Political Dynasties

Political dynasties are very common in the Philippines. In fact around 70 percent of the 15th Philippine Congress have dynastic leaders. That is actually a lot if you compare it to other countries with prominent dynastic families such as Japan who has around 37 percent of them.

But first, what are they? A political dynasty would be a family who maintains power in a certain area for several generations. Querubin explains that political dynasties exhibit “a particular form of elite persistence in which a single or few family groups monopolize political power”(2011). In the Philippines, families who are have political dynasties are among those of the elite. If we trace our past, we can see that political dynasties existed from long ago. Stephanie Cabigao, who wrote an article in the UP forum about political dynasties in the Philippines, found that they were believed to be first recorded in the pre-Magellanic period. This is because of our original form of government which deals with strong familial bonds and the development of the ‘ruling class’ from the elite. This was further developed during spanish period when the term principalia was introduced which brought about a new type of elite class who were the descendants of the datus and their families who were given land by the spanish to influence their people to become part of the city. During this time, there was a very obvious difference between the locals and the principalia. As the difference between the locals and the principalia grew bigger, the harder it was for the locals to participate in government activity. Political dynasties were so ingrained in our history that they still persists up to contemporary times.

Ernesto Dal Bo, Pedro Dal Bo and Jason Snyder (2009) state ...

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...last election on May 2013, one of the main issue that people were campaigning against was the presence of political dynasties in the Philippines. Is it time to get rid of political dynasties in the Philippines? Some people certainly thought so. The Gordon/De Los Reyes family of Zambales, the Ampatuan family of Maguindanao, as well as the Jalosjos family of Zamboanga seem to have lost their control over their ‘jurisdiction’. Meanwhile, other families such as the Singson family of Ilocos Sur, Ejercito family of Manila and Laguna and Escudero family of Sorsogon are still able to enjoy governing over their respective provinces. Why is that so? Despite all the activism being displayed against political families, some seem to be prevalent. What could be the difference between these political families and their jurisdiction that caused the results of the May 2013 elections?