The Lesser Evil
The Lesser Evil Amiel Gerald A. Roldan™ November 6, 2026 In the Philippine 2028 national elections, “the lesser evil” is not a discrete outcome or a stable ranking of candidates/parties but a recursive structural feature of the political system itself . It is the dominant heuristic produced by elite continuity, weak institutional filters, dynastic concentration of resources, and a polarized electorate that repeatedly confronts imperfect options under conditions of high stakes and low trust. Surveys and elite maneuvering as of late 2026 illustrate the pattern without resolving it. Structural Context and Recursive Logic Philippine presidential contests operate under a single six-year term with no reelection, strong local machines, and weak party institutionalization. Power circulates among a small set of families and their clientelist networks rather than through programmatic competition. The 2022 UniTeam (Marcos–Duterte) victory fractured into open rivalry by the mid-2020s, produc...
