Alvienne Mae DG. Altre & Reina Corazon Y. Sanchez:

Decolonizing Knowledge, Decolonizing the Social Sciences: Issues, Concerns and Recommendations

Our Country, Our Culture by Kurzweil and Phillips, Supply and Demand Curves, Scientific Method, Internet, Condoms, Microwave Oven, Aggression, Stratification and Social Capital. Are they familiar? What are these things and concepts? These are only some of the wide variety of works the Westerners have made for the entire universe.

With the world we are living in today, it is no doubt that the Westerners have dominantly influenced us. They have made every possible way by which to achieve power and control over one country. And this they do in a manner that is not really obvious to the public. They’ve entered in such a way when we are in our times of drastic downfall. And the two major areas they dwell into are in Education and the Social Sciences. The “invaders” as we may call them first attacked us in a way that would further affect our whole being – our minds. Every individual acquires new knowledge in his process of growing up, and this can be achieved through education. One subject involved is Mathematics. It includes concepts, symbols, materials and method of teaching that perpetuates the cultural invasion of countries in terms of trade, administration and simply education (Bishop, 1995:73). In relation with education is the discipline of Social Sciences that is also greatly affected by the Westerners. The way people find their sense of self (David, 1977:100), the way they interact and depend to other people to find jobs (Alatas, 2006:605) are things that involve one specific area of what social reality is. The everyday journey we travel provides us with experiences that either changes or stagnates our well being. We came up with ideas that tests our objective and subjective knowledge that complicates more our thinking about things that surround us (Searle,1995:xi) – brought about by the continuous influence of Westerners in our country, the Philippines that we refer to as Neocolonialism. Thus, we really can say that we are still in the shadows of the reining class of the world.

In economics, the mode of teaching, theories, books and subject matter itself clearly shows liberalization. Professors use and discuss Western theories which invite students to enter into a new and large intellectual community. Students are challenged to read foreign books which in return liberate them from their backgrounds. Most of the books n economics are written in the west which leads to the issue of educating students away from what they believe in and their culture.

Smith, Solow, Lewis, and John Keynes are among of the famous economists. They formulated theories that are essential in economic decision making, explaining and predicting phenomena and the like which made them famous. Most of the economic theoreticians are from the west and males. Having these in mind, theories are design for Western and developed countries but due to academic dependency of the third world countries problems arise. In the book Economics of Development by Todaro and Smith, they argues that problems lie in the difference in structure and organization of the third world countries from the West making the theories questionable and incorrect. This issue exists due to the fact that there are no theoreticians in the third world countries. Academic dependency of the third world counties also exist because there are large amount of researches done and many theoreticians help in developing those theories and new ideas are formulated.

The issues that Education and the Social Sciences are experiencing right now demands of solutions that would lighten the problems and further enhance their status in intellectual thinking and standard of living.

We, the writers of this paper have come up with two major ways on which the issues be possibly solved. These could later be broken down in ways which a country can apply.

1. Theoretization
Academic dependency exists in the third world countries because there are no theoreticians who help in the formulation of new knowledge and theory development. Government subsidies are important in resolving the issue. It is needed in order to finance and allocate funds for responsible and intelligent persons to engage in research for gaining knowledge and advancement of the theory. Lack of government support and finance is one of the factors in the scarcity of theoreticians. Research serves a vital role in generating and developing knowledge. Thus, it is through this process we will be able to lift our reputation as dependent nation when it comes to intellectual matters. Conducting research needs funding to fully facilitate the study. Government should invest in research in order for us to be known in intellectual community as a source of knowledge not just a passive one.

2. Implementation
After the theoretization principles are laid and tested, public could now be given the chance to experience the new found ideas. This includes the mode of teaching of educators. Rather than teaching only the Western concepts, they should take into consideration the importance of what is really their own. They must move away from the idea that the best of the best are in the First World countries and that we can no longer improve by our own selves. We must start by studying our identity, our self-concept. We believe that once we know our inner self, it will move out to the outside thus affecting our over-all well being and the environment as a whole – popularly known as “proximodistal development” in Psychology.
We are also not saying that it would be a fast paced of adaptation of the theories and achieving them, but we must inculcate into our selves the values of patience, courage, perseverance and determination. And besides as what the Filipino proverb states: “Kapag may tiyaga, may nilaga” or “Kapag may itinanim, may aanihin”. Making the theories into action should be started locally, then nationally and in God’s own time internationally. We must do our part as citizens of our own country that has dignity and pride of standing up in our own feet.

