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A Boholano’s View by Jose “Pepe” Abueva The Bohol Chronicle

October 19, 2014

We Need Progressive Leaders:

Leaders with Moral Purpose and Humanity

I mean leaders who will transform our weaknesses as individuals and as a people into positive

values and strength of character. Leadership that will transform our society by reducing poverty

and inequity, and by redistributing wealth, power and opportunity so that most Filipinos are

empowered to improve their quality of life and their sense of dignity.

A moral and spiritual crisis: a failure of character. Filipino leaders have asked, what

happened to our country which was once regarded as a likely model in Southeast Asia in the

1950s? What happened to the hopes that “people power” kindled to a flame at EDSA in 1986,

which caught the attention and admiration of the whole world? Why are so many among our

people, especially the young, discouraged by our disunity and poverty, the prevalence of greed

and dishonesty, and our seeming lack of direction and very slow progress?

I believe that at the root of our malaise we face a moral and spiritual crisis, a crisis of

character, a crisis of leadership and citizenship. Financial and technical solutions, foreign aid and

investments, treaties of trade and commerce will not help us very much, unless our moral values

and behavior as individuals and as a nation are transformed.

In his book, Educating for Character, Thomas Lickona observes that schools, families,

churches and other social institutions in America have failed to develop two fundamental moral

values in the people—respect and responsibility—which psychologists say are necessary for

healthy personal development, caring interpersonal relationships, a humane and democratic

society, and a just and peaceful world. I strongly believe that such an observation can be made of

us Filipinos too, and even more so.

Let me therefore elaborate on Lickona’s analysis. Respect, which means showing regard

for the worth of someone or something, takes three forms: (1) respect for oneself, (2) respect for

other people, and (3) respect for the environment and one’s surroundings.

Responsibility is an extension of respect. It includes caring for others, being

dependable, carrying out any job or duty to the best of our ability. I believe that the biggest moral

challenge of our time is to balance rights and responsibilities and to raise young people who have

a strong sense of both. In our day, too many of our people strongly assert their rights and

entitlements while evading their duties, responsibilities and obligations.

Besides the two great moral values of respect and responsibility, other related values

are important. Honesty, fairness, tolerance, prudence and self-discipline are forms of respect for

oneself and others; while helpfulness, compassion and cooperation contribute to the attainment

of the broad ethic of responsibility. Some qualities like moral courage and the democratic values

of the rule of law, equal opportunity, due process, representative government and democratic

decision-making are important qualities in creating a society based on respect and responsibility.

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The moral purpose of university education. If we go back to the purpose of education,

we find that our 1987 Constitution commands all educational institutions to “inculcate patriotism

and nationalism, foster love of humanity, respect for human rights, appreciation of the role of

national heroes…; teach the rights and duties of citizenship, strengthen ethical and spiritual

values, develop moral character and personal discipline, encourage critical and creative thinking,

broaden scientific and technical knowledge, and promote vocational efficiency.” (Article XIV,

Section 3)

What do our colleges and universities today teach? I wanted to know as UP President,

because for many years we simply assumed without really knowing, that in UP we had been

teaching and exemplifying the right values to our students.

Emphases of U.P. education. According to students in our own University of the

Philippines, in a survey of 14 colleges in UP Diliman that I initiated and Dr. Maria Luisa

Doronila designed and carried out when I was U.P. president, the qualities that their respective

colleges wanted to develop in them were, in order of emphasis: leadership ability (32%), which

includes independence, articulateness, assertiveness and self-confidence; the work ethic (27%),

notably patience, discipline, diligence, resourcefulness and efficiency; intellectual capacities

(24%), which include critical/analytical thinking, academic excellence and creativity. Below all

these, a far fourth is social orientation (11%), showing relatively weak compassion, a weak sense

of service and a weak pro-people inclination; while ethical/moral uprightness, exemplified by

honesty and integrity, was at the bottom of the list (2.9%). These perceptions of UP students of

the kind of education they are getting are disturbing and sobering.

