Landlords and Capitalists

Conclusions and Summary

Local Manufacturing Elite:

o Landed Capitalists Conflicting economic interests as Capitalists and
Landlords, Foreclosed the option of a Comprehensive Land Reform
Program, Their influence in the government caused the diversion of
massive state resources to traditional elite economic activities.
o Non-landed Capitalists With their less prominent social origins,
stronger reliance on state resources, and history of personal ties with
ruling political families, the non-landed capitalists produced numerous
cronies among local manufacturers under the Marcos Regime.
Two key resources the Marcos Regime used to expand its
financial capacity:
Export Crops Monopolizing sugar & coconut products
Foreign loans Debt driven growth
o Particularistic Interest Financing of unproductive
projects, Inefficient government enterprises,
Predatory crony firms
o Chinese-Filipino Capitalists Ethnic and policy prejudices limited their
influence in shaping major policies within the constituency supporting
ISI interests. These policies changed under the Marcos Regime but the
Chinese-Filipino Capitalists was still unable to support nationalistic ISI
interests.
The failure of having a genuine agrarian reform and of shifting to export
oriented industrialization resulted in a highly oligopolized industry that is
rooted in land ownership.
Foreign Investment:
o The Foreign investors constituted an important segment of the ISI (joint
ventures)
o Thus enjoying the same benefits and protection as local investors
during both the period of controls and tariff protection under the
Laurel-Langley Agreement (Bell Trade Act).
o Centered on final-stage processing activities, garments, and semiconductors with little domestic integration.
The lack of a strong developmental state:
o Import controls in the 1950s underscores the centrality of the
state in directing economic growth
o The state eventually succumbed to the interests of traditional agrarian
elites and transnational actors opposed to exchange and import
controls, and the state was therefore unable to construct or oversee a
social coalition for sustained industrial growth.
There should be a triple alliance between the state, local capital and
multinationals to preside over a local process of capital accumulation.
1

o
o

Redesigning political and constitutional frameworks to make them

more compatible with both economic development and democratic
consolidation
Strengthening state autonomy reforming the police, military and
revenue gathering units
The shift to an electoral system of proportional representation
combined with a unicameral parliamentary system and stronger
political parties with well-defined programs of the government firmer
and broader political basis upon which policies can be formulated and
implemented
While reforming its own key bureaucracies and institutions, the state
through its government will then have to construct and nurture the
growth coalition that will underpin a strategy for sustainable
industrial growth and development. As an inclusionary process, this
will necessarily have to include as its core elements the following: key
government officials, the most productive business elites and
entrepreneurs regardless of their social or ethnic origins, the
industrial and agricultural workers, the community of
nongovernment organizations (NGOs) and peoples organizations and
competent professionals in various fields of expertise. In
constructing this growth coalition, the state will then be
compelled to enhance its own strength and autonomy while
coordinating and supporting best initiatives and resources
from civil society.

Source:
Temario, Rivera. Landlords & Capitalists: Class, Family, and State in Philippine
Manufacturing. Quezon City: University of the Philippines Press, 1994