High levels of poverty and
inequality have plagued Philippine society since time in memorial. For the past
eight years, poverty has remained unchanged: 21.0 percent in 2006, 20.5 percent
in 2009 and 19.7 percent in 2012 (NCSB, 2012). Being a problem that has lasted
for so long, both government and citizens have developed a highly familiarized,
personalized and depoliticized view of poverty; in other words, poverty has
become nothing more than a personal trouble (Mills, 1959). This dangerously
translates into ineffective government policies and misleading public opinion.
The infamous statement of local celebrity Bianca Gonzales (2013) “Bakit nga ba bine-baby ang mga informal
settlers?” as a reaction to a government policy of providing monetary and
housing assistance to evacuated informal settlers in Quezon City displays the
very limited view of poverty by both government and the public. Much of the
perspectives on poverty today are culturally and historically ignorant, unaware
of the factors of the colonial experience and the global economic order played
in deeply rooting and worsening inequality and poverty in the country (Bello,
2009; McCoy, 2009). However, such a limited view on poverty did not simply
evolve out of the individual mind throughout time due to the longevity of the
issue. The modern social system and the incapability of the human agency to
transverse it has led to the dominance of the economic system in modern society
(Luhmann, 2012). As a result, different social institutions and cultural
practices oriented around the capitalist culture of consumerism and
individualism (Baudrillard 1998) have reinforced the factor of time in shaping
a one-dimensional and inadequate perspective on poverty In the final analysis,
the subtle influence of these institutions and practices have proved to be the
greatest hindrance to solving the problem of poverty in the Philippines.
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Using a structural functionalist
framework, this paper argues that the practices of outreaches and public
service oriented activities have become capitalistic in nature; which, in turn,
contributes to a self-utilitarian, individualistic and depoliticized view of
poverty. Through ethnographic-like research, this paper examines how the
perspective of the youth has shifted from substantive structural causes of
poverty to the pursuit of self-realization. It then roots the argument in the
origins of a consumerist culture that dominates society by investigating the
structures of class and capitalism in perpetuating it. This paper will conclude
by present the general politicized and sociological view on poverty, using the
frameworks of political economy and culture, rooting it in the larger
socio-cultural structure for a more adequate and effective understanding of the
perennial issue of poverty in the Philippines.
II.
Analytical
Framework
Structural functionalism is a broad
perspective from the disciplines of sociology and anthropology that interprets
society as a complex system that is beyond the human beings which comprise it.
Its focal point of analysis are social structures and institutions within
society, how they interact with each other and with individuals within the
social system (Ritzer and Goodman, 2004). Tracing its origins, August Comte (1798-1857)
introduced structural functionalism as a theory of society that emanates from
biology. He finds the organism as a natural model for society; arguing that the
way how an organism relates with its environment, how its parts interrelate
within its overall system, and how it maintains balance is similar to the
operation of a social system (Harper, 2011). Emile Durkheim, in his classic
work Division of Labor (1893),
expands structural functionalism in asking how exactly society is able to
maintain a level of integration similar to those of organisms. He argues that
through interdependency and interaction of individuals with more specialized
roles, or mechanical solidarity, social ‘facts’ or institutions emerge which
are beyond the individual and has a life on its own. For both theorists, the
individual or human agency is downplayed as less deterministic and independent;
individuals only act the roles or functions required of them by the social
system.
Modern theorists develop a more
sophisticated structural functionalist perspective. The German sociologist,
Niklas Luhmann (1997), furthers the deconstruction of an anthropocentric view
of society and argues that individuals are not integral parts of society;
society is a system of communication. It is further divided into autopoeitic
communicative spheres—the economy, politics, family, religion and etc.—that
operate according to their respective functions based on their own medium and
codes. Individuals do not so much act independently but rather participate in
the function of a specific communicative sphere by using its medium (Moeller,
2006). That is, the individual merely traverses the different communicative
spheres; he does not exist in himself, he exists as part of a social sphere. The inter-relations of these communicative
spheres make up the entire social system. Luhmann, however, emphasizes that in
a highly modern society, no communicative sphere will dominate or be the
overarching steerer of society unlike the dominance of religion and the family
of traditional societies.
Jean Baudrillard (1998) makes an in depth
investigation of the economic sphere, the structure of capitalism and its role
of propagating a consumerist culture. He argues that human beings have a
‘natural propensity to happiness’ that is mobilized by the myth of equality;
the core principle of liberalism that underlies the structure of global
capitalism. Happiness is then measured in terms of objects and signs which the
individual consumes. It is removed from any collective sense; as being fuelled
by egalitarianism, happiness is based on individualistic principles. Propagated
by the structures of capitalism and consumerism, the myth of egalitarianism is
made real through an equalization of consumption, even in the face of absolute
inequality.
