The relationship between landlords and democracy constitutes an important dimension in democratic studies. Existing structuralist and rational-choice approaches generally regard landlords as a social force detrimental to democratization. However, the symbiotic relationship between landlords and democracy in the Philippines challenges conventional theories.
Spanish and American colonial rule introduced private land ownership and liberal democracy to the Philippines through dual economic and political empowerment. The resulting landlord elite secured political power through competitive elections to preserve and balance class interests, thereby achieving integration with democracy and giving rise to feudal democracy.
Its underlying mechanism is that when the popular-democratic essence of democracy is reduced to procedural electoral democracy, democracy instead becomes an instrument for protecting the dominant class. Feudal democracy is a major cause of the Philippines' governance dilemmas.
The theoretical implication of this significant political phenomenon is that liberal democracy centered on competitive elections is essentially designed to protect private property rights. In practice, "liberal democracy" can assume the form of capitalist oligarchy, feudal oligarchy, or other oligarchical types, all of which lead to severe social inequality and governance difficulties.
In the political development of the developing world, the combination of liberal democracy and feudal social institutions has given rise to a widespread political system or model of democracy known as feudal democracy, a form of oligarchic democracy. The Philippines represents a typical case. This model poses numerous challenges to democratic theory, and this paper focuses on the major challenges it presents to research on the relationship between landlords and democracy.
Existing studies on this relationship can be divided into two waves: the first wave adopts a structuralist approach, while the second employs a rational choice approach. Both waves generally conclude that the existence of a landlord class or unequal land distribution is detrimental to democratization. However, the process of state-building in the Philippines runs counter to such theoretical expectations. Although the Philippines was labeled "democratic" after independence and is currently classified as a democratic country, it has maintained a high level of land inequality, and a powerful landlord elite continues to exert significant influence on its political development.
Existing theories portray landlords as an anti-democratic force. Why, then, have these two seemingly opposing factors persisted side by side in the Philippines? Why has the powerful landlord class in the Philippines been able to accept and even support democracy, rather than being eliminated during the process of democratization?
New phenomena call for new theoretical explanations. Based on theoretical frameworks and historical materials, this paper conducts a processual historical analysis of the relationship between landlords and democracy during the state-building process in the Philippines through case study. As a deviant case, the Philippines contradicts established theoretical assumptions about the landlord-democracy relationship. The concept of feudal democracy proposed in this paper is significant for enriching democratic theory, understanding democratic change in world politics, and uncovering the roots of development dilemmas in developing countries.
About the author:
He Jiacheng, Lecturer of Department of Political Science, School of International Studies at Renmin University of China; Director of the Editorial Office of Chinese Political Studies. His research has been published in core journals including World Economics and Politics, Academic Monthly, and Social Sciences. Several articles have been reprinted in Xinhua Digest and the Information Center for Social Sciences of Renmin University of China. His main research fields are historical political science and comparative politics.
