___________________________________________ UNDERSTANDING THE PHILIPPINE PUBLIC POLICY PROCESS:

An Executive Branch Perspective ______________________________________________________

By: LT ANTONIO F TRILLANES IV PN October 2002 INTRODUCTION

On January 20, 2001, the Philippines was again a witness to another People Power phenomenon, the EDSA Dos, which removed what was perceived as a corrupt and incompetent government under President Joseph E. Estrada and installed then-Vice President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) to power. While some sectors glorified this miraculous occurrence, certain dynamics of the people power phenomenon now have become embedded in the policy process that it threatens the very nature of the process itself. In this light, the Philippines public policy process is, indeed, a very complex, yet interesting object of study. As it would have been ideal to cover both the legislative and executive policy processes, this paper focuses only on the latter with the GMA Administration as the context of the study. To better analyze the policy process, the Stages Heuristic framework or the Stages Approach (Jones, 1970; Anderson, 1975; Brewer and De Leon, 1983) will be used. The stages involved are: (1) agenda setting; (2) policy formulation; (3) legitimation; (4) implementation; and (5) evaluation.

THE POLICY PROCESS

Institutional Framework According to Paul A Sabatier (1999, p. 3), the public policymaking process includes the manner in which problems get conceptualized and brought to the government for solution; governmental institutions formulate alternatives and select policy solutions; and those solutions get implemented, evaluated and revised. From this perspective, several institutional built-in systems for policymaking have been identified. These are functioning within the government structure to cover specific policy agendas, examples of which are: the National Economic Development Authority (NEDA) for socio-economic policies; the National Security Council (NSC) for national security and defense concerns; the Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council (LEDAC) for general legislative agendas; and even local level agencies like Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA) for concerns affecting basic services within Metro Manila. While the last three agencies mentioned do perform certain stages of the policy process, none of them have a more defined and extensive mandate and a more permanent structure than the NEDA. Hence, the NEDA will be used as the unit of analysis to illustrate the executive branch policy process in the country. The NEDA

The NEDA is the highest policymaking body responsible for all aspects of the development program. The NEDA Board is headed by the President with selected Cabinet secretaries and other executive staff officers as members. On the other hand, the NEDA Secretariat is the research arm of the NEDA Board. It provides technical support in matters involving policy development, policy formulation, implementation and evaluation. The NEDA Director-General heads the Secretariat, and is also the Socio-Economic Planning Secretary (per EO Nr 230). The Policy Stream The agenda is normally set after evaluating certain indicators and statistics fed by other government agencies such as the National Statistics Office (NSO), National Statistics and Coordination Board (NSCB), Population Commission (POPCOM), Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) and all the other departments. This agenda would take into consideration (a) the actual performance during the preceding year, (b) new developments and emerging issues in the local and international economies and (c) shifts in the policy emphasis of the administration (NEDA 1995, p. 13-15). To ensure agreement in policy formulation, the Board is assisted by six inter-agency committees, each responsible for specific areas within the development program. One of these is the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC). The DBCC serves as the link between planning and budgeting to guarantee conformity of the national budget with the development plan. In formulating the policy, NEDA utilizes several methodologies classified in the following categories: (a) Econometric Models; (b) Input-Output analysis; (c) Accounting Frameworks; and Project Evaluation and prioritization techniques. These tools have significantly increased the policy analysis and forecasting capabilities of the NEDA (NEDA 1995, p. 18). In short, as designed, policy research and analysis are the foundations in the policy formulation processes. The policy issues covered by the NEDA are: social development (includes education and manpower development, social welfare and community development, health and nutrition, and housing); investment (including evaluation and approval of public sector projects); infrastructure development; trade and tariff matters; and the generation and use of official external assistance. After the tedious process of policy formulation comes the legitimation stage. This comes in the form of the Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan (MTPDP), which is usually promulgated with the first State of the Nation Address (SONA) of the president. The MTPDP encapsulates the bulk of the new policy directions of the Administration. It practically covers the whole range of national policy issues, namely: macroeconomic policies, poverty alleviation, Information and Communications Technology (ICT), tourism, infrastructure development, agriculture, agrarian reform, environment, education, health care, housing, peace and order, and foreign policies. Benchmarks and standards are