III.
Depoliticising
Poverty
Consumerism and
Individualism in Outreach Programs
In an NSTP pagpapalalim session, participants are asked to reflect on the
semester-long outreach activities that were conducted. Composing of students
who mostly come from similar middle class backgrounds, the reflections they
gave also followed a common theme—NSTP has been a source for self-actualisation
or “feel-good” sentiments. A number of students commented that they “felt good”
helping people less fortunate than they. Another number of students said that
it allowed them to “break out from their comfort zones” and that it was
“fulfilling” to participate in such humanitarian activities. When asked about
what they think they could do to further help the less fortunate, the class was
united in answering “remind them to do well in school and make right
decisions.”
It
is clear from the anecdotal evidences that the practices of outreach and other
public service oriented activities, which are so often engaged in by the youth,
have been means for self-actualization and fulfillment. The unifying theme of
all the reflections of the NSTP participants have been oriented around
self-focused words such as “felt good” and “fulfilling.” As much as
self-oriented their reflections were, their view on poverty and the plight of
the less fortunate is just as individualistic—to win against poverty, the less
fortunate must individually excel in activities increasing social mobility.
Tracing Consumerism and Individualism
in the Structures of Class and Capitalism
It
is convenient to account such a personal-utilitarian and depoliticized view of
poverty to the unique conditions of the individual. However, it is grossly
mistaken. According to structural functionalists, the individual is
insignificant; it is the larger social structures that make up society which
determine the predispositions of the individual (Ritzer and Goodman, 2004).
Analysing the described phenomenon in such terms entails a close examination of
the practices of outreaches and service-oriented activities in the context of
the larger social institutions and structures in which they are embedded in. As
argued earlier, the reflections of the youth reveal an individualistic,
self-focused view and the very manner in which outreach activities are carried
out has a very capitalistic nature. Under these conditions, poverty becomes a
commodified form of self-actualization and happiness that is consumed by the
youth through outreach activities.
Using
such a framework, outreach activities and the likes are revealed as commodities
that are instrumental to the very survival of capitalism. Systems function to
survive (Luhmann, 2012); the high levels of sophistication of the modern
capitalist system allows it to coopt anti-capitalist activities and transform
them into capitalistic ones. On the
surface, charitable acts such as these appear to go against the very
individualistic principles of capitalism; but a critical analysis reveals that
such acts have resembled an industry that merely reproduces the capitalist
system.
The
strong structures of capitalism and class have contributed to the dominance of
the consumerist culture that is observed even in supposedly non-capitalist, to
an extent anti-capitalist, activities such as outreaches and other public service
oriented activities (Hickel, 2013).
According to Baudrillard (1997), consumerism is built on the hegemony of
the liberal-capitalist idea that the biological propensity of human beings for
happiness can be achieved through equality. However, Baudrillard is critical of
the concept of equality, arguing that equality is a myth perpetuated by a
capitalist system that lives on its existence. To his mind, equality is not
considered in absolute terms; but in terms of objects and other manifest signs
of success and happiness. In other words, the happiness of an individual is
based on the objects he consumes.
The
manner which outreach activities are carried out show that it is highly
oriented around the manifest signs and objects of well-being (Baudrillard,
1997), a characteristic of consumerism. Outreach activities are commonly
programmed into three parts: activities, feeding and goods giving.
First,
the activities that are being done are usually in the form of games and other
fun exercises, under the simple purpose of “giving joy and making them (the
poor) forget of their troubles even for a while.” Sometimes, it is even
noticeable that some of the activities have become sources of enjoyment for the
facilitators instead, while some of the target participants have become
uninterested. When a happiness is manifested through smiles and laughter, the
program is deemed to be a success. In other cases, activities are oriented
around education; teaching the target participants about the environment,
leadership, literacy or financial literacy. While such are indeed important,
the teachings merely reinforce the existing liberal-capitalist idea of “every
man for himself.” It frames a way of thinking that poverty is caused by lack of
skill instead of “a collapse in the structure of opportunities” (David, 2000).
The plight of participants are attributed to their individual failure, emptying
the argument of the failure of the system they are trapped in.
Second
and the last, feeding programs and goods giving replicate exactly what
Baudrillard critiques as the myth of egalitarianism before consumption. For a
brief moment in time, the inequality between the privileged facilitators and
the underprivileged participants is blurred as they are able to consume the
same food and goods. It also becomes a direct form of consumerism, one can only
speculate how much capitalist firms have profited from such charitable
activities.
