POSC 1013

POLITICS AND GOVERNANCE WITH PHILIPPINE CONSTITUTION

Politics
The process by which governmental decisions are made, as a famous definition puts it, politics is
determining who gets what, where, when, and how.

Political Science
Political Science is the systematic study of Politics. The political scientist is an objective observer who
asks questions about and studies the effects and structures of different systems of governments.

Public Administration
Public administration is concerned with the organization, activities, and behavior of administrative
agencies and officials in the conduct of government. Public administration includes the study of how
bureaucracies interact with other political institutions, the political and legal context of administration,
and how organization structures and governance structures affect the actions of government.

Governance
Governance is commonly defined as the exercise of power or authority by political leaders for the well-
being of their country’s citizens or subjects. It is the complex process whereby some sectors of the
society wield power, and enact and promulgate public policies which directly affect human and
institutional interactions, and economic and social development.

Leadership
Leadership means the quality of a man who has the ability to lead a team or a country or an
organization.

Forms of Government

Law and Order

A situation characterized by respect for and obedience to the rules of a society.
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Law and Logic

Presumption of regularity in the performance of official function/duty of a public official

Politics and Administration Dichotomy

 For President Wilson, the field of politics aims to answer the question, “Who shall make law and
what shall it be?” while administration attempts to address the question, “How should the law
be administered?”
 Frank Goodnow stated that while politics has something to do with policies or expressions of the
State’s will, administration has to do with the execution of such policies.
 Wilson and Goodnow made clear that politics is limited to crafting of policies and lawmaking, a
function generally vested upon a State’s legislative body; and administration is focused on the
implementation of laws, a function normally held by the State’s executive branch.

E-governance
E-governance, expands to electronic governance, is the integration of Information and Communication
Technology (ICT) in all the processes, with the aim of enhancing government ability to address the needs
of the general public. The basic purpose of e-governance is to simplify processes for all, i.e. government,
citizens, businesses, etc. at National, State and local levels.

Separation of Powers
The system of separation of powers divides the tasks of the state into three branches: legislative,
executive and judicial. These tasks are assigned to different institutions in such a way that each of them
can check the others.
Executive Legislative Judiciary
Executes Enacts Interprets
Sword Purse Pen

Delegation of Powers
Delegation of powers, in law, is the transfer of authority by one person or group to another person or
group. For example, the Congress may create government agencies to which it delegates authority to
promulgate and enforce regulations pursuant to law. More specifically, in constitutional law, delegation
of powers refers to the different powers granted respectively to each of three branches of
government—executive, legislative, and judicial.

Blending of Powers
Blending of powers is actually sharing of powers of the different departments of government whereby
one department helps and coordinates with the other in the exercise of a particular power, function or
responsibility.
The following are examples under the 1987 Philippine Constitution where powers are not confined
exclusively within one department but are in fact shared:
1. The President and Congress help one another in the making of laws. Congress enacts the bill and
the President approves it.
2. The President prepares a budget and Congress enacts an appropriation bill pursuant to that
budget.
3. The President enters into a treaty with foreign countries and the Senate ratifies the same.
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4. The Supreme Court may declare a treaty, international or executive agreement, or law, as
unconstitutional, and it has also the power to declare invalid any act done by the other
departments of government.
5. The grant of amnesty by the President is subject to the concurrence of a majority of all the
members of the Congress.

Check and Balance

The system that allows each branch of a government to amend or veto acts of another branch, to
prevent any one branch from exerting too much power.

Statutory Construction
The process of determining what a particular statute means so that a court may apply it accurately.

