DEVELOPMENTALISM AND THE 'NEW SOCIETY' fHE REPRESSI:VE IDEOLOGY OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT*

When Martial Law was proclaimed on September 21, 1972 a11d a "New Society" brought officially to life, new social forces were set into motion and old social forces distilled into new forms. As some of the old forces died out, others merely split and still others. consolidated or merged with entirely new ones. New contradictions became evident. The problem of constructing adequate analytical differentiations has quickly emerged. Central to this problem is the correct formulation in political economy of the specific and definite social mode of which underdevelopment and dictatorship in the Philippines may be both scientifically understood and competently exposed and opposed. It is correct that the whole social condition is determined in the last instance by the concrete logic of real processes understandable only through the methodological and analytical struc.,. tures of historical materialism expressed in political economy. It would be wrong, however, to see the problem of ideological formation as entirely peripheral, for to do so would mean to deny subjective disposition as an eventually objective force in the internal logic of a given line of historical development: The martial law regime in the Philippines -the most consistent and outstanding feature of Philippine ·politics over the last yearsis both common and distinct. It is common in the sense that it partakes of a general political tendency sweeping numerous Third World societies, especially those most closely linked with centers of monopoly capital through tight webs of dependency and underdevelopment. This general political tendency is characterized by the emergence of strong, centrally organized authoritarian states working through expanded military organizations and powerful technocracies operating beyond the old "law and order" line of self-justification and forming a more sophisticated line of ideological argument that vests the