The Continuing Past

Renato Constantino's The Continuing Past is the sequel to his nationalist and revisionist history A Past Revisited. The book covers the end of the Commonwealth period, the Japanese Occupation, and the Third Republic up to the Macapagal Presidency. It is explicit in its nationalist orientation as a critique against standard texts taking a Western perspective. It is devastating and illuminating in its critique of the megalomania of McArthur and the intervention of the CIA to catapult Magsaysay to the presidency. It is not, however, blindly anti-American for while it criticizes American policy, it is even more unforgiving of what Recto labeled as our mendicant foreign policy. It is understandable that America protects its national interest; it is lunacy for Filipinos to think that our interests coincide with America's.

I disagree with Constantino's advocacy for industrialization and criticism of agriculture. Perhaps his views were viable forty years ago, but in today's globalizing world, it would be suicidal to compete against Chinese manufacturing, and Brazil's successful development of agriculture for export is probably worth emulating.

We continued to act like a lapdog when we supported the US invasion of Iraq and we looked even more foolish when we withdrew our contingent of noncombat troops when a Filipino was held hostage by Iraqi fighters. We obviously did not learn our lessons from the extraterritoriality of American bases when we agreed to a VFA that allowed a serviceman accused of rape to be detained in the US embassy. The removal of US bases did not end the special relationship with the US. In foreign policy, at least, the past truly is continuing.