Developing as a democracy

Between 1992 and 1998, Fidel V. Ramos presided over a remarkable turnaround in the Philippines. Elected President with less than a quarter of the votes in a field of seven candidates, the former soldier plunged boldly into a program of structural reform - dismantling the cartels and monopolies controlled by the traditional oligarchy and opening up to global competition an economy that had been closed for 40 years. In the process, President Ramos transformed his country from being the "Sick Man of Southeast Asia" to the East Asian state the experts now judge to be the most likely to come through the region's currency crisis ahead of all the others. The purposes and details of this reform program are spelled out in these speeches collected over the six years of the Ramos Presidency. This book enables readers throughout the globe to understand what had been done and what will most likely happen in the future of this key East Asian country.