Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
IT'S THEIR SEASON once again. The poor of this nation rule. Elections have a way of smoking them out of the woodwork, the cracks and crevices they inhabit. They are wooed, romanced if you like, as if candidates discovered them and fell in love with them for the first time. Suddenly the poor are on center stage, in the limelight.
IT'S THEIR SEASON once again. The poor of this nation rule. Elections have a way of smoking them out of the woodwork, the cracks and crevices they inhabit. They are wooed, romanced if you like, as if candidates discovered them and fell in love with them for the first time. Suddenly the poor are on center stage, in the limelight.
That is how it appears if you go by the political ads of many candidates in the coming May elections. Images and voices of the poor provide the backdrop for campaign ads that cost millions of pesos to produce, air and print.
How do the truly poor feel when they see the likes of them being glorified in those multi-million TV ads? I am inclined to use the word obscene to describe this obsession to appear pro-poor, to be indentified with the poor, to be counted among the poor—in order to gain votes. Obscene is the word when candidates use the poor to speak for them and to make the poor personify their ambitions.
Well, yesterday’s Inquirer hbanner eadline said: “It’s carnival time again.”
I dug into my files (under “Elections”) and I found the results of the study conducted by Ateneo University’s Institute of Philippine Culture (IPC) titled “The Vote of the Poor: The Values and Pragmatics of Elections” released during the presidential campaign period in 2004. I had written two columns about the research findings at that time. The 2004 findings are still relevant given the fact that this country is still in this smelly rut that it was in then.
Do the poor produce a “dumb masa” vote? How do they make their choices? How much influence do the media exert on them? What to them are the traits of a true leader?
“The Vote of the Poor” was the result of a research using focused group discussions (FGD) as a tool to get to the raw sentiments and perceptions of the subjects. Unlike surveys that use statistical methods, the FGD type elicits qualitative responses and scrutinizes the meaning and quality of these responses.
The study showed that the most important sources of influence in the choice of candidates were: media, family, church, political parties, one’s own (sarili lang/walang nakakaimpluwensiya) and surveys.
The mass media appeared to play a crucial bridge between the poor’s leadership ideals and the process of choosing candidates.
Do the poor produce a “dumb masa” vote? How do they make their choices? How much influence do the media exert on them? What to them are the traits of a true leader?
“The Vote of the Poor” was the result of a research using focused group discussions (FGD) as a tool to get to the raw sentiments and perceptions of the subjects. Unlike surveys that use statistical methods, the FGD type elicits qualitative responses and scrutinizes the meaning and quality of these responses.
The study showed that the most important sources of influence in the choice of candidates were: media, family, church, political parties, one’s own (sarili lang/walang nakakaimpluwensiya) and surveys.
The mass media appeared to play a crucial bridge between the poor’s leadership ideals and the process of choosing candidates.
To arrive at an informed choice, IPC said, the participants recognized the media as playing a most crucial role. Only among rural participants did the media not figure as the most important source of influence. The family and the church were on top of their list.
While the research participants mainly got information from newspapers, radio and TV, the youth also relied on text messages and the Internet. Across all groups, tsismis (gossip or small talk) figured as a source of information. Discussions (pakikisalamuha) with other people were also deemed important. Urbanites also looked to ads, leaflets, campaign streamers to get to know the candidates.
But body language was important too. And here the electronic media had an edge over print. The poor analyzed the images projected by candidates via radio or TV to gauge character (ugali). How did the candidates speak and comport themselves?
Rural women looked at the candidates’ manner of speaking. Did they “speak with respect”? Males also observed the speaking style and the face, how the candidates stood, walked and dealt with people. Nothing beats a face to face encounter. Urbanites observed the candidates’ personal appearance.
Here are some quotes from the FGDs. Sa pananalita malalaman mo kung mabait o magaling. Sa reaksyon niya sa mga tao habang nangangampanya. Physical appearance is a good source for determining behavior.