Rights
1. Natural rights are rights which are "natural" in the sense of "not artificial, not man-made", as in
rights deriving from human nature or from the edicts of a god. They are universal; that is, they
apply to all people, and do not derive from the laws of any specific society. They exist
necessarily, inhere in every individual, and can't be taken away.
2. Legal rights, in contrast, are based on a society's customs, laws, statutes or actions by
legislatures. An example of a legal right is the right to vote of citizens. Citizenship, itself, is often
considered as the basis for having legal rights, and has been defined as the "right to have
rights". Legal rights are sometimes called civil rights or statutory rights and are culturally and
politically relative since they depend on a specific societal context to have meaning.
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3. A claim right is a right which entails that another person has a duty to the right-holder.
Somebody else must do or refrain from doing something to or for the claim holder, such as
perform a service or supply a product for him or her; that is, he or she has a claim to that service
or product (another term is thing in action). In logic, this idea can be expressed as: "Person A has
a claim that person B do something if and only if B has a duty to A to do that something." Every
claim-right entails that some other duty-bearer must do some duty for the claim to be satisfied.
This duty can be to act or to refrain from acting.
4. A liberty right or privilege, in contrast, is simply a freedom or permission for the right-holder to
do something, and there are no obligations on other parties to do or not do anything. This can
be expressed in logic as: "Person A has a privilege to do something if and only if A has no duty
not to do that something."
5. Positive rights are permissions to do things, or entitlements to be done unto. One example of a
positive right is the purported "right to welfare."
6. Negative rights are permissions not to do things, or entitlements to be left alone. Often the
distinction is invoked by libertarians who think of a negative right as an entitlement to non-
interference such as a right against being assaulted.
7. Individual rights are rights held by individual people regardless of their group membership or
lack thereof.
8. Group rights have been argued to exist when a group is seen as more than a mere composite or
assembly of separate individuals but an entity in its own right. In other words, it's possible to see
a group as a distinct being in and of itself; it's akin to an enlarged individual, a corporate body,
which has a distinct will and power of action and can be thought of as having rights.

Obligations
An obligation is a juridical necessity to give, to do or not to do. This definition specifically pertains to civil
obligation in difference to natural obligation. The term juridical in the definition refers to the legal
aspect of an obligation. If an obligation is juridical, it follows that you can go to court and ask for a civil
action in case of breach or non-compliance.

Hierarchy of Laws

Philippine
Constitution

Laws (Administrative order,

Memo circular, Executive order,
Presidential Proclamation etc. )

Ordinances
(Province, City/Municipality, Barangay)
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Suit vs. Class Suit

 A civil lawsuit is a legal process by which a person or entity can hold another person or entity
liable for some wrong, injury, or damage. If the party who filed the lawsuit is successful in court,
the other party may be ordered to pay monetary damages, or he may gain some other
advantage.
 A class action lawsuit is a civil legal action in which one or more individuals sue a person or
entity on behalf of a larger group or class of people. Class action lawsuits are commonly used to
address situations in which a large number of individuals have been injured or wronged by the
defendant in the same manner.

Legal Personality vs. Legal age vs. Legal capacity

 Legal Personality is the sum total of an individual’s legal advantages and disadvantages; Defined
as the lawful characteristics and qualities of an entity. An example of these is a person’s age or
asset ownership.
 Legal Age is the age at which the person acquires full capacity to make his own contracts and
deeds and transact business generally (age of majority) or to enter into some particular contract
or relation, as the “legal age of consent” to marriage.
 Legal Capacity is the Lawful capacity for an entity in its own name to enter into binding
contracts, to sue and to be sued.

Distinction between Self Executing vs. Non-Self Executing provisions of the Constitution
 A constitutional provision is self-executing when it can be given effect without the aid of
legislation, and there is nothing to indicate that legislation is intended to make it operative. For
example, a constitutional provision that any municipality by vote of four-sevenths of its qualified
electors may issue and sell revenue bonds in order to pay for the cost of purchasing a
municipally owned public utility is self-executing and effective without a legislative enactment.
 Constitutional provisions are not self-executing if they merely set forth a line of policy or
principles without supplying the means by which they are to be effectuated, or if the language
of the constitution is directed to the legislature. As a result, a constitutional provision that the
legislature shall direct by law in what manner and in what court suits may be brought against
the state is not self-executing.

State Elements: People, Territory, Government and Sovereignty

 People - the population living in a state.
o Kind of Persons: Natural Person- human beings, individual
Juridical Person- Organizations, corporations
 Territory - includes the land, the rivers, the sea, and the air space which the jurisdiction of the
sate extends.
 Government - The agency, through which the will of the state is formulated, expressed and
carried out.
 Sovereignty or independence - the power to command and enforce obedience, free from
foreign control.