stated in both the MTPDP and SONA as tangible targets to be achieved and as measures of the administrations success or failure. The rationale behind the Cabinet-level interagency structure of the NEDA is to forge a consensus at the pre-implementation phase (NEDA 1995, p. 13), since it is the different departments who are actually tasked to implement the various programs stipulated in the MTPDP and other policy declarations. This set-up ensures cohesion and coordination in the implementation phase of the program. Finally, The NEDA has set up periodic feedback and monitoring mechanisms through its attached agencies for the careful evaluation of the program implementation and economic performance, which would become essential inputs to cover policy gaps and the improvements of the policy for the next policy cycle. Problems and Politics Streams Given such impressive backdrop of a coherent system for policymaking, one wonders, why is our country still stuck in the proverbial hole? In answering this perplexing question, we will need to lay down certain elements of the policy environment. There are three streams, which contribute or influence agenda setting and alternative specification. These are: policy, problems and politics (Kingdon 1995, p. 16-18). What was described above centers only on the normal policy stream where the alternatives were selected through certain processes of gradually accumulated knowledge and perspective of specialists. The actors here include academics, researchers, consultants, career bureaucrats, analysts, etc. (Kingdon 1995, p. 17, 200). Problems, meanwhile, are the unexpected crises that arise, which are not usually covered by a particular policy, or crises borne out of a failed policy. Finally, the politics stream refers to the influences that work outside of the institutional policymaking framework. The freak nature of how the GMA administration assumed power has boxed it in a monumental dilemma of trying to meet high expectations of the people, who were promised good governance, new politics and moral regeneration, and accommodate the interests of other EDSA Dos stakeholders. At the same time, it is being preoccupied by the continuous emergence of all sorts of crises. This precarious situation has been exacerbated by the emergence of the new influence players the Catholic Church, with two EDSAs to their credit; the mass media, whose traditional role as observer of events has been transformed into a compelling instrument to manipulate and/or direct public opinion; and now the civil society, who took it upon themselves to rise up and partake of the largesse of power. To resolve this dilemma, the GMA Administration coupled the problems and politics streams. Specifically, the crisis management teams, oversight

committees and task forces it created to facilitate the policy processes to address problems and crises would incorporate and consider political concessions with her EDSA Dos supporters while, in the same breadth, mask the policies created with a populist face to appease and deceive the public to protect its own interests. To illustrate this new policy standpoint, three issues would be fleshed out, namely: (1) the rising criminality, (2) the Purchased Power Adjustment (PPA) issue and (3) the population explosion problem. 1. Rising criminality. After EDSA Dos, a marked rise in criminality was experienced (e.g. kidnap-for-ransom and robbery cases) all over the country. Policy process instrument: Crisis management team Implementing Agency: Philippine National Police (PNP) Policy considerations: (1) Public outcry (particularly the Filipino-Chinese community); (2) Growing public perception that GMA is not in control; and (3) Protect/defend the incompetence/ineffectiveness of Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Jose Lina and PNP Chief Larry Mendoza, who are her EDSA Dos allies Actors: The President, DILG, PNP, concerned agency heads, anti-crime NGOs, media and behind the scenes, the political propagandists, publicists, and media handlers Result of Policy process: GMAs public pronouncements of strongly worded anti-crime policies while having photo ops with crime suspects (However, no new anti-crime drives were given to operating units on the ground.) Effect of policy: The crime rate continued to rise but the effective propaganda strategy employed by the Administration allayed the fears of the Filipino-Chinese community and projected GMA as a no-nonsense leader. At the same time, it distracted the public from the failures of the DILG and PNP leadership. *The non-political solution in this situation should have been the immediate and unceremonious relief of both Secretary Lina and PNP Chief Larry Mendoza for incompetence/ineffectiveness. This act delivers a strong message to the people and the bureaucracy that such incompetence cannot be tolerated, and there would be no sacred cows. This will project GMA as a strong leader with political will, and who is serious in curbing criminality. More importantly, it will send a chilling message to the next appointed DILG Secretary and PNP Chief and compel them to accomplish their mission of keeping our streets safe from criminals. 2. The Purchased Power Adjustment (PPA) issue. There was a growing public outrage regarding the collection of the PPA, which has significantly increased the electric bills of consumers. Policy process instrument: Crisis management team

