Ennui

I STRIVE in my columns and interviews (the honor and responsibilities that arise from having these great privileges are something I take very seriously) to provide a deeper and more nuanced perspective and not to resort to name-calling and empty partisanship, lift other articles or show blatant bias. We all have at least some biases, but I try to explain why I have reached certain views or issues. A few years ago, I raised structural issues that we face as a country and that short-term fixes and belief in a person or movement will not fix that. They include long-standing flaws that can be masked at times by some dynamism or changes but if not addressed will keep our pattern of modest improvement but relative underperformance in place. This is basically where we have been since the 1970s when our neighbors started catching up and then exceeding us in economic performance, literacy, health and other objective criteria that point to improvement, stagnation or regression in a country.

I have pointed out that until we address major flaws and issues in a comprehensive and apolitical manner, we will not improve and further regress. Short-term solutions and fixes will not do and frankly would never do for sustained progress. What interested me is that after some praised and others criticized me for taking this longer and deeper view, I am now seeing many columnists start trotting out the "failed state" argument for the Philippines. I have long felt that if not for the ability to relieve the double failure of unsustainable and relentless population growth and deindustrialization of what puny manufacturing we had resulted in insufficient jobs for our now increasing yearly by 2 million population by deploying millions of our workers overseas, there would have been major social unrest in the country.