THE FILIPINO PEOPLE long for change.
I am certain. This is one of the opinions I am so sure with myself that I would bet my life on it. It is the reason why the people voted for Rodrigo Duterte back in 2016, with “Change is Coming” on his left hands, a clenched iron fist on the right, and relatable vulgarity on his mouth which was a far cry from the alien formalities of the also-crisis-ridden previous administration; and Ferdinand Marcos Jr. back in 2022, bearing the slogan of “Bagong Pilipinas” on his left hands and a historically distorted “golden age” pseudomemory of his father’s dictatorial regime on the other. The question of whether or not Duterte and Marcos Jr. were the wise choice is, of course, a different one (although, for the record, I do believe that they were not). But my point remains. And among voters who desire change, a more progressive camp has chosen their standard-bearer—Leni Robredo.
Even within the latter group, however “progressive” and “enlightened,” a fanaticism has come into being. And what lumps all of these crowds together, however different they may seem on the surface, is the notion that we need a messiah, a savior, a hero figure, to save us from whatever rotting scum this is, which we find ourselves in.
Recently, news poured in about Robredo’s announcement that she will not pursue any national post in the 2028 National Elections as she will focus on her mayoralty in Naga City. As I scrolled through social media, what caught my attention the most were tens of thousands of kakampinks sad-reacting news of this doubtless decision of hers—supporters dismayed and hopeless.
A point has been made by Robredo herself that there are far more other promising and also-capable leaders. We must admit, she does not indeed have a monopoly on good governance. To quote her, “Ako sa tingin ko dapat, alisin ‘yung mentality na may isang savior. Dahil wala namang ganyan. Wala namang monopoly ng kakayahan.” What I think the recent discourse on the matter needs more emphasis on is the question of whether or not there are “saviors,” and if we need “saviors” at all. Indeed, I agree with her remark that we need to end ‘savior’ politics, and that this mentality hinders growth; however, where I diverge from her is when she, ironically and contradictorily, began to name other potential leaders as possible alternatives for her.
(On a side note, Robredo is not perfect either. As progressives, we should not look at her as a saint. As a devout Christian, she has previously expressed her conservative stances on divorce, abortion, and the like; she has also expressed support for “all of the mandate and functions” of the infamous National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-ELCAC), which has been one of the the primary agencies of the state in suppressing dissent and violating human, civil, and political rights. Whether these stances will translate into corresponding political action is a different question, and is something that we cannot know for sure.)
Electoral Realism, Individualization, and the Reverse-Messiah Complex
This centering of politics and social change on individual politicians is, what I think, a superstructural manifestation of what Mark Fisher calls business ontology in his book Capitalist Realism. Fisher describes this concept as the notion “in which it is simply obvious that everything in society, including healthcare and education, should be run as a business.” Although Fisher specifically demonstrated the pervasiveness of business ontology in the material, substructural sense (or, beyond the economic base, at least merely in the politico-legal aspect of the superstructure), I would argue that this ontology has seeped into the ideological superstructure—the social consciousness—of society. On a deeper level, this business ontology has become the very meaning and fabric of reality for everyday people. Our reality has become nothing but capital, its pursuit and accumulation (i.e. business). I have identified two forms in which it manifests politically: (1) hierarchical dependence, and (2) individualization.
Within capitalist relations of production, the role of the capitalist boss is framed as a necessary component, without which, the enterprise would be unable to function due to the lack of leadership; this is viewed not as a specific historical development of an economic system or mode of production, but an unchanging, eternal, and intrinsic part of the natural order of things. Likewise, in the Philippine context, not only does business ontology manifest in what is referred to as bureaucrat capitalism, which is defined as “the way of operating the government as if it were a business,” but also in the very form of the political life and consciousness of the masses. This hierarchical dependence results in what I would like to call the reverse-messiah complex. It is when the people rely on a single individual to realize progress; when the people falsely believe that they need to be saved by a political messiah in order to break free from their chains.
