ABSTRACT
The Philippines is a somewhat different place than it was a decade or two ago. Gone is the regime of Ferdinand Marcos—the president who imposed martial law in 1972—and then was overthrown in the People Power revolution of February 1986. Gone are many of the policies he put into place with ruinous effects for both the Philippine economy and foreign business interests. Gone too are the American bases, notably the air base at Clark and the navy base at Subic, that Marcos permitted the United States to maintain in exchange for enormous quantities of US aid funds. In their place are free ports, and their existence is one of the more visible signs of the Philippines’ shifting political and economic outlook.
