Philippine Democracy

I. INTRODUCTION Philippine democracy and politics has long been a troubled environment. With the recent developments regarding the Napoles case, it has only reaffirmed the fact that there are a lot of failures within this system. Aside from this latest scandal, democracy in the nation has been plagued long before the Pork Barrel story. Issues regarding nepotism, lack of transparency, participation of the masses, and so on have been present for the longest time. Being a Management student, I am sometimes disconnected with the occurrences in Philippine democracy. It may be due to the fact that the numerous scandals in our country’s politics have a numbing effect on our perception, or maybe because I’m tired of hearing more bad than good whenever I tune in to what’s happening. I realized that participation in Philippine democracy had nothing to do with your job, social status or even college course. There is something we each can bring to the table in trying to improve our democratic system. That is where my Management course comes in. I know politics and management may not always come hand in hand, but there are some aspects to management where Philippine democracy can learn from, more specifically a heightened knowledge of marketing acumen. That is why I believe that knowledge of marketing can lead to a more developed Philippine democratic environment. There are many aspects to marketing which can be applicable to democracy. It’s not a field reserved only for consumer products but can be used in a wide variety of areas. In order to really see how marketing acumen can aid in Philippine democracy, it is important to first define what is marketing, then define what democracy is.

II. MARKETING DEFINITION According to the 1American Marketing Association, “Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.”