Children and Politics in the Philippines: Socialization for Stability in a Highly Stratified

Society
Author(s): Justin J. Green
Source: Asian Survey, Vol. 17, No. 7 (Jul., 1977), pp. 667-678
Published by: University of California Press
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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE
PHILIPPINES: SOCIALIZATION FOR
STABILITY IN A HIGHLY STRATIFIED
SOCIETY

Justin J. Green*

THE IMPORTANT EARLY studies in the field of political

socialization linked socialization's role in inculcating political attitudes,
values, and norms with the stability of the political system. In general,
these works argued that the high levels of system trust and affection
(generally measured by the level of benevolence exhibited toward poli-
tical authorities) acquired by young people of all social classes con-
tributed to this stability.1 Although other political orientations such as
efficacy and participation were seen as influential, it was high affect that
was the most important explanatory variable in the stability equation.2

* The data for this article were gathered during 1966-1967 while I was in the
Philippines as a Fulbright Graduate Fellow.
1 Fred I. Greenstein, Children and Politics (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1965); David Easton and Jack Dennis, Children in the Political System (New York:
McGraw-Hill, 1969); and R. D. Hess and Judith V. Torney, The Development of
Political Attitudes in Children (Garden City: Doubleday, 1973). As Searing has
pointed out, this argument is based on the primacy principle: "childhood learning
is relatively enduring throughout life" and attitudes learned early severely con-
strain future behavior. Donald Searing, Joel J. D. Schwartz, and Allen E. Lind,
"The Structuring Principle: Political Socialization and Belief Systems," American
Political Science Review, LXVII (June 1973). The validity of the primacy principle
has been questioned by data dealing with the stability of children's attitudes
[Pauline M. Vaillancourt, "The Stability of Children's Survey Responses," Public
Opinion Quarterly, 37 (1973), pp. 373-387; P. Vaillancourt and R. Niemi, "Children's
Party Choices," in R. G. Niemi, ed., The Politics of Future Citizens (San Francisco:
Josey-Bass, 1974); R. Sigel and M. Brookes, "Becoming Critical About Politics," in
Niemi, Politics of Future Citizens] and on methodological grounds such as the
usefulness of structured interviews when used on children [F. Greenstein and S.
Tarrow, Sage Professional Papers in Comparative Politics, No. 01-009 (Beverly
Hills: Sage, 1970); Jeanne N. Knutson, "Prepolitical Ideologies: The Basis of Politi-
cal Learning," in Niemi, Politics of Future Citizens].
2 Hess and Torney find that although class difference has little to do with
affect, it does influence both the acceptance of authority figures, efficacy, and par-
ticipation. Hess and Torney, Development of Political Attitudes, pp. 145-197.
Greenstein finds slightly higher affect among lower class children. Greenstein, Ch
dren and Politics.

667

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668 JUSTIN J. GREEN

Later works cast doubt on these earlier findings.3 The later data
suggested that among the economically deprived and socially isolated
children of black and ethnic groups or among children of lower social
class backgrounds, high feelings of affection toward the political system
were less likely to be found. The inference that could be drawn from
these later results was that system instability might occur if these groups,
with their low levels of system affect, were of sufficient size or impor-
tance.
A partial explanation for the inconsistency of these findings might
be that later works are measuring distinct subcultures within the Amer-
ican political system, and, as cultural cleavages often overlap with social
class position, these studies are confounding subcultural and class views.
Indeed, given the relatively collapsed class structure in the United
States the methods used to measure social class difference in most of the
socialization literature is highly suspect.4 If our purpose is to under-
stand the effect of social stratification on political stability, we must
distinguish between class and subcultural behavior patterns. One way
to distinguish the two patterns is to examine culturally homogeneous
societies with highly stratified social class systems. For example, Hess,
in reporting on Chile (a society that would appear to meet these cri-
teria), has noted that in contrast to the American findings reported
above there is "a greater emphasis among working class children of the
benign qualities (of the leader) at early ages."5 Beyond Hess' effort there
is little other data reported from societies which meet both the homo-
geneity and class stratification criteria. The Philippines, from which
the data for this article are drawn, would appear to satisfy both criteria.
In a highly stratified society in which most of the benefits accrue to
a small group at the top of the status heap, it would seem logical to
expect that the unrewarded many would be demanding-either overtly
or covertly-a greater share of the economic, political, and social re-
wards and that a possible consequence of these demands might be sys-
tem instability. If, however, these strong demands are nonexistent, and
system stability exists despite high levels of social stratification, we
might infer that lower-class adults as compared with upper-class adults