The rugged individualism incentivized by capitalism (and pushed by neoliberalism to its atomistic extreme) has likewise resulted in its permeation in the political life and consciousness of society, and with it, the persistence of the reverse-messiah complex. Every aspect of social life, including and most especially politics, and everything that is meant to be collective, is individualized. The individualization of politics appears in both ends of the power structure of the state: social issues are individualized (e.g. the idea that poverty is the individual’s own fault, instead of it being seen as a systemic problem) and the solutions for them (i.e. the notion that we need an individual, good politician to fix these problems), thereby pacifying any revolutionary potential. Besides this debilitation, the harm of the individualization of politics lies in the recuperation of revolutionary desire into what Marx calls Bonapartism (and the related Caesarism). Individualization and the reverse-messiah complex has historically produced (in the superstructural aspect) history’s worst totalitarian and fascist regimes. Strongmen exploit and co-opt this desire for progress, enact selective reforms, but actually preserve and protect the old state of affairs, in an open dictatorship (a “benevolent” one, they claim). Case in point: Hitler.
On top of this, I would argue that another realism has emerged in our present political climate: electoral realism, or the view that confines [the entire concept of] politics within the bounds of elections; the belief that bourgeois representative democracy is the only viable system, and that there are no other possible, better alternatives; the illusion that it is the fullest form of democracy. No matter how much the reactionary state claims that “all government authority emanates from the people”, “civilian authority is, at all times, supreme over the military”, or how it itself identifies as the people, these are nothing but mere abstract conceptions true only in theory (the state’s use of “the people” itself is abstract and immaterial). The reactionary state is but a joint dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, bureaucrats, and the landlord class. In actuality, the elite ruling classes hold material power over the people it claims to be its state’s ultimate superior.
What genuine revolutionary, emancipatory, and democratic politics is, is the decentering of politics away from individual politicians, and recentering it to the true movers of history: the broad masses of the people. It is a democracy where the interests of the toiling majority—workers, peasants, and all of those who create—are upheld. It is the loud acknowledgement that the exercise of democracy is primarily grounded on the direct, collective action of the people; that when representative institutions cease to be participatory and fail to uphold their supposed mandates, the people have all the right to revolt to reclaim their power. Deep-rooted problems warrant radical solutions.
Tse-Tung, The Internationale, and Birds
History has shown us that what liberates peoples are not saviors in the incarnation of a single person descending from the sky. Revolution after revolution, uprising after uprising, it has been evident—it is the people who save themselves, breaking the yoke of oppression from the bottom up. The first EDSA People Power was called as such because it was the collective action of the people who overthrew Marcos Sr. The 1896 Philippine Revolution was not the lone doing of Bonifacio or any of its leaders. Without the broad masses, radical change would not have been possible.
It would be both historical distortion and idealism to think that ‘heroes’ are the ones who have driven social progress. We did not vote against Spanish colonization. We did not vote for the reduction of daily working hours from around 16 to an eight-hour maximum, or the minimum wage, or workplace fire exits, or the many benefits workers reap today. We did not vote for women’s suffrage—there was no possible way it could have happened because how would women have voted for it at a time where the majority of voting men did not want to.
When we depend on elections and individual political figures for the societal change we desire, we strip ourselves of our own agency, as active agents of change. We, the masses, are the makers of history. As the famous Che Guevara quote goes, “Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves.” Not in Duterte, Marcos, Robredo, Sotto, or any lone political messiah shall we count on. No Napoleons. No idols. No saviors. Our liberation lies in ourselves.
It is not in Robredo’s hands, or any single person’s, from which genuine political change comes from. It is high time that pink acquires a stronger shade of red.
We are not damsels in distress in need of princes or knights in shining armor. Not especially princes who despotically rule over—and expropriate the riches created by—their subjects, and knights who violently carry out the oppressive orders of their king. When we surrender our ability to change society according to our own will, we surrender democracy. The true essence of democracy is in it being the rule of the people. An active, continuous, and dialectical struggle. This is what we must never forget. Because when a bird believes it could not fly, relying only on the little food its captor gives, it will live a life starving, not knowing it could find all the nourishment it needs on its own, only if it flapped the powerful wings it always had.