The youth said they could tell a person’s character by the manner of speaking and responding to questions during a debate. They also studied the temper of the candidate. As one young FGD participant said: “They say liars have unstable eye movements.”
Despite media’s high ranking, participants still considered the information from the media inadequate, particularly in the case of those running for national positions. TV ads were considered unreliable as there was no way to check out the claims.
Election time is a time of confusion, nakakalito. Too many candidates, too many positions to fill. And the information about candidates were not to be trusted. Maraming paninira ang lumalabas sa mga kandidato, hindi mo alam kung ano ang totoo.As to vote buying and selling, there was a sense that the public ultimately would lose if this practice went on. Hindi tama na mamigay, kasi kapag nanalo, babawiin din ito, baka mas malaki pa. Dai, magkakaigwa nin korapto. Mali, kasi parang binibili ang pagkatao mo.
While a handful said they would never accept money, most participants said they would accept but still vote for those they like as long as their votes could not be checked.
IPC concluded that, as suggested by the opinions expressed by the research participants, the poor possessed a dignified, defensible and rational idea about good leadership. However, the study said, there appeared to be a mismatch between the ideals of leadership on one hand, and elections as the mechanism for choosing elected leaders, on the other.
Here is an important lesson that needs to be recognized. If the electoral process is fair and the broader political system is reformed, the poor, despite their poverty—can make good choices. But, they way it was, the IPC study pointed out, they could only make good choices based on a flawed system. For our political problems, the voting poor (much used and abused) are not to blame.
The poor are smarter than you think.
While the research participants mainly got information from newspapers, radio and TV, the youth also relied on text messages and the Internet. Across all groups, tsismis (gossip or small talk) figured as a source of information. Discussions (pakikisalamuha) with other people were also deemed important. Urbanites also looked to ads, leaflets, campaign streamers to get to know the candidates.
But body language was important too. And here the electronic media had an edge over print. The poor analyzed the images projected by candidates via radio or TV to gauge character (ugali). How did the candidates speak and comport themselves?
Rural women looked at the candidates’ manner of speaking. Did they “speak with respect”? Males also observed the speaking style and the face, how the candidates stood, walked and dealt with people. Nothing beats a face to face encounter. Urbanites observed the candidates’ personal appearance.
Here are some quotes from the FGDs. Sa pananalita malalaman mo kung mabait o magaling. Sa reaksyon niya sa mga tao habang nangangampanya. Physical appearance is a good source for determining behavior.
The youth said they could tell a person’s character by the manner of speaking and responding to questions during a debate. They also studied the temper of the candidate. As one young FGD participant said: “They say liars have unstable eye movements.”
Despite media’s high ranking, participants still considered the information from the media inadequate, particularly in the case of those running for national positions. TV ads were considered unreliable as there was no way to check out the claims.
Election time is a time of confusion, nakakalito. Too many candidates, too many positions to fill. And the information about candidates were not to be trusted. Maraming paninira ang lumalabas sa mga kandidato, hindi mo alam kung ano ang totoo.As to vote buying and selling, there was a sense that the public ultimately would lose if this practice went on. Hindi tama na mamigay, kasi kapag nanalo, babawiin din ito, baka mas malaki pa. Dai, magkakaigwa nin korapto. Mali, kasi parang binibili ang pagkatao mo.
While a handful said they would never accept money, most participants said they would accept but still vote for those they like as long as their votes could not be checked.
IPC concluded that, as suggested by the opinions expressed by the research participants, the poor possessed a dignified, defensible and rational idea about good leadership. However, the study said, there appeared to be a mismatch between the ideals of leadership on one hand, and elections as the mechanism for choosing elected leaders, on the other.
Here is an important lesson that needs to be recognized. If the electoral process is fair and the broader political system is reformed, the poor, despite their poverty—can make good choices. But, they way it was, the IPC study pointed out, they could only make good choices based on a flawed system. For our political problems, the voting poor (much used and abused) are not to blame.
The poor are smarter than you think.
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