Data of the country’s economic performance from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s indicate that there had been significant decline in standard of living, including in the environmental aspect, as shown in: decreased real wages of workers and farmers increased levels of poverty, inflation, unemployment, and external debt and massive deforestation where forest cover in the whole archipelago got reduced into almost half. The political economy of the Martial Law regime had become known as a “conjugal dictatorship” of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos characterized by “crony capitalism” or a “kleptocracy” of the first family and their favored clique of oligarchs. This marked the beginning of a 14-year period of one-man rule that would effectively last until Marcos was exiled from the country on February 25, 1986. State power and resources were concentrated on Marcos as the de facto chief executive, chief legislator, chief justice, and chief commander of the armed forces all at the same time.Īt 7:17 pm on September 23, 1972, President Ferdinand Marcos announced on television that he had placed the entirety of the Philippines under martial law. Under conditions of Martial Law, Marcos had the monopoly to make decisions on government operations because there were hardly any democratic limits to his prerogatives. While ascertaining the real intention of Marcos for imposing military rule is a subject of endless debate between opposing views, the result is obvious: the Martial Law regime prolonged and centralized the far-reaching presidential powers and privileges of Marcos for a total of 21 years (i.e., from his first term starting in 1965 and re-election in 1969 until his deposition through a peaceful social uprising in 1986). The government’s official rationale for the order was to protect the authority of the republic and guarantee security of its citizens against lawless elements, particularly communist insurgency and other rebellious tendencies. Constitutional authoritarianism, or the use of constitutional law to justify authoritarian governance, was imposed on the entire country to build a “New Society”. 1081, establishing a state of Martial Law in the Philippines. On 23 September 1972, the late President Ferdinand Marcos went on television to announce Proclamation No.
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