3 Dean Jaros, Herbert Hirsch, and Fredrich J. Fleron, Jr., "The Malevolent
Leader: Political Socialization in an American Sub-Culture," American Political
Science Review, LXII (June 1968), pp. 564-575; E. Greenberg, "Black Children and
the Political System," Public Opinion Quarterly, 34 (1970), pp. 333-345; Dean Jaros
and Kenneth L. Kolson, "The Multifarious Leader of Political Socialization of
Amish, Yanks, Blacks," in Niemi, Politics of Future Citizens.
4 For example, the Easton, Hess, and Torney Chicago Study data use respondent-
reported father's occupation as the basis of its social class scale and locate 45.7% of
respondents as middle class and 45.4% as upper class. In addition, the correlation
between respondents' reports of fathers' occupations and the data taken from school
files where available was only .64. Hess and Torney, Development of Political Atti-
tudes, Table 01, Appendix A, p. 262.
5 R. D. Hess, "The Socialization of Attitudes Toward Political Authority-Some
Cross National Comparisons," International Social Science, XIV (1963), pp. 542-559.

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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE PHILIPPINES 669

are better socialized to legitimizing attitudes of high affection for the

system, low efficacy, and low cynicism. Further, from the primacy prin-
ciple, which suggests that these different adult attitudes are acquired
during early childhood, we could hypothesize that lower-class children
as compared with upper-class children would be found at significantly
different levels on scales measuring these basic political orientations. It
is this hypothesis we tested in the Philippine setting.

Politics in the Philippines

Philippine political life is the result of the intersection of several

major forces. First, there is the indigenous Malay culture with its
emphasis on the equalitarian extended family and its wide network of
horizontal multistranded dyadic relationships. These exchange networks
constrained the acquisition of power and economic resources and
tended to disburse widely decision-making roles. Second, almost four
hundred years of Spanish hegemony converted the equalitarian family
system into multilayered patron-client networks, which contributed to
and were supported by a social class system consisting of a small group
of very rich landholders and a large mass of poor peasants.6 The Span-
ish occupation, however, failed to shatter the bilateral extended family,
which continued to provide support for all its members and underwrote
the myth (and occasionally the reality) of mobility.7 Third, a half cen-
tury of American presence overlaid these networks with American-style
democratic institutions including the tripartite division of political
power, a bureaucracy staffed by civil service employees, and an Ameri-
can-style educational system replete with the English language, the Pro-
testant work ethic, snow scenes at Christmas, and the liberal democratic
credo. All this Americanization, however, had only a minimal effect on
the existing distribution of political and economic power.8 The Filipino
who emerged from these multifaceted experiences has a set of values
and behaviors that enable him to mesh rather smoothly with this
dualistic world of American institutions and an indigenous social
system.
With regard to subcultural differences and class structures, it can
be said that despite the continued existence of linguistic and other
cultural divisions among Filipinos, in the main, family and value sys-
tems tend toward homogeneity. Further, despite social structural ties

6 Land6 has documented the vertical dyadic nature of the Philippine political
system. Carl H. Land6, "Networks and Groups in Southeast Asia: Some Observations
on the Group Theory of Politics," American Political Science Review, LXVII (March
1973), pp. 103-127. The notion of multistrandecdness and its effect have been dis-
cussed by Wolf. Eric Wolf, Peasants (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1966).
7 F. Landa Jocano, ed., Filipino Cultural Heritage-A Lecture Series, No. 2
(Manila: Philippine Womens University, 1966).
8 David Wurfel, "The Philippines" in G. T. Kahin, ed., Government and Politics
in Southeast Asia (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1959).