 Policy considerations: (1) Pressures from the business sector who supported her at EDSA Dos to lower electric rates of industrial users and legitimize the collection of the PPA; and (2) the possible outrage of the affected residential consumers Actors: The Secretaries of Finance and Energy, technocrats from National Power Corporation, Energy Regulatory Commission, the business sectors {e.g. Manila Electric Railroad and Light Company (MERALCO)}, media, and usual retinue of propagandists, publicists and media handlers Result of Policy process: GMA rushes Congress to pass the Electric Power Industry Reform Bill. Meanwhile, a propaganda blitz on the so-called 10point program supposedly for the reduction of power charges was conducted through the media. GMA even promised the people that electric rates would be reduced immediately after its ratification. Effect of Policy: GMAs supporters from the business sector got their reduction of power charges and legitimized the collection of the PPA. The power charges tripled but the potential public outrage was stunted by the effective propaganda employed by the Administration. *The non-political solution should have been to: (1) remove the unjust PPA from the power charges; (2) review IPP contracts and rescind onerous ones; and (3) prosecute those responsible for approving the grossly disadvantageous IPP contracts. However, the EDSA Dos factor came into play and, according to GMAs new politics, the big business groups that supported EDSA Dos must be paid back accordingly. 3. The Population explosion problem. The population problem had been acknowledged by experts (and even GMA herself in one of her speeches) as one of the primary causes of poverty. There were also mounting pressures from multinational organizations/financial institutions for our country to have a population control policy as a requisite for the approval of grants/loans. Policy process instrument: NEDA Policy process (as discussed above) Implementing Agency: Department of Health Policy consideration: Pressures from the Catholic Church and civil society groups, which could lead to loss of political support or another civil unrest Actors: NEDA Board, Secretary of Health, Civil Society groups, the Catholic Church, and media Result of Policy process: A population control policy that promotes only natural methods of birth control Effect of Policy: The population rate is now one of the highest in the world at 2.3% per year. *The non-political solution should have been to implement a comprehensive population management policy that will promote reproductive health care and

basic family planning education to adults as well as making artificial birth control methods (except abortion) accessible to the poor without prejudice to their religious beliefs. Just from these examples, we can see that patronage politics has become the centerpiece of the present public policy process and not surprisingly, with disastrous results.

CONCLUSION
On paper, the present Philippine public policy process is institutional in character, with the NEDA as the primary policymaking body with regard to the development scene. But the workings of the EDSA phenomenon have changed the landscape of policymaking. The role of the civil society groups in influencing agenda-setting has never been more evident than now. Likewise, the Catholic Church and the mass media, realizing their power to make and unmake governments are intruding in the process to the detriment of the majority of the people, who are being deprived of right, sound and viable policies because of political indebtedness, concessions, and the sheer lack of political will. With the incessant fight for power and scarce resources, the highly functional institutional model had been effectively relegated to the background. Now, the elite and interest group molds have come to the fore thus, transforming the policy process itself into nothing but a crisis management cycle focused on the GMA Administrations political survival.

REFERENCES
Anderson, James. 1975. Public Policy-Making. In Paul a Sabatier. ed., Theories of the Policy Process. Colorado: Westview Press Brewer, Gary and Peter de Leon. The Foundation of Policy Analysis. In Paul a Sabatier. ed., Theories of the Policy Process. Colorado: Westview Press Jones, Charles. 1970. Introduction to the Study of Public Policy. In Paul a Sabatier. ed., Theories of the Policy Process. Colorado: Westview Press Kingdon, John W. 1995. Agendas, Alternatives And Public Policies. 2nd ed. New York; Adison-Wesley Sabatier, Paul A 1999. Theories of the Policy Process. Colorado: Westview Press 2001. President Gloria Macapagal Arroyos State of the Nation Adress

2001. The Medium-Term Philippine Development Plan 2001-2004. NEDA. Pasig City 1995. 60 Years of Development Planning in the Philippines: A Commemorative Brochure. NEDA. Pasig City 1986. Executive Order Nr 230 entitled Recognizing the National Economic Development Authority. Malacaang, Manila