The Middle Class and Politics in the Philippines : With a Focus on the People Power Revolution and the August Twenty-One Movement

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The purpose of this research was to investigate the political forces of the middle class in the Philippines. The main reason for this attempt was that for the first time in Philippine history the urban middle class playd an important role in shaping the political direction of the country by activity participating in the anti-Marcos struggle leading to the "people power revolution which restored democracy. Considering the fact that the middle class forces were composed of a large number of organizations many of which were quite small in membership size, this research focused on BANDILA,the largest and most influential umbrella organization or federation of various middle class organizations, and some member organizations of BANDILA such as the August Twenty-One Movement led by Agapito "Butz" Aquino, a younger brother of the late Benigno Aquino, Jr.The results of the general analyzes of the political forces of the middle class in terms of their organization and behavior as well as of their ideology and program were almost fully presented, together with their brief historical account, in the Pilipinas article. While detailed analyzes of individual organizations such as the August Twenty-One Movement will be presented in another article soon, theoretical generalization of the findings in the Philippine context through comparative study of the middle class in other countries will be the most important future task.