By Prof. Jan-Argy Y. Tolentino

The election of George W. Bush as president eight years after his father left the White House, and the possibility of a Hillary Clinton in the White House after eight years of a Bill Clinton Presidency, proves that dynastic politics is not a preserve of Third World democracies and dictatorships.

Even industrialized democracies are not immune to the politics of dynasty. Although the Kennedys were the most famous Western political dynasty, the Bush election is the second instance in American history of a father-son presidency, the first being the Adams.

South Asia has proved the most fertile ground for political dynasties. Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal all have a resilient tradition of electing dynasties to the top office.

Sri Lanka started its tradition in 1960 when Prime Minister Solomon Bandranaike's widow, Sirimavo Bandranaike, became prime minister. Now her daughter, Chandrika Kumaratunga, is president.

Bangladesh has seen the electoral contest between two iron-willed women, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, daughter of President Mujibur Rahman, and Khaleda Zia, widow of President Ziaur Rahman.

India's Nehru family is probably the world's oldest democratic dynasty, now spanning four generations, producing the only team of grandfather-daughter-grandson prime ministers, ruling for 37 of India's 53 years as an independent state. These were Jawaharlal Nehru from 1947-1964, Indira Gandhi from 1966-1977 and again from 1980-1984, and Rajiv Gandhi ruled during 1984-1989. His widow, the Italian-born Sonia Gandhi, now heads the Congress Party and is considered the de facto Prime Minister, ruling from the shadow via Mamohan Singh. And India is the world’s biggest democracy, so they claim.

In Pakistan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was prime minister during 1971- 1977, and his daughter Benazir was elected for two stints as prime minister during the 1990s, the first woman from a Muslim state to head a government, and she might make a comeback given the tumultuous Musharraf regime.

In South East Asia, Megawati Sukarnoputri came to power mainly on her lineage. Aung San Suu Kyi of Burma is the daughter of the country’s founder, Aung San. The family of Anwar Ibrahim of Malaysia took the responsibility after he was incarcerated. Singapore was ruled by the Lee Family (Lee Kuan Yew and now Lee Hsien Loong) since independence, interrupted only for a few years but with the blessing of the Lee family.

Therefore the democratic "purists" and critics of Philippine Politics should stop "moaning about how we alone in the world have been loaded with politicians whose fathers or grandfathers, mothers or grandmothers, uncles or aunts, great-uncles or great-aunts or plain cousins also happen to be politicians."

Looking at the history of the Philippine Politics starting from the 1898 Malolos Congress, it would seem that families, not political parties, are their most enduring feature. Regimes come and go but the families remain. Political parties are formed and disbanded but the clans that make them up stay on.

Families survive wars, dictatorships, and uprisings. The most enduring political families are the best evidence of this: The Aquinos and Cojuangcos of Tarlac, the Osmeñas, Duranos and Yaphas of Cebu; the Romualdezes of Leyte; Ortegas of La Union; Rectos of Batangas; Roxases of Capiz; Daza’s of Northern Samar; Zubiris of Bukidnon; Dutertes of Davao, and; the Marcoses of Ilocos Norte, among others, have been in Philippine politics for four generations. Some families eventually go into decline after successive electoral defeats or the death of a powerful patriarch, but others, stronger and more resilient, hang on and flourish.

Philippine politics is the ultimate family affair. In Landlords and Capitalists, political scientist Temario Rivera revealed that 87 families controlled the top 120 Philippine manufacturing companies from 1964 to 1986. Sixteen of these families were involved in politics, and most were part of the landowning elite.

Data gathered for the PCIJ study show the persistence of political families since the fall of Marcos. The reality is still that politicians are elected largely by mobilizing their kinship networks and family assets (e.g. money, name recall, connections). Once in office, they pave the way for other relatives to be either appointed to the bureaucracy or elected to government posts. Within a few years, a newly elected legislator will likely have kin in local office, various government agencies, and state-owned corporations. Before long, the next generation takes over.

Two-thirds of the legislators in the post-Marcos Congress are members of political families. Of these, 70 percent are second and third-generation politicians. Nearly all of them also have multiple relatives in public office.

The passing on of a public seat from one generation to another provides evidence of the caste-like structure of the political elite. Four in every ten representatives in all the post-Marcos Congresses had relatives in previous legislatures. A third had parents who were in public office.

These are unusually high percentages and are an important index of the extent of real "democratization" that has taken place. But they still show, though, that Congress is not closed to those who do not come from powerful families. The flipside of the equation — six in every 10 representatives are not related to former legislators and seven out of 10 do not have parents who were in public office — should not be overlooked.

Once in Congress, however, legislators tend to stay there. The pattern since 1946 is for the number of first-termers in the House to decrease as time goes by, as congressmen hang on to their seats, using the perks and the powers available to their office to perpetuate themselves in power. Conversely, the number of those with multiple terms increases with time.

What are the causes behind the emergence of political dynasties, and why do they remain resilient for decades, sometimes generations, even in democratic societies? Hard-and-fast answers may be difficult to find, but some explanations could be easier to understand.

There seems to be a logical explanation. First, access to the political system in most countries is costly in terms of money and only those who can afford the time, money, resources and have the requisite connections find an entry into what is often an exclusive if not closed club.

Political lineage buttressed by money helps facilitate that entry. Bush, Gandhi, Macapagal-Arroyo fit the bill for what can be termed as politicians from establishment families, with enough credentials due to a famous political surname to ensure a place on the political pedestal.
Then there are those who are respected for rendering services to their country during crucial periods, such as an independence struggle — hence, their legitimacy is unquestioned and widely accepted.

The Nehru family in India, Aung San and Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma, Megawati Sukarnoputri in Indonesia, Hafez al Assad in Syria, the Roxas and Osmeña families are some examples of this.

Finally, there are those whose leadership is etched in the popular imagination, and for people to identify with such a charismatic leader comes almost automatically.

Bhutto of Pakistan, Bandranaike of Bangladesh, Peron of Argentina, Ziaur Rahman and Mujibur Rahman in Bangladesh, the Kennedys in the United States and our very own Estradas all were populists with charisma, which is then sometimes "transferred" to their scions and close relatives.

Whatever the cause, more often than not having a famous surname helps in politics, whether it is a socialist one-Party regime, a right-wing Republican presidency or an Islamic republic, or, for that matter, just a plain old traditional democracy.