PREPARATION
This module deals with vital economic, social, cultural, and political developments of the 19th century. Understanding these developments entails a thorough awareness of Rizal’s enduring significance among the Filipinos and of the magnitude of his ideas and principles at present.
It is then this module’s objective to make you analyse the various economic, social, political and cultural changes that occurred in the 19th century and describe the critical role played by the Chinese mestizos and their status in the Philippine society and economy.
PRESENTATION
Economic Development
Before the Spanish occupation, our forefathers have already been trading with the Chinese, the Japanese, the inhabitants of Siam, the Indians, Cambodians, and with the natives of Borneo and Mollucas. When the Spaniards arrived, the Spanish government carried on the existing trade relations with these countries for a period.
The Spaniards’ eventual closure of Manila’s ports, however, to all other countries except Mexico set off the Manila-Acapulco Trade better known as the Galleon Trade which connected the Philippines with Mexico for 250 years. This Galleon Trade was a government monopoly of two trading ships: one navigated from Acapulco in Mexico to Manila for 120 days with some 500,000 pesos worth of merchandise and the other sailed from Manila to Acapulco for 90 days with some 250,000 pesos worth of goods.
The Suez Canal Opening on November 17, 1869 afforded the Philippines and Spain a relatively effortless maritime route for Spanish trading. The canal started off as an agreement between Ferdinand de Lesseps, Cairo’s former French diplomat and the Ottoman governor of Egypt in 1854 for the former to construct a 100-mile canal across the Isthmus of Suez. The construction commenced in April 1859 with forced laborers digging by hand with picks and shovels. European workers though with dredgers and steam shovels later arrived. Labor disputes and a cholera epidemic slowed down the canal construction consequently delaying its completion for four years. Additionally, due to its dimensions when it opened, less than 500 ships navigated the canal during its first year of operation yet the improvements made after seven years transformed the Suez Canal into one of the world’s most heavily navigated nautical channels.
The shift, however, in the Spanish monarchy from the Habsburgs to the Bourbons in the late 18th century paved the way for massive economic, political, social, and cultural reforms that transpired in the Philippines during the 19th century. Recalibration of Spanish colonial policies led to Bourbon reforms aimed at revitalizing the generation of revenues in Spanish colonies like the Philippines and converting them into fiscally sufficient territories.
Jose V. Basco who became the first governor-general to the Philippines under the Bourbon reign arrived in the country in 1778 when the Galleon Trade was a failing venture. The global surge of industrialization, however, afforded the Spaniards a glimmer of hope as they sought to bring an end to the economic decline of the Spanish empire. Basco’s economic program was developing and promoting agriculture in the country in order to transform the Philippines into a financially sufficient colony. This resulted into the establishment of the Royal Philippine Company which, despite its objective of facilitating the economic reorientation by financing agrarian projects that included the tobacco monopoly [among others] was confronted by challenges from various groups and compounded by corruption as well as maladministration reached its end in 1834 when free trade that instigated the opening of Manila ports to foreign markets was officially recognized. This led to the growth of the export industry in the Philippines.
This growth was manifested by seven British and two American trading firms along with four others that invested in the Philippine thriving export industry of agricultural products like tobacco, abaca, and sugar which dwarfed all other export products like cotton, indigo, and coffee by late 19th century. Despite Governor-General Primo de Rivera’s abolition of the government monopoly on tobacco due to its being beset by abusive and corrupt practices, Philippine cigars retained their status of popularity throughout Britain, the European continent, and North America.
The Philippine abaca which was deemed as the finest material for rope and cordage became indispensable and eventually alternated with sugar as the country’s most valuable export. The latter has been produced and processed [using primitive methods] from the sugarcane of Negros which was uninhabited before it became the center of Philippine sugar industry that exports products to Britain and Australia. This resulted from the opening of Iloilo port in 1855 as well as the entrepreneurial genius and technical brilliance of then British vice consul, Nicholas Loney who orchestrated generous credit terms for local landlords to invest in the crop. He also instigated the replacement of the conventional method of low-grade sugar production with steam-driven refineries and urged to source labor from the adjacent island of Panay
Social, Cultural, and Political Development
The colonial government strengthened its bureaucracy and simplified its governance as a response to the intricacies of an emerging 19th century economy which prompted internal migration. This brought about overcrowding that resulted into issues in sanitation, public health, increase in crimes, and workforce mobility which rendered tax collection arduous. The colonial government resolved the latter with more improved surveillance mechanism and regulatory procedures such as Governor-General Narciso Claveria’s 1849 decree mandating people to take on surnames, undergo registration, and be in possession of cedula indicating one’s name and residence, as well as the employment of guardia civil that assumed a facilitative function of carrying out the colonial government’s policies.