On
the surface, outreach and other charitable activities reflect countercultural
and anti-capitalist values; however it did not take long before a powerful
capitalist system was able to co-opt such ethics. Such acts of
counter-capitalism are neutralized and channeled back into new forms of
virtuous-consumption (Hickel, 2013). Sociologist Slavoj Zizek (2009) calls this
the “redemptive quality of consumerism”—in the act of consumption, the
consumers are not only buying their redemption from mainstream capitalism, but
also its vicious effects on the world. As argued, outreach and charitable
activities have become part of these “virtuous commodities” (Hickel and Khan
2012). Sociologist Jason Hickel (2013) puts it well “people think of this as a
countercultural process – a process by which the individual resists society –
but in fact it has become essential to the reproduction of capitalism, for the
primary method of self-realization has become consumption.”
The
infiltration of the capitalist system and liberal ideology into non-capitalist
activities has been an evolutionary process of history. As noted before, German
sociologist Niklas Luhmann (1997) argued that in a modern society, no one
social sphere dominates the system; not even the economic system. However, even
Luhmann admits that modernity is an evolutionary process that still continues
to occur in society today. Scholars have also argued that Luhmann is more
post-modern than he is modern (Moeller, 2006). In his famous the end of history
thesis, Francis Fukuyama (1992) argues that the victory of the west in the cold
war marked the end of history; the end of an ideological evolution and the
universalization of Western liberalism and capitalism as political and economic
orders, respectively. Liberalism, as an ideology, is largely apolitical; with
emphasis on individual rights and on compromise (Heywood, 2007), it breeds a
centrist ideology and argues that the individual lives and dies by his own
hand. The dominating victory of
capitalism and liberalism as the hegemonic forces of the world order explains
how even anti-capitalist activities such as outreaches and charities are
transformed into vehicles for consumerism and individual self-actualization,
empty of any political critique of the larger social structure of the liberal
world order as a possible root cause of poverty.
IV.
Conclusion
The American sociologist C. Wright Mills
(1959) says it right: “when, in a city of 100,000, only one man is unemployed,
that is his personal trouble, and for its relief we properly look to the
character of the man, his skills, and his immediate opportunities. But when in
a nation of 50 million employees, 15 million men are unemployed, that is an
issue, and we may not hope to find its solution within the range of
opportunities open to any one individual.”
Indeed, poverty, at its high levels in the
Philippines, is beyond the milieu of the individual; poverty is a public issue
that roots itself in the fundamental structure of Philippine society as it is
embedded in the larger global political economy.
Baudrillard
furthers his argument about consumerism and capitalism by including the structure
of class. He argues that capitalism is a function of inequality; its survival
as a system is highly dependent upon the maintenance of an order of privilege
and class. The inequality that is inherent in capitalism is blurred by the myth
of egalitarianism pushed by consumerism. The function of class and privilege is
“precisely to reproduce caste and class privilege” (1997). In other words, the
survival of a capitalist system is dependent upon the maintenance of inequality
and class difference as it is hidden behind the façade of consumerism. However,
while Baudrillard emphasizes that “the system knows only the conditions of its
survival, it knows nothing of social and individual contents”, opportunities
for redistribution and genuine equality lies in the social structure. However,
in the Philippines, such a structure has broken down.
In
his famous book The Anarchy of Families,
Alfred McCoy (2009) traces inequality in the Philippines through the power
structure that privileges a minority over the majority. The power structure of
Philippine society has largely been built by the Spanish and American
colonizers. During the Spanish colonial period, families who cooperated with
the Spanish colonizers in their divide and rule strategy lorded over fellow
Filipinos with vast amounts of land or haciendas granted to
them. These haciendas were incomparable in terms of size to
that of any other Southeast Asian country. American colonial policy further
exacerbated this by giving the landed oligarchs institutional access to the
state apparatus. When the privileged minority is able to control the state, the
only institution powerful enough to redistribute wealth to the underprivileged
is rendered useless in this regard.
It
is disappointing to see the ignorance or sheer hypocrisy of policymakers in the
Philippines to address the issue of poverty. According to Filipino sociologist
Randolf David (1999), every administration had attempted to solve poverty while
choosing to turn a blind eye to the larger social structure that maintains it.
Cory Aquino treated it as a matter of charity, Ramos viewed it as an inevitable
consequence of economic development, and Estrada treated it hand in hand with
development. However, all these efforts merely reproduce the inherently unequal
capitalist system, hypocritically legitimizing it as a solution to poverty.
Indeed, Baudrillard (1997) says it best, “if poverty and nuisance cannot be
eliminated, this is because they are anywhere but in the poor neighbourhoods.
They are not in the slums or shanty-towns, but in the socio-economic
structure.” When the economic elites are also the ones steering the state, any
radical change to the unequal structure of Philippine society will never
happen.
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