These ways may be easier said and done, but if we really wanted it to happen – we must start now and it can happen.-

Glenda Gambito & Precious Iva Joulea L. Maiquilla:

Decolonizing Knowledge, Decolonizing the Social Sciences: Issues, Concerns and Recommendations

For almost four hundred years, the Spaniards, Americans and Japanese colonized the Philippines. It was only in 1946 that the Philippines gained “independence”. But, are we really liberated? Our physical bodies may be free from the rule of the colonizers but our minds are not. Thus we are not truly liberated but experiencing the worst form of colonization, the colonization of the mind. According to Altbach, colonialism does not end with our independence from the colonizers but their influence continues in the sphere of our intellectual life. What they invaded is the minds of the people (1995: 452).

.Because of a very long time of being a colony, our thoughts, ideas, beliefs, attitudes and our culture as a whole have been westernized. One of the reasons for their continued domination is their use of the educational system, particularly the social sciences. Even Mathematics, considered to be universal, was also a form of domination or colonization that they employed as Bishop had said in one of his articles.

.To some extent, values like rationalism, objectism and power and control are connected with Western Mathematics. Rationalism is the use of human reason in order to arrive at a certain decision. Math also exhibits the value of power and control through te use of number and measurement in the different parts of the state like trade and administration. Objectism is also one of the goals of Mathematics wherein the reality is abstracted or decontextualized in order to come up with a generalization (Bishop, 1995: 74-75). The idea of objectism or objectivity is usually contrasted with subjectivity. Searle emphasized that a good deal of our outlook in life depends on our concept of objectivity and the distinction between the objective and the subjective (1995: 7). According to him, two distinctions are crucial in differentiating what is objective and what is subjective: in terms of epistemic sense and ontological sense. In the epistemic sense, objective and subjective are predicates of judgments while in ontological sense, objective and subjective are ascribed modes of existence (Ibid: 8).

.Two contrasting views regarding the colonization of the knowledge can be seen today. The first view, the traditionalists, believes that liberal education should be promoted. Liberal education is the transcendence of a person over his or her origin, gender, race, and ethnicity. They try to make the students rise above the mediocrity, provincialism or other restrictions of whatever environment from which they have come ( Searle, 1995: 231). There is no need for representativeness and everything must be based on merit and intellectual quality. One does not necessarily need to believe in a particular theory or practice to be able to teach it.

.However, the idea of multiculturalism emerges as an opposition to the traditionalist’s view. According to this view, there should be a resistance tot eh perpetuation of Western knowledge. Alatas termed the phenomenon of the control of the colonizers of various disciplines like political sciences in Third world countries as academic imperialism (2006: 600). This is maintained through academic dependency which creates inequality between the Social Sciences of the West and of the Third World. The former imposes their theories and ideas that the latter passively accepts and applies to their country even if it is not suitable or appropriate (David, 1977:96). Third World countries like the Philippines therefore need an academic dependency reversal. In the Social Sciences, the discipline of Political Science may be a good place to start.

.Due to the colonization, several issues have arisen in the situation of Philippine Political Science. One of these is the adoption of the idea of democracy as the form of government in our country. This democracy, which has the presidential system of government, is patterned in the Western model specifically American democracy. As the dominant ideology, it follows that it will penetrate the realm of knowledge taught in the Philippines. Thus, it became the standard in the Academe to use the Western model of democracy.

.Studies on Philippine politics are usually written by Western political scientists like Riedinger, Wurfel and McCoy. Even the assigned readings in political courses are written mostly by the West. Though a lot of political scientists are being produced by Philippine universities, only a few of them gain academic recognition. However, the sad fact is that these political scientists are only recognized if they make researches for other countries or in partnership with a Western author. Focus on doing our own Political Science is not being done.

