The Anarchy of Families: The Historiography of State and Family in the

Philippines
By McCoy
(Through case studies of popular political families, McCoy traces the roots of our
present socio-political system and proposes economic and cultural factors for its
perpetuation)
I.

The Filipino Family

Like in Latin America, weak state and powerful oligarchies combine to make
familial perspective on national history relevant.
Philippines has long history of strong families assuring survival when nationstate is weak.
After 1946 independence, Philippine central govt lost control of countryside to
regional politicians, some so powerful they became warlords.
Warlords- through private armies, reinforce economic power and political
offices
- Terrorized peasantry and extracted de facto regional autonomy
- Regional autonomy is the price in delivering their vote banks to
Manila politicians
A. Role of the family
Social capital what the state cant provide, the family must (e.g. take care
of the sick)
Employment capital educates the young, protects good name, commands
highest loyalty, transmits character to succeeding generations
B. Central Characteristic
Bilateral descent acknowledge relatives from both mother and father side
- Produces overlapping, ego-centric networks
- Devoid of lineal or vertical continuity but expanded
horizontally
- Necessarily forges broad alliances to negotiate intrafamilial
politics
II.

The Weak State

Elite families and the state have a reciprocal relationship define and
redefine each other
Two key elements form powerful political families:
1. Rise of rents- rent is defined here as a significant share of
nations economy controlled by the elites.

Basically its the control of resources by the few elites

(oligarchy in the provinces)
2. Provincial autonomy result of attenuation of central government
control over the provinces
How so? Privatization of public resources in the provinces strengthens a few
fortunate families while weakening states resources and bureaucratic
apparatus
3rd World Politics social units such as family clan or faction can block the
state from translating national authority into social action
A. Colonial Period
Spain and US tried to forge a strong bureaucratic apparatus based
on their own laws and social practice, but since the modern
Philippine state did not evolve organically from Filipino society, it
could not induce compliance through a shared myth or any form of
social sanction.
Denied voluntary cooperation from Filipino subjects, Spain and US
derived authority from implied coercion of colonial rule by
extending powers of central bureaucracy of Spain while
simultaneously experimenting with grassroots democracy in
local elections. And so US introduced Local Autonomy.
B. Independence
After 1946 independence, the new Republic inherited colonial task
of both rent seeking (economic control by the few) and provincial
autonomy. Presidents won with electoral support of provincial elites
and Manilas oligarchs. It was a contradiction between dependence
on elite families to deliver votes and his duty to apply laws against
violence and corruption to these same supporters. This later on
pressured partisan politics into realms of appointments and
corruption.
C. Factors for Elite Family Domination (and therefore Provincial
Autonomy and Weakening of Central Government)
1.

Economic manipulation

Philippine presidents used states licensing powers as bargaining

chips in their dealing with national and local elites, crating
benefices that favored dominant political families.

In rent-seeking politics, political system was not based so much on

extraction of surplus goods or production of wealth but on
redistribution of existing resources and artificial creation of rents -by manipulating regulations to reallocate wealth to
dominant families
Republic regulated enterprises transport, media, banking, logging
to the extent that families required protection from competition to
remain profitable. Hence, families gain strength while state
weakens.
2.

Military force

Independence allowed rise of private armies operating beyond

Manilas control. During the war, collapse of central authority
and distribution of infantry to guerillas broke Manilas monopoly
of firepower. Provincal politicians demanded neutralization of
Philippine Constabulary to deliver their vote banks to
presidential candidates, fostering local autonomy and endemic
political violence.
Proliferation of arms paralleled with erosion of central authority
allowed rise of provincial warlords.
1960s- official crime rates extraordinarily high by international
standards, linked to electoral processes. Examples:
Crisologo (Ilocos Sur)
Gustilo (Negros Occidental)
Durano (Cebu)
Dy (Isabela)
2.1.
Factors for the rise of warlordism:
a. Instability in the provinces, fostered by ethnic rivalry or
economic circumstance
e.g. local elites formed private army to defend extraction
of resources through logging, fishing the basis for wealth
in many societies
-

Licenses for extraction were won formally through access

to national politicians in Manila, in exchange of electoral
support

b. Vulnerability to expropriation in Ilocos, human

settlement is concentrated along narrow coastal plains

pinched between Cordillera and South China Sea. Since

transport moves along a single national highway,
paramilitary groups monitor commerce from checkpoints.
e.g. Anyone who tried to export tobacco from Ilocos
without drying it at the Crisologo factory and paying tax
suffered confiscation
c. Individual factors some eventually abandon force
e.g. a minor datu such as Ali Dimaporo (Lanao del Sur)or
an ambitious peasant like Faustino Dy (Isabela) has little
choice but to use violence to establish political and
economic base. After securing wealth through armed
force, provincial politicians begin to barter votes to win
immunity from prosecution in the form of rents, cheap
credit, licenses. His position is legitimized, children study
in Manilas elite schools and become lawyers and other
professionals, marry into established families,
accelerating legitimization process and discouraging
political violence.
III. Case Studies of Filipino Families (Tips for Aspiring Politicos)
Republics weak, postcolonial state was a necessary precondition
for the rise of powerful political families. Since 1946 independence,
territorial aspect of provincial politics encourage extreme de facto
local autonomy known as warlordism.
e.g. Warlords like Durano, Dimaporo, Montano used private armies
to control localities and gain secure tenure over elected offices.
They must seek rents of state revenues to assure political survival,
turning political capital to economic opportunity.
Elite families that did not mobilize their own militia still had to deal
with inherent violence in the provinces, either by manipulating it
like the Lopezes did, or confronting it like the Osmenas.
From his legal studies in UP and Harvard, Eugenio Lopez allied with
Iloilos criminals to seize control of the provinces largest bus
company. When Lopez moved to manila, he became a financier and
philanthropist, assuming an aura of cultured, cosmopolitan
entrepreneur and avoiding direct involvement in political violence.

Osmenas present a contrasting case as rarely employing violence.

After US Army landed in Cebu, he launched political career by
arranging the surrender of armed revolutionaries. After his election
as speaker of the Philippine Assembly, he acquired the patrician air
of a statesman. His family late moved from US to Manila to
establish their own political careers with an ethos of managerial
competence.
Montano, a provincial warlord, was Cavites preeminent leader for
30 years until he turned against Marcos. Marcos denied access to
state patronage, Montano fell back on family resources insufficient
to sustain political influence. Moreover, since Montano, unlike the
Lopezes and Osmenas, did not produce an effective political heir,
he could not perpetuate his lineage.
In seeking variables that account for ability of politicians to
capitalize upon opportunities of office, one factor seems to stand
out: legal skills.
Lopez was educated in law, not in business or finance. Durano Sr.
was a warlord but it was his legal education allowed him to
translate political influence to private wealth. Through legal
education, politicians learn to manipulate regulations in
their quest for rents. With his introduction to legal culture,
even the most virulent warlord has the tools to succeed as a
rent-seeking entrepreneur. Marcos combined violent provincial
politics as a constitutional lawyer and a rent-seeking politician at
the same time. When elected president, he used a mix of state
violence and legal manipulation to acquire a vast array of rentseeking corporations for himself and his entourage.