FRANCISCO, Ma.

Francesca DL
2ASN2
CHAPTER 10 : EQUALITY AND DEMOCRACY

South Asian countries :

o Have accepted the ideology of planning for development
o Have treated the economic development as a concern of
the state and thus a political issue
Those are important facts that differentiates our
situation from the Western countries
o Another is South Asians commitment to egalitarianism (an
integral part of our ideology of planning ; it played a role in
the liberation movements)

ECONOMY should be a paramount of PLANNING

o Whether a conflict between economic equalization and
economic progress arises a price must be paid for
equalization in terms of retarded progress

ECONOMIC INEQUALITY is one of the causes of SOCIAL

INEQUALITY
o TO RESOLVE : a decrease in economic equality should tend
to bring about a decrease in social inequality, which would
have a beneficial effect on economic development
LOW LEVELS OF LIVING AND LOW PRODUCTIVITY OF LABOR
o The lower strata should increase labor input and labor
efficiency, and raise production
o CONVENTIONAL POST WAR APPROACH : treats
development simply as a function of investment, abstracts
from both these important relationships, and this makes it
possible to believe not only that development can take
place without egalitarian reforms, but even that increasing
inequality may be a condition of economic growth
When the paramount goal of greater equality is retained at the
same time as the development problem is approached in the
biased way, the result is likely to be muddled, opportunistic
thinking and the covering up of policies that are not in line with
the egalitarian ideal

Effects to raise standards of health and education should have

equalizing effects
o BUT, only a small part of the governments expenditure is
earmarked for the neediest

o And the SCHOOL SYSTEM in particular is biased, against

the LOWER STRATA

UPPER CLASS regard themselves as middle class citizens

LOWER CLASSES are the people that need to be aided if there
is to be a real advance in equality
o Interest in this matter has waned in the face of mounting
internal and external political problems

POLITICAL DEMOCRACY is related to the ideal of social and

economic equality
o A system in which an executive is responsible to the
peoples will, as expressed by :
Elections with universal suffrage
Independent judiciary
Guarantee of a wide range of civil liberties

Part of the attraction of greater social and economic equality was

the realization that without political democracy would be an
empty achievement

Commitment to political democracy was commonly embraced by

the leaders of all of South Asia

The patterns they chose were borrowed from the Western

countries
o Little thought was given to the fact that the political
structure of the Western countries was quite different when
they were at a comparable stage of underdevelopment
o The pattern of the West were modified to confer to the
norms and the belief of a country
o Some of the South Asian countries used the Parliamentary
form and the Democratic form, in which the Philippines use

From the standpoint of modernization and economic

development :
o The contrast between the countries that retained a
democratic form of government and those that moved
toward authoritarianism is more apparent than real

The tide of history cannot be rolled back to enable the new

states of the region to experience the political evolution of the
Western countries

The issue of government intervention in industry is assumed,

everywhere, to be crucial :
o ANSWER : socialist or free enterprise society
o The South Asian countries after independence, could have :
Inherit enterprises in the public sector
Nationalize private enterprises
Establish new state industrial enterprises