A graduate from the Ateneo de Manila University in Metro Manila wrote: “My education

may have given me technical competence and some basic managerial skills, but it has fallen

short in helping me develop personal clarity that will enable me to be effective interpersonally.

In school, I was not given the structures and opportunities to integrate my skills into some bigger

picture and appreciate the interrelatedness and wholeness of things—including my intellectual,

physical, emotional, behavioral, and spiritual dimensions, side by side with those of other people,

institutions and the environment.”

Social orientation, morality and ethics. I am sure that while it is true that leadership

ability, intellectual skills, and the work ethic are important qualities that you should acquire in

college, it is social orientation, morality and ethics that shall invest leadership and rationality

with a vision beyond self and family and give it moral purpose and humanity. Without the latter

qualities, I am afraid that a graduate remains ethically poor and illiterate.

It is not enough to be an excellent professional, a smart person; it is equally important to

be a good man or woman, to be a good citizen of our country and a good member of the human

race, a child of God.

The progressive leader we want serves as a role model for basic change in our society and

in the world. Conscious of the strengths and weaknesses of the people, the progressive leader

sets goals, selects strategies, and mobilizes support and resources to achieve those goals with the

participation of the people.

A study conducted by the Senate Committees on Education, Arts and Culture, and Social

Justice, Welfare and Development in 1987-1988 reported that Filipinos, by and large, are

extremely personalistic, family centered, lacking in discipline, passive and lacking in initiative,

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suffer from colonial mentality, practice kanya-kanya syndrome, and lack the skill of self-analysis

and self-reflection. But at the same time they possess the positive traits of empathy or

pakikipagkapwa-tao, orientation to an extended family, joy and humor, flexibility and

adaptability, hard work and industry, the ability to survive, and faith and religiosity.

According to the same Senate study, strategies for change must be multi-sectoral; they

must emphasize change in the power holders as well as in the masa; they should be holistic,

emphasizing individual as well as system or structural change. The change should involve a

critical mass of people. The goals should be cut into “bite-size” pieces for implementation.

Strategies for change must be connected to the daily life of the people, and they must be

implemented by an act of the will and involve self-sacrifice. Leaders in government, business,

religion and civic life will do well to consider these principles in bringing about social change for

the good of all.

As the U.P. president in 1987 I challenged the faculty with a vision. I said that U.P. must

examine and review itself so as to provide “learning and leadership for social transformation,”

and thereby help our leaders and people in building the just, humane and democratic society

envisioned in our new Constitution. There is no end to learning, for individual citizens and for

the nation. If we fail because our lesson is hard, our country will languish in social fragmentation

and environmental spoliation.

Our social transformation requires internal change in our leaders and citizens alike. We

must keep faith in the Filipino’s capacity to transform himself—his values, his way of thinking

and behavior, his structures and institutions. We want thoughtful men and women, capable of

prayer and action, who can give life and meaning to our people’s ideals and aspirations, who can

imagine a far better society, create options and alternatives, and work honestly without fanfare

towards them.

We want women and men of vision and courage, of deep passion and great compassion,

whose integrity and eloquence will teach and persuade other leaders and the

citizenry. We want women and men who, by their faith in our people’s good sense and integrity,

awaken their capacity for self-transformation; who, by word and example, inspire our people to

bear the price of change and progress for the common good; who, by their respect for each one’s

freedom and dignity, create a national conscience and ignite a peaceful social revolution to

eradicate poverty, injustice, violence, incompetence and corruption.

These are the leaders we need, the kind of persons we want for our communities

and our country as a whole. Let us all continue to develop good habits of the mind, of the

heart, and of action: to know what is right and good, to desire what is right and good, and

to do what is right and good.

Our faith and 1987 Constitution can guide us in developing and practicing this

humane and progressive citizenship and leadership.