of knowledge deemed
necessary and profitable by the international capitalist system.

Rationalization in the service of commercial interests may be placed under the broad label of
"Privatization." The Privatization program of the government, which began during Pres. Cory Aquino’s
term, has arrived at the final phase of privatizing social services. This presumably placed last due to the
possible negative political effects such a procedure may entail especially in the education and health
services which have always been chronically underserved. Privatization in these areas can only mean
that those who used to have a little shall now have nothing will still have more of the same. However, it
is important to realize that the term "privatization" itself is a consistent victim of double-talk. Some
technocrats would find it convenient to make an extremely narrow definition of "privatization" that
would be restricted to the outright sale of the government assets and properties in question. Since
many SUCs have not been sold, but simply "rationalized" in the manner discussed above, they would
deny that any kind of privatization is occurring in education.

It is important to keep in mind a broader and more effective definition of "Privatization" which states
that it is any move on the part of the government to reduce its involvement in any area or activity.
"Privatization" would therefore point to a process of reducing State participation rather than to a
simple, direct sale. "Rationalization" per se is not necessarily "Privatization." The State can and should
"rationalize" its functioning according to a standard and measure necessary and the unnecessary arrived

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at through a genuinely democratic means of public deliberation. It is only when "rationalization" occurs
under the unmitigated pressures of private enterprise that it is possible to speak of "privatization."
While the government has always been subservient to imperialism, it can still be said that the process of
"privatization" hands over the direct control of the "privatized access" to monopoly capitalism and
eliminates the traditional mediatory role of the State leaving monopoly capitalists with an "unmediated"
and direct control over the national system of education.

The second area of concern regarding the "liberalization" of private education cited above points to the
corollary process parallel and in conjunction with privatization. Government does not simply leave a
vacuum in the area where it is vacated, it only withdraws in order to affect the transfer from the public
to the private. To ensure this, the private sector must be encouraged to invest in education by offering
all sorts of attractive incentives such as the deregulation of tuition fees and the relaxation of restrictions
and requirements. CHED has claimed that it has a purely regulatory role in relation to tuition fee
increases and cannot prevent schools and universities from regularly implementing the increases.
However, even while it still requires that 70 percent of any tuition fee increase should be used for
teacher compensation, 20 percent for overhead costs and 10 percent for return on investment, CHED
does not even have enough resources to make sure whether all educational institutions which have
recently increased their tuition have really allotted 70 percent for the salary increases of teachers. As it
is, the economic condition of the teachers in private schools at the primary and tertiary level are, in
general, appreciably lower than that of the teachers in public schools.

The privatization, rationalization, commercialization and liberalization of SUCs in the name of improving
basic education does not mean that basic education itself is spared from these relentless processes. The
fact is that even withdrawal of government from tertiary education does not translate into enough
resources for the provision of basic education. A controversial case of privatization in basic education is
the phasing out of the Instructional Development Center under DECS and the privatization of the
publication of public schools textbooks by this year under the Book Publishing Industry Development
Act. Of course, the main objection to this is the inevitable increase in the prices of learning materials and
the problem of insufficient supply.

However, apparently more significant is the policy of devolution being implemented in the primary and
secondary levels is really only another form of rationalization. "Devolution" means that part of the
burden of financing education shall be shifted to the Local Government Units (LGUs) and the private
sector. Concomitant to this, devolution cannot be implemented without that parallel phenomenon of
"decentralization." It is claimed that "centralized academic and financial management and supervision
does not encourage innovation and initiative at the school level." Decentralization thus takes the form of
assigning "more prerogatives and resources for school heads" and the improvement of their
entrepreneurial and managerial skills. It is hoped that decentralization shall result in greater efficiency,
responsiveness and competition. Public educational institutions shall therefore be forced to vie with one
another for "scarce" educational funding.

Since 1991, the Local Government Code (LGC) has institutionalized two elements, which serve as
preliminary steps towards devolving the public educational sector. The first of these are the School
Boards covering provinces, cities or municipalities which are headed by LGU and DECS officials and
tasked with allocating local government funds to education. The second is the Special Education Fund
(SEF) which is set aside by the LGUs for the maintenance and construction of educational facilities and
for the granting of additional benefits to teaching and non-teaching personnel. The current review of the
LGC is also geared towards devolving more educational functions excluding teachers' salaries. The
government admits that "devolution" may worsen already increasing inequities in education since LGUs
can only give that amount of funding which they can afford. The gap between poorer and wealthier
LGUs will replicate itself within the educational institutions themselves and thereby make the chasm
separating poor and affluent schools even wider.

The solution, which DECS proposes, is to increase the share of wealthy LGUs in shouldering education
while increasing the relative amount that the poorer LGUs shall receive. In other words, they aim to
determine the amount of local subsidies necessary on a case-to-case basis. Which means that there shall
be an overall shift in education expenditure from the central to the local governments. It is through this
devolutionary rationalization of resources that government aims to be able to "target the most needy."

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This kind of maneuver may by now be quite familiar. By a sleight of hand, government succeeds in
pitting the recipients of educational funding against each other and at the same time gains the moral
high ground by appealing to "poverty alleviation." By labeling the increased dependence of the
educational institutions upon local community involvement and financing as decentralization and
"grassroots empowerment" it fosters the illusion that where there is minimal state power is where the
people's power lies, thereby obscuring the obvious fact that the power of the people should reside in
the state or there should be no state at all.

What is hidden behind all of the above-mentioned apologetics is the fact, that government does not
hesitate at all to sacrifice the interests of the vast majority of Filipino people to the interests of the IMF-
WB. It distributes a pittance among the poor while "redistributing" the nation's real wealth among the
ruling elites and the gigantic and greedy transnational corporations. The Ramos government thinks that
it can fool the people into believing that the bitter medicine of privatization and rationalization under
the aegis of liberalization is all for the good of the nation. It thinks that it can make people believe that
the education budget has reached the highest possible ceiling and cannot be augmented anymore even
if it shovels billions into the pockets of foreign banks. It will continue to dismantle even the barest
structures of social services in the Philippines heedless of the fact that this will inevitably result in even
more intense pauperization and exploitation for the great majority. However, the "inconvenient" reality
for those in power is that even the most abstruse calculations for maximization and efficiency cannot
factor out the political movements that continually gain in strength as more and more people find no
other alternative but to protest against these blatant attacks on both their political and economic rights.

Erich D. Garcia Ed.DPage 8