|
Philippines Political Economy of United States Military Bases
In early 1991, the Philippine government was in ongoing
negotiations with the United States on the future status of
United States naval and air facilities at Subic Bay and Clark Air
Base
(see Relations With the United States
, ch. 4;
Foreign Military Relations
, ch. 5). What would normally be an issue of
foreign policy and national security became a major domestic
political issue and took on an economic dimension of considerable
importance. At the domestic level, the conflict was between those
who argued that the continuing presence of the United States
bases was an infringement on Philippine sovereignty and a
continuation of a neocolonial relationship and those who, for a
combination of internal security, foreign relations, and economic
reasons, saw the need for maintaining the presence of the bases.
President Aquino, through 1990, refused to publicly commit
herself to a position; however, it was clear that her government
was working to reach accommodation with the United States. As
negotiations progressed, the economic issue became prominent.
There were three economic considerations from the point of
view of the Philippine government. First, the proportion of the
Philippine budget allocated for its armed forces was the smallest
in the region, a fact linked to the presence of United States air
and naval forces in the Philippines, as well as direct military
assistance. Second, in the latter half of the 1980s, the bases
directly employed between 42,000 and 68,000 Filipinos and
contracted for goods and services from Filipino businesses.
During this period, yearly base purchases of goods and services
in the Philippine economy (when corrected for the estimated
import content of the goods purchased) was in the range of P6.0
billion to P8.3 billion.
A third and politically very important consideration, was the
sum given to the Philippines by the United States in connection
with the presence of the bases, referred to as aid by United
States officials and as rent by the Filipinos. Base-related
payments were first agreed to in 1979 when United States
president Jimmy Carter made a "best effort" pledge to secure
US$500 million for the Philippines from the United States
Congress over a five-year period. In 1983 another five-year
commitment was made, this time for US$900 million. In October
1988, the Philippines' Secretary of Foreign Affairs Raul
Manglapus and United States' Secretary of State George Schultz
signed a two-year agreement for US$962 million, an amount double
the previous compensation but substantially less than the US$2.4
billion that the Philippines initially demanded. In 1991 talks
over the future of the bases and the size and terms of the aid or
rent that would be given in consideration for continued United
States access to military facilities in the Philippines was the
most important unresolved issue. The decision of the Philippine
administration to bring Secretary of Finance Jesus Estanislao
into the negotiations in March 1991 was a further indication of
the economic importance of the bases to the Philippine
government.
* * *
Vicente B. Valdepeñas, Jr. and Gemelino M. Bautista's The
Emergence of the Philippine Economy is a concise history of
the Philippine economy from the pre-Hispanic period until the
1960s, and Frank H. Golay's The Philippines is an
excellent overview of the 1945-59 period. Romeo M. Bautista, John
H. Power, and others offer a major critique of Philippine
industrialization policy and an argument for liberalizing the
economy in Industrial Promotion Policies in the
Philippines. The argument in favor of continued protectionism
is put forth in Alejandro Lichauco's Nationalist
Economics, and Alichir Ishii's National Development
Policies and the Business Sector in the Philippines explores
several aspects of the interaction between the business sector
and the government. Yujiro Hayami, Ma. Agnes R. Quisumbing, and
Lourdes S. Adriano's Toward an Alternative Land Reform
Paradigm reviews the history of land reform and current
reform efforts, and suggests an alternative policy. The
monopolization and control of export agriculture industries
during the martial law period is examined by Gary Hawes in The
Philippine State and the Marcos Regime. Elias T. Ramos's
Dualistic Unionism and Industrial Relations has the only
extensive discussion of the development of unions in the
Philippines.
An Analysis of the Philippine Economic Crisis, a
collective work of University of the Philippines economists
edited by Emmanuel S. De Dios, provides insight into the 1983
economic crisis. Walden Bello, David Kinley, and Elaine Elinson's
Development Debacle and Robin Broad's Unequal
Alliance criticize World Bank activities in the Philippines.
The Philippine Institute for Development Studies has produced a
number of studies of specific aspects of the economy. Its
Survey of Philippine Development Research series contains
articles that survey research on specific areas of the economy.
Specialized studies include Rosa Linda P. Tidalgo and Emmanuel F.
Esguerra's Philippine Employment in the Seventies, and
James K. Boyce's The Political Economy of External
Indebtedness, which examines the extent of capital flight
from the Philippines.
A Guide to Philippine Economic and Business Information
Sources, edited by David G. Timberman, provides a good
bibliography of newsletters, government documents, and other
material of interest to Philippines businesses. (For further
information and complete citations, see Bibliography).
Data as of June 1991
|