Principal- Agent Relationship

The principal-agent relationship is an arrangement in which one entity legally appoints another to act on
its behalf. In a principal-agent relationship, the agent acts on behalf of the principal and should not have
a conflict of interest in carrying out the act. Principal- Boss >> Agent- Subordinate
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PHILIPPINE CONSTITUTION ARTICLE 1

NATIONALTERRITORY

The national territory comprises the Philippine archipelago, with all the islands and waters
embraced therein, and all other territories over which the Philippines has sovereignty or jurisdiction,
consisting of its terrestrial, fluvial and aerial domains, including its territorial sea, the seabed, the
subsoil, the insular shelves, and other submarine areas. The waters around, between, and connecting
the islands of the archipelago, regardless of their breadth and dimensions, form part of the internal
waters of the Philippines.

Philippine Archipelago:
1. Treaty of Paris, December 10 1898 – cessation of the Philippine Islands by Spain to the United States
2. Treaty of Washington November 7 1900 – clarifying territories to the US by Spain, particularly the
islands of Cagayan Sulu and Sibutu.
3. Convention between US and Great Britain 1930– delimiting the boundary between North Borneo and
Philippine Archipelago

What comprises the National Territory?

1. The Philippine Archipelago with all the islands embraced therein
2. All other territories over which the Philippines has sovereignty or jurisdiction

The Philippine Archipelago with all the islands embraced therein

Archipelago - under the UNCLOS (United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea), it is a group of
islands, interconnecting waters and other natural features which are so closely inter-related that such
islands, waters and natural features from an intrinsic geographical, economic and political entity, or
which historically regarded as such.

2 Elements of Archipelagic Principle

1. Definition of internal waters
2. Straight baseline method of delineating the territorial sea
o Straight Baseline Method - allows a country with offshore islands and/or very jagged
coastlines to calculate its territorial seas from straight lines drawn from a point on the coast to the
islands, or from island to island. One then “connects the dots” literally, and the water behind the lines is
designated internal waters, while waters away from the line and toward open waters are considered
territorial seas

All other territories over which the Philippines has sovereignty or jurisdiction
• Includes any territory that presently belongs or might in the future belong to the Philippines through
any of the accepted international modes of acquiring territory.
• Batanes (1935 Constitution)
• Other territories belonging to the Philippines by historic or legal title (1973 Constitution)
 Claim to Sabah
 Spratly Islands (PD 1596 of June 11 1968)
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Components of National Territory:

I. Terrestrial – refers to the land mass, which may be integrate or dismembered, or partly bound by
water or consists of one whole island. It includes all the resources attached to the land.

II. Fluvial
a) Internal waters - the waters around, between and connecting the islands of the archipelago,
regardless of their breadth and dimensions.
b) Archipelagic waters – waters enclosed by the archipelagic baselines, regardless of their depth or
distance from the coast.
Archipelagic State – state made up of one or two archipelagos
Straight Archipelagic Baseline – determine the archipelagic waters, the state shall draw straight
baselines connecting the outermost points of the outermost islands and drying reef provided that within
such baselines are included the main islands and an area in which the ratio of the water to the area of
land, including atolls, is between 1:1 and 9:1. The length of such baselines shall not exceed 100 nautical
miles, except that up to 3 per cent of the total number of baselines enclosing any archipelago may
exceed that length, up to a maximum length of 125 nautical miles. The drawing of such baselines shall
not depart to any appreciable extent from the general configuration of the archipelago.
c) Territorial sea - belt of the sea located between the coast and internal waters of the coastal
state on the one hand, and the high seas on the other, extending up to 12 nautical miles from
the low water mark
d) Contiguous zone - Extends up to 12 nautical miles from the territorial sea. Although not part of
the territory, the coastal State may exercise jurisdiction to prevent infringement of customs,
fiscal, immigration or sanitary laws.

Principle of Innocent Passage – guarantees that all vessels, whatever flag that they are flying, can
freely cross all territorial seas.

e) Exclusive economic zone - Body of water extending up to 200 nautical miles, within which the
state may exercise sovereign rights to explore, exploit, conserve and manage the natural
resources.
f) Continental shelf – the seabed and subsoil of the submarine areas extending beyond the
Philippine territorial sea.
g) High seas – res communes; not territory of any particular State. They are beyond the jurisdiction
and sovereign rights of the State.

III. Aerial – Rules governing the high seas also apply to outer space, which is considered as res
communes.
Kármán Line – lies an altitude of 100 km (62 mi) above the Earth's sea level and is commonly
define the boundary between the Earth's atmosphere and outer space.