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670 JUSTIN J. GREEN

that tend to mitigate class disparities, wide gaps in life style persist be-
tween classes.
Before proceeding, a caveat is necessary. Our data elicit a set of
children's attitudes using questions that have their roots in the Ameri-
can institutional setting. Thus, though we may infer from our findings
relationships between the attitudes uncovered and the stability of the
democratic institutions that existed in the Philippines until 1972, the
possibility exists that these orientations, though relevant in Western
society, are irrelevant to the Filipino's ability to function in his real
political world.9
An example of what we mean here is the concept of political
efficacy. This attitudinal or psychological dimension has been much
favored as an explanatory variable in the study of American political
behavior. In the American context it has been argued that a sense of
efficacy is a prerequisite to self-recruitment to voting and other forms
of political participation. The Philippine political system, however,
comprised as it is of vertical dyadic networks, tends to recruit people to
participation for the sake of survival, regardless of whether or not they
have a highly developed sense of efficacy. Under these conditions it
seems valid to question the cross cultural validity of political efficacy.
In general, the question is whether the political attitudes found in
Western societies are necessary components of a Filipino's mix of
political orientations. This question should be kept in mind when we
examine the Philippine data.

Methods and Data

The data presented here were obtained by a partial replication of

Greenstein's New Haven Study.'0 All fourth, fifth, and sixth grade
pupils from four Manila elementary schools were interviewed using a
pen and pencil questionnaire. The schools, two public and two private,
were deliberately chosen because each enrolled a distinct socioeconomic
range of pupils. One public school was located in the heart of the
"Tondo" district, Manila's poorest; the second was also in a poor dis-
trict but one not quite so poverty stricken as "Tondo." The two private
schools attract relatively high (but not the highest) status children. Their
pupils tend to come from a mix of middle- and upper-class families."
Although each teacher in each class received a personal explanation
of how the instrument should be used, no observers were present during

9 Lester W. Milbrath, Political Participation (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1965).

10 Greenstein, for example, has noted the difference between the ego-defensive
view of authoritarianism, which may be applicable within the American cultural
milieu where authoritarianism is not the norm, and the cognitive theory, which
suggests that authoritarianism is based on "simple learning of the conceptions of
reality prevalent in one culture." Greenstein, "Personality and Political Socialization
in the Theories of Authoritarianism and Democratic Character," The Annals, Sep-
tember 1963.
11 Greenstein, Children and Politics.

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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE PHILIPPINES 671

the questionnaire administration period, and thus no effort was made

to insure that the directions were followed. Even though English was
the medium of instruction in Philippine public and private schools,
the level of student language competence appeared quite low. This was
particularly true in the public schools and it may account for the num-
bers of questions that remained either unanswered or were answered
"don't know." Language competency may also have effected the results
in other unaccountable ways. A total of 1100 respondents were inter-
viewed, but because of the above problems, the number (N) examined
below do not approach this level. Despite these methodological prob-
lems, it is felt that the data represent a reasonably accurate picture of
the attitudes of Manila youngsters ages 9-13. Whether these findings
can be generalized to the entire country is a question that cannot be
answered here.

Affect

Three questions will be examined in order to measure this sam-

ple's feelings toward the political system. The first question is, "Who
do you want to be like?" The answers were coded into four categories.
One category contained those who named either the president of the
Philippines or his wife; the second, those who named a Philippine cul-
tural hero; the third, those who named a contemporary opposition
political figure; and the fourth, those who made other choices such as
an actor, actress, or sports figure. Respondents who didn't answer or
replied "don't know" are not included in Table 1.
The percentages in each category by age and socioeconomic status
are shown in Table 1. The data indicate that at the age of nine children
of lower socioeconomic status (SES) identify with a Philippine political
or cultural hero to a greater degree than children from high SES back-
grounds. As lower-status children grow older, this identification remains

TABLE 1: Who Philippine Children Would Want to be Like, By Age and Socio-
economic Status (SES)
High SES Low SES

Age Age
9 10 11 12 13 9 10 11 12 13

(in percent) (in percent)

Philippine President
or His Wife 31 18 25 1 17 40 32 31 51 26
Philippine Cultural Hero 31 48 23 16 17 40 34 51 22 59
Contemporary Opposition
Figure - 4 - 15 3 - 6 5 4 3
Other 38 30 52 68 63 20 28 13 23 12

NUMBER 16 23 31 19 24 5 46 73 68 34

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672 JUSTIN J. GREEN

high, whereas among high social status children aging is associated with
a rather rapid decrease in identification with political figures or cul-
tural heroes.
Table 2 is a collapsed version of Table 1 and was created by con-
sidering the first three categories as indicative of high affect and
eliminating age as a variable. As can be seen, there is a strong and
significant positive relationship (Q = .575 p <.01) between low status
and high identification with Philippine political figures or cultural
heroes. Although it might be argued that the category of Philippine
opposition political figure does not measure high affect, the numbers
in these cells are too small to affect the high correlation or the signifi-
cance level of the results.