.Since the knowledge being inculcated in Philippine political science is based on Western models, it only follows that Western ideas are being applied in our government. The Philippine Constitution and the way of governance in the Philippines are transplanted from the United States of America. This shows that we have a strong attachment to our former colonizer and we hold them in the highest regard which created the myth that whatever is best for them would be best for us too. This thinking then led to failure since applying democracy, specifically presidential system of government, is not suited or applicable in our country. A lot of drawbacks can be seen in the Philippine case from the time of our adoption of American democracy. Some of these weaknesses are: 1) political elites continue to dominate Philippine politics, 2) political participation only happens during elections, 3) continued marginalization of the poor, 4) suspicious disappearances of activists in the country and extrajudicial killings, 5) the continuing human rights abuses, and 6) extreme inequalities in wealth and protection between Christians and Muslims ( Riedinger, 1999: 207).

.Due to the weaknesses of applying Western democracy in the Philippines, we therefore need to construct a form of government, which is better suited to our country, and this task should be first done in the academe in order to start remaking the mindset of Filipino political scientists. Remigio Agpalo suggested a pangulo regime wherein it prescribed the value of organic hierarchy. It prescribed that the pain suffered by the humblest member was also suffered by the entire nation. This means that if one part of the country suffers, all the other parts also suffer (1996:200). What Agpalo wants to emphasize is that we should incorporate our own values like “pakikisama” or sharing, loving and caring in our government, which would act as one body. We should abolish or abandon the individualism and impersonalization embodied by Western democracy. In doing so, how political science, whose focus is particularly on the structure of the government, is being taught would be revolutionized. Thus, if a pangulo regime would be established, we would somehow become decolonized in our knowledge. However, in order to do this, certain ways on how to decolonize our knowledge in political science should be developed. These are: 1) making Filipino political scientists get interested in doing research studies in the Philippines which are not patterned after Western models, 2) improvement of tertiary education by the government, and 3) provision of good jobs, in order to stop the brain drain, by the government here in the Philippines which would help in redoing Philippine social sciences. If all of these could possibly be done, development of the Filipino nation in all aspects would be realized.-

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BIBLIOGRAPHY


Agpalo, Remigio E. The Philippines: From Communal to Societal Pangulo Regime. Adventures in Political Sciences. Quezon City: University of the Philippines. 1996.

Alatas, Syed F. Countering Eurocentrism: Asian Discourses in the Social Sciences. London: New Delhi. 2006.

Altbach, Philip G. Education and Neocolonialism. ed. Bill Ashcroft et. al. The Post-colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge. 1995. p452-456.

Bishop, Alan J. Western Mathematics: The Secret Weapon of Cultural Imperialism. ed. Bill Ashcroft et. al. The Post-colonial Studies Reader. London: Routledge. 1995. p71-76.

David, Randolf S. Ang Pagkagapos ng Agham Panlipunang Pilipino. Ikalawang Pambansang Kumperensiya ng Sikolohiyang Pilipino. Lunsod ng Quezon. 1977

Riedinger, Jeffrey M. Democracy and its Limits: Lessons from Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. 1999.

Searle, John R. Is There a Crisis in American Higher Education?. ed. Edith Kurzweil and William Philips. Our Country, Our Culture: The Politics of Political Correctness. Boston: Partisan Review Press. 1994. p227-243.

Searle, John R. The Construction of Social Reality. New York: Free Press. 1995

Julie Ann Q. Benamera:

Decolonizing Knowledge, Decolonizing the Social Sciences: Issues, Concerns and Recommendations in the case of the Public Administration in the Phils.

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I. Introduction

Our conception of knowledge can be mainly based on how we, as observers, perceive it. This is a subjective view of how we see the world not as a “given”, but as something that has come to be agreed upon by convention. Today, this knowledge that makes up our reality determines the purpose of our actions, thus, it becomes the source of meaning that we put into our daily lives.