Additionally, since the economy required an educated labor force to handle trading, the Spanish colonial government was obliged to issue an order in 1836 that ensured literacy through primary schools in towns. This ultimately brought about, after centuries of Spanish occupation, the enactment of a decree in 1863 which mandated free access to modern public education for all Filipinos, which rendered the teaching of Spanish compulsory, and which afforded the country a complete educational system comprised of primary, secondary, and tertiary education.
Furthermore, landownership and management came to the fore when agricultural lands became vital to the thriving export industry of agricultural products. Destitute farmers ended up losing their lands to wealthy hacienderos as a result of pacto de retroventa which is an agreement of land sale that guaranteed the farmer to buy the land back at a value equivalent to when it was sold. Buying back these lands, however, proved difficult thus burying the farmers with mounting financial obligations forcing them to relinquish the land to affluent hacienderos thereby reducing themselves to being tenant farmers.
Land-grabbing became another method of land acquisition when the flourishing 19th century economy entailed: 1) better land management through inquilinos who were mainly Chinese mestizos and 2) natives reaching out to them to finance celebrations such as baptism, a funeral, an anniversary, and a wedding among others all celebrated with big banquets. Inquilinos are leaseholders of friar-owned agricultural lands in the Philippines who hired natives or kasama (partner) to cultivate the land in their stead for shares. These Chinese mestizo inquilinos who constituted part of a provincial intermediate social class were the result of an innovation in Philippine society that is the inquilino system which later afforded them acquisition of vast native lands through pacto de retroventa when native debtors give up their land to satisfy credit obligations.
Factors along with the growing importance of the country’s mestizo population led to some social strata modification by adding an intermediate mestizo stratum and another after a mass of pure-blooded natives:
Challenges confronted the Spaniards who continued to assert their authority on the account of their race when they lost their economic power in the 19th century. Such challenges were brought about by the growing population of the country’s principalia and mestizo citizens whose quest for social recognition consistently denied from them by the pure-blooded Spaniards was unrelenting for the entire century and whose standing in the Philippine society as economic prime movers was indispensable.
Reinforce what’s written for you in this module thru supplementary texts via the following links:
https://www.britannica.com/place/Philippines/The-19th-century
PRACTICE
Answer the following with a partner:
- How would you describe the Philippine economy before the Spanish occupation?
- What are the evidences of the Philippine economic development?
- How would you evaluate the country’s economic development during Rizal’s time?
- Why is the inclusion of the country’s economic condition during the 19th century imperative in the study of Rizal’s life and works?
References
Wani-Obias, R., et al. (2018). The life and works of Jose Rizal. Quezon City: C & E Publishing Inc.
Ariola, M. M. (2018). The life and works of Rizal. Intramuros, Manila: Unlimited Books Library Services & Publishing Inc.
Borromeo-Buehler, S. (1985). The Inquilinos of Cavite: A social class in nineteenth century Philippines. Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 16(1). 69-98.
Mclennan, M. S. (1969). Land and tenancy in the central Luzon plain. Philippine Studies, 17(4). 651-682.
Wickberg, E. (1964). The Chinese Mestizo in Philippine History. Journal of Southeast Asian History, 5(1), 62-100. doi:10.1017/S0217781100002222
Britannica. (n.d.). The 19th century. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/place/Philippines/The-19th-century.
Wickberg, E. (1965). The Chinese mestizo in Philippine history. Journal of Southeast Asian History, 5(1), 62-100. Retrieved from https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-southeast-asian-history/article/chinese-mestizo-in-philippine-history/7EFA0FF2223DFC834791A75476F0FC71.
Britannica. (n.d.). Cultural life. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/place/Philippines/Cultural-life.
Wright-Mills, C. (1959). The promise. In the Sociological imagination. Retrieved from https://sites.middlebury.edu/utopias/files/2013/02/The-Promise.pdf.
Photo Source: https://gop.com.ph/portfolio-items/the-philippines-in-the-19th-century-2nd-edition/#iLightbox%5Bgallery_image_1%5D/0
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