TABLE 2: Collapsed Version of Table 1

High SES Children Low SES Children

High Affect 180 53

Low Affect 44 59
NOTE: Q = .575 correlation significant by one-tailed "Z" test at the 01 level

Two additional questions were examined in order to clarify the

effects of social class on benevolent feelings toward leaders. The ques-
tions were: (1) Does the president of the Philippines do a good job?
and (2) Does the mayor of Manila do a good job? The distribution of
the responses to these questions are shown in Table 3.

TABLE 3: Filipino Children's Responses to the Questions: (1) Does the president
do a good job? and (2) Does the mayor do a good job?, by Age and Socio-
economic Status (SES)

High SES Low SES

Age Age
9 10 11 12 13 9 10 11 12 13

(in percent) (in percent)

President
Very Good & Fairly Good 96 95 98 94 98 100 98 98 93 91
Not Very Good & Bad 4 5 2 6 2 - 2 2 7 9

NUMBER 28 60 65 79 44 11 76 118 142 47

(in percent) (in percent)

Mayor
Very Good & Fairly Good 83 91 84 82 70 100 86 90 86 95
Not Very Good & Bad 17 9 16 18 30 0 14 10 14 5

NUMBER 30 47 59 51 37 11 76 106 122 41

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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE PHILIPPINES 673

In response to the question about the kind of job the president

does, an overwhelming number of children, regardless of social class
or age, felt that the president does a very good or fairly good job. When
this table was collapsed, there was no significant correlation between
social status and feelings about the president's performance. There are
several possible explanations for these results. At the time of the survey
(1966), President Marcos was at the height of his popularity and was
widely publicized and perceived as doing a good job. This media effect
may have washed out any class-induced attitudinal differences which
otherwise might have existed. In addition, the Philippine president is
to most children a fairly remote figure and is portrayed by both the
media and the school system as the symbol of the nation. In a develop-
ing society that stresses nationalism in its educational system, it is
probable that children of all social classes are socialized to positive
attitudes toward the prime national symbol.
When we examine children's perceptions of the kind of job
Manila's mayor does, our results change. The dyadic networks of
patron-client politics tend to increase in strength at the local level
and thus affect lower-class people more, making the mayor of Manila
an important and controversial figure. His efforts affect such things as
the availability of water, the adequacy of trash collection services, and
the relative corruptibility of the police, etc. Therefore, the results of
his efforts are either directly encountered by young children or come
to them mediated by their parents' feelings. In poor areas, Manila pro-
vides few services so one would expect poorer children to denigrate
the mayor's performance. Wealthy areas receive the majority of the
benefits the mayor provides and wealthy children should accord him
high marks. Quite the contrary is the case. As we see in Table 3, chil-
dren of low status applaud the mayor's performance to a greater degree
than their higher-status cohorts. The difference becomes more pro-
nounced as the children become older. It is possible that these higher
levels of affect among disadvantaged children are the result of particu-
laristic, less visible benefits that filter directly down the vertical dyads
from the mayor to the poorer children's parents. If this is the case,
then these higher levels of affect for the mayor among lower-class chil-
dren may be seen either as a rational or an emotively based attitude.
A collapsed version of Table 3 yields a Q correlation of .26 between low
status and high affect. This correlation is significant by a one-tailed Z
test at the .05 level.
We have sought here to ascertain the effects of social class on
Filipino children's feelings toward their leaders. Our data, thoug
limited, has tended to suggest that the attitudes of poorer children a
positively and significantly correlated with greater affection and trus
for societies' leaders and thus our hypothesis receives partial support.

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674 JUSTIN J. GREEN

Efficacy

We have noted that Philippine society is highly stratified and that

social mobility is rather limited. But due to the nature of the social
structure, many participate in politics and subjectively feel that in so
doing they obtain important benefits, although objectively only a few
are highly rewarded. Given this subjectively positive evaluation of
politics by most Filipinos, we might expect to find little or no differences
in efficacy levels between low and high status children.
The first question used to measure efficacy was, "How would you
change the world if you could?" The answers were coded into three
categories: (1) those who chose a political means or end, for example,
"I would give people more to eat" or "I would stop war"; (2) those who
proposed a nonpolitical end or personal change, for example, "I would
make no more typhoons" or "I wish to be prettier"; and (3) those who
responded "don't know." In order to separate political efficacy from
other forms, it was decided that only those whose response fit the first
category would be considered as politically efficacious, while those who
responded "don't know" were categorized as having low efficacy. Table
4 indicates the political efficacy of Filipino children controlled for age
and social status.

TABLE 4: Political Efficacy of Filipino Children, By Age and Socioeconomic

Status (SES)
High SES Low SES

Age Age
9 10 11 12 13 9 10 11 12 13

(in percent) (in percent)

High Efficacy 39 42 52 63 46 25 20 27 37 22
Low Efficacy 61 58 48 37 54 75 80 73 63 78

NUMBER 23 36 57 56 30 8 56 86 114 41

The results here are rather startling. By age 10 the percentage of

high-status children reporting high efficacy is almost twice that of low-
status children. As these children grow older, the differences become
even more pronounced. At age 10 there is a 20% differential between
children which increases at age 12 to 36%. The collapsed version of
this data, Table 5, indicates a strong and significant correlation (Q =
.43 p < .01) between low social class and low efficacy. The question
here is, How can we explain these results in the light of most Filipinos'
instrumental and subjectively positive evaluation of political participa-
tion? The answer is that what we appear to have measured is the upper-
class children's belief that the world is more open to human interven-
tion rather than lower-class children's orientations toward political
effectiveness.

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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE PHILIPPINES 675

TABLE 5: Collapsed Version of Table 4

High SES Low SES

High Efficacy 107 91

Low Efficacy 101 219
NOTE: Q = .43 correlation significant by a one-tailed "Z" test at the .01 level.

Thus, although most Filipinos regardless of class may perceive

politics as providing rewards, upper-class children are more likely to
see these as a result of their own activity whereas lower-class children
probably feel that political outcomes are more related to luck than to
deliberate actions. The former orientation tends to produce higher
levels of and more efficient political participation, while the latter
leads to lower levels of expectation.
The second question used to measure efficacy had to do with chil-
dren's perceptions of whether they would vote in the future (see Table
6). This question does not differentiate efficacy as well as the previous

TABLE 6: Filipino Children's Future Voting Patterns, By Age and Socioeconomic

Status (SES)
High SES Low SES

Age Age
9 10 11 12 13 9 10 11 12 13

(in percent) (in percent)

Will Vote 60 51 75 71 80 73 72 78 88 92
Will Not Vote 5 5 10 5 6 9 10 8 8 4
Don't Know 35 44 15 24 14 18 18 14 4 4

NUMBER 38 72 89 85 49 11 85 132 157 54

one, although the percentages do indicate

class effect. There are several possible explanations for the weak rela-
tionship between status and efficacy on the issue of future voting. First,
those of upper SES levels may perceive the vote as an unrealistic means
for influencing political outcomes.'2 Second, rather widespread "vote
buying" brings many lower-status adult Filipinos to the polls and thus
lower-class children observing the monetary payoffs to their parents for
voting might perceive future voting as a realistic choice.

Realism-Cynicism

The last dimension to be examined is that of political cynicism.

12 It should be noted that although in the Philippines there is a gap separating

middle class from upper classes, the disparity is even greater between the middle
and lower SES groups. Chester Hunt, et al., Sociology in the Philippine Setting
(Quezon City: Phoenix Press, 1963).

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676 JUSTIN J. GREEN

Milbrath points out that the findings reported in the literature on

cynicism are mixed. Although several studies have indicated that cynical
adults participate in politics to a lesser degree, the results are far from
conclusive. The data relating social class to cynicism is also inconsistent.
Some studies find such a relationship, others none.
We will examine here the answers to two questions which we
initially considered to be measuring the level of cynicism of this sam-
ple. If cynicism was the dimension tapped, then the results as shown in
Tables 7 and 8 are consistent with other data reported for the Philip-
pines.13 High-status children are more cynical than their lower-status

TABLE 7: The Responses of Filipino Children to the Questions: (1) Is there a

difference between political parties in the Philippines, and (2) Does it make a
difference which side wins an election?, by Age and Socioeconomic Status (SES)
High SES Low SES

Age Age
9 10 11 12 13 9 10 11 12 13

(in percent) (in percent)

Party Difference
Yes 42 52 30 42 49 60 70 57 60 52
No 58 48 70 58 51 40 30 43 40 48

NUMBER 19 27 58 57 37 5 46 88 109 38

(in percent) (in percent)