This paper aims to integrate the concepts, which the authors of the readings want to convey. I will discuss and summarize the ideas of the authors that primarily focused on the (de)colonization of knowledge, particularly in the social sciences. In the second part, I will speak about an issue in the Philippine Public Administration – a topic that falls within the realm of Political Science. I will try to explain how the Philippine bureaucracy has been colonized and is still being colonized up to now. Toward the end of the paper, I am tasked to present a recommendation on how this issue can be solved and what concrete actions we may take to help in the decolonization process in this particular area in the social sciences.

II. Integration of Concepts

The answer to the question of whether a particular knowledge is objective or subjective, I believe, is something that may still be value-laden – meaning, one’s answer is still subjective. Our idea of what passes as knowledge is based on our judgment that that something can be considered as knowledge, which depends on what area or discipline that knowledge belongs and relative to whoever says that it is indeed “knowledge” (Searle, Construction of Social Reality, p. 5).

The acquisition of knowledge in the social sciences constitutes our basic familiarity with “the classics”, which have become our theoretical foundation in our study of the contemporary issues present within each discipline (Searle, Our Country, Our Culture, p. 231). Tradition says that it is important to uplift one’s identity by being liberated from the knowledge that is based from one’s background or origin (ibid.). However, this may seem to contradict the main idea of “liberation”. Once we separate ourselves from our background that identifies us, we move into another’s “identity”, so to say. This can be clearly seen in our educational system. At this point, the colonization process begins. Generally speaking, Western knowledge evidently dominates the educational system. “Western values and views”, as Altbach puts it, are taught in most schools (Altbach, Education and Neocolonialism, p. 453). We have actually become academically dependent on the ideas offered by the West. Not only that. Since we have almost perfected the reshaping of our identity, and we have inculcated in us values from the West, it has become easier for us to relate to them, and even respond to the “demands for [our] expertise in the West” (Alatas, S. F. 2003: p. 605). In our case, this can be seen through the high demand of our professionals to become OFWs. The use of the English language has also become very indispensable. In the case of the Philippines, English is the medium of teaching, and obviously, foreigners from neighbor countries come to the Philippines to study the English language because we, Filipinos, have become very proficient in speaking it. We may also look at the cultural level in terms of “cultural rebirth” that Bishop speaks about (Bishop, 1990: p. 75). It is important to look back to our own culture and to rethink the values that have changed or have been replaced that might have affected our ways of thinking. Having knowledge of the culture is in itself a way to resist the dominant culture that controls all the other cultures. Again, in the case of the Philippines, this cultural or intellectual hegemony is present. The social sciences in the Philippines, I believe, are still dependent on Western ideas and views. The academe replicates Western concepts that lead to the colonization of the mind. We do not come up with our original ideas and viewpoints, but we continue to receive many of these from the outside (David, Ang Pagkagapos ng Agham Palipunang Pilipino, p. 96). Given the idea that generally, knowledge in the social sciences has been colonized, we now move on to one issue in Political Science – public administration.

III. Issue In Political Science: the case of Philippine Public Administration

The bureaucracy has become a key state apparatus that is in charge of the operations within the government. It operates and functions through public administration. Historically, the American colonization has become a great influence in the Philippine public administration. The Americans have introduced to us management and governance theories that we still apply today (Genato Rebullida and Serrano, 2006: p. 219). We have somehow patterned our administrative ways to fit into that of the West. This is the issue at hand: Is there really an existing Philippine Public Administration?

The answer to this question is usually a firm “NO”. However, we must rethink and say that there exists our own public administration. The problem is, it is not purely coming from us. If we talk about plain management, obviously, the ideas come from the West. However, if we consider the underlying factors involved in management, we can see that our culture, environment and society also shape the Philippine public administration. We can say that we have been colonized in terms of bureaucratic structure, functions, operations and management in general. Yet we have our own way of decolonizing the identity of our public administration. Filipino values and belief systems are also incorporated in the present bureaucracy. Our ideas of “pakikisama, utang na loob, and hiya” are seen in the bureaucracy. These are traditional Filipino values that actually lead to the downfall of the whole system. These values may lead to “graft and corruption, nepotism or favoritism, patron-client relations, and conflict between personal interest and public interest.” (ibid., p. 228) Thinking again, if this is how we will decolonize our idea of bureaucracy, this may eventually lead to the failure of our objective. Do we might as well adopt Western values and be colonized once more? My answer is no. The negative consequences of the actions of our bureaucrats and the Filipino society in general are dependent on how we use our knowledge of these cultural values. These values are essential part of our culture and we better use these for our further development. Scientific management theory that comes from the West is not actually necessary because culturally speaking, it does not fit our set of values and norms. It is the ideas coming from the outside that must adjust to the traditions we set, not the other way around.