Outcome Difference
Yes 11 0 11 13 12 0 15 2 40 28
No 89 100 89 87 88 100 85 98 60 72

TABLE 8: Collapsed Version of Table 7

High SES Low SES
Party Difference
Yes 81 170
No 117 116
NOTE: Q = -.35 correlation significant by one-tailed "Z" test at the .01 level
Outcome Difference
Yes 8 16
No 72 102
NOTE: Q = -.16 correlation significant by one-tailed "Z" test at the .05 level

13 In the Philippines, the author's study of women leaders found that the
higher the rank of the leader-and rank was a function of participation in decision-
making-the more politically cynical the leader was. However, at no time did the
level of cynicism in Filipino leaders approach that reported in other national
leadership samples. Justin J. Green, "Social Backgrounds, Attitudes and Political
Behavior-A Study of A Philippine Elite," Southeast Asia, 2:3, 1973, pp. 301-336.

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 CHILDREN AND POLITICS IN THE PHILIPPINES 677

cohorts. The two questions used to measure cynicism were: (1) Is there
a difference between political parties in the Philippines?, and (2) Does
it make a difference which side wins an election?
Tables 7 and 8 indicate that a significant dimension is being mea-
sured. In Table 7 the correlation between low status and cynicism is
high (Q = .35 p <.01). In the case of Table 8, the association is less
strong, though still significant (Q = .16 p <.05). The questions is, Is
political cynicism the dimension we are measuring? Probably not. Here
the problem of the cross-cultural validity of questions seems most evi-
dent. The questions as seen through the eyes of Filipino youngsters
seem to be tapping a combination of two elements. The first of these is
knowledge about how the system really works. The social studies text-
books to which these children are exposed discuss political parties and
party politics in terms which suggest that they play a meaningful role
in the political process. Since the system was modeled after that of the
United States, it is assumed in these texts that the Philippine system
works in a similar manner. Indeed, the parties in their election propa-
ganda had in the past attempted to make such a case, arguing that there
was a real ideological and issue position difference between them. In
reality, however, parties differed very little on issues and policy decisions
seemed unrelated to changes in the party in power.
The second element tapped is the degree to which children's atti-
tudes parallel the ideal rather than the real version of society. These
attitudes may be gained either from the child's parents or from the
primary school environment. It seems probable that among upper-
status children the socialization process is discontinuous, the home
atmosphere strongly emphasizing the realities of the system, the school
emphasizing the ideal. Lower-status parents, however, have grown up
with a set of political attitudes that include high affect, low efficacy,
and less cynicism (higher idealism), and it would seem likely these
parents would communicate to their children the ideal version of society
rather than the real. Thus, for lower-class children the socialization
process is relatively more continuous with the ideal versions of the so-
ciety emphasized both in the home and in the school.
No matter whether one says that upper-class children's attitudes
are more cynical or some combination of greater realism and less
idealism or that lower-class children are positively associated with
attitudes of lower cynicism, less realism, and more idealism, a strong
relationship does exist between class and these attitudes. It would
appear from these data that higher-status children are better prepared
to deal with the realities of the political system; therefore, as adults they
are more likely to have their demands satisfied. Lower-class children
on the other hand would tend to idealize the system. This idealization
combined with the children's high affect and low efficacy suggests that
these attitudes, if they persist into adulthood, might in the future legiti-
mize system outputs even if these outputs are unresponsive to the policy
preferences of the adults.

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678 JUSTIN J. GREEN

Conclusions

There are, as stated earlier, valid methodological questions that

surround this data, questions for which we have provided only partially
satisfactory answers. This, of course, casts some doubt on the results
reported. Nevertheless, the data suggest that in Manila, lower-class
children learn a different set of political attitudes and orientations than
children of high social status. If the attitudes, orientations, and be-
haviors they learn as children persist into adulthood, then as adults
they are better prepared to be observers rather than meaningful partici-
pants in the political arena. Despite the fact that as adults they may
receive few of society's rewards, the level of affection toward the politi-
cal system and its leaders acquired during childhood enables them to
view the system's outputs as legitimate. By such behavior they contri-
bute to political system stability which, at minimum, allows them to
pursue their economic survival with the reasonable certainty that at
least tomorrow will come.

JUSTIN J. GREEN is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Villanova Uni-

versity, Villanova, Pennsylvania.

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