III. Recommendations

The issue of establishing the identity of the Philippine public administration and its eventual separation from the Western theories and concepts has proven that culture is still an essential part of the development of a country’s bureaucratic system. Filipino values and norms are very strong to the extent these greatly influence even the Western ideas that have been introduced to us by the West. Still, our culture determines our management of our bureaucracy. To conclude, I recommend that the bureaucratic system adopt these Filipino values and use them sensibly for the betterment of the services that our bureaucrats offer us. Moreover, our bureaucrats must apply concepts, ideas and theories based on our culture and to what the society demands. In this way, we may slightly, but significantly “decolonize” the public administration in the Philippines.

References:

Readings

Alatas, Syed Farid (2003). ‘Academic Dependency and the Global Division of Labour in the Social Sciences’.

Altbach, Philip G (1971). ‘Education and Neocolonialism’.

Bishop, Alan J. (1990). ‘Western Mathematics: The Secret Weapon of Cultural Imperialism’ in Race and Class.

David, Randolf S. ‘Ang Pagkagapos ng Agham Panlipunang Pilipino’ sa Ikalawang Pambansang Kuprensya ng sikolohiyang Pilipino.

Searle, John R. ‘Is there a Crisis in American Higher Education?’ in Our Country, Our Culture.

_____________. The Construction of Social Reality.

Book

Genato Rebullida, Ma. Lourdes G., and Serrano Cecilia (2006). ‘Bureaucracy and Public Management in Democracy, Development, and Governance in the Philippines’ in Philippine Politics and Governance: An Introdudtion, ed. Noel M. Morada and Teresa S. Encarnacion Tadem. Diliman, Quezon City: UP Press.

Abigail E. Dayawen:

DECOLONIZING KNOWLEDGE, DECOLONIZING THE SOCIAL SCIENCES: Issues, Concerns, and Recommendations

A movement in the Social Sciences is currently gaining momentum – a movement for a separate and distinct knowledge base for different cultural milieus – even as the international community approaches increased homogeneity and blurring of cultural divides. This movement can be referred to as Decolonization, both of the Social Sciences and of knowledge in general. In this movement, alternative views are on the rise, supporting the expansion of the present dominantly-Western core knowledge of the Social Sciences, in order to better accommodate the cultural and intellectual diversity of humanity. This movement echoes the clamor of the minority in the Social Sciences – i.e., the intellectual community of the Third World and other non-Western nations, as well as their Western intellectual sympathizers – to be free of such things as the use of education for cultural imperialism (Bishop, 1990); education and neo-colonialism (Altbach, 1971); the need for diversity in higher education (Searle, 1994); pagkagapos ng agham panlipunang Pilipino (David, 197_ ); and academic dependency (Alatas, 2003), among others. The Decolonization movement works under the precept that knowledge in the Social Sciences (and in general) in it present form is utilized as an instrument for neocolonialism and neo-imperialism of the West to the (marginalized) Other (i.e. the Third World and the non-Western). The West, in this assumption, remains to hold other nations as pacified captives through subtle yet potent means. Education is one such means, as elaborated upon by Bishop, Altbach, and Searle. The Social Sciences in particular plays a major role in painting a social scenario as it would be seen through Western lenses; it is, therefore, a tool in perpetrating theories, methods, and explanations of social and cultural phenomena that are, in essence, Western in grounding (as discussed by Alatas and David). The power of the Social Sciences in social research and mobilizing policy-making can subtly be a tool for endorsing The Industrial and The Global as ideals and goals for national development, with the Western industrialized nations as the epitome of such a successful society.

Issues. Here we can see, too, that captive nations become, in most ways, alienated from knowledge: they do not own their knowledge and yet they cultivate it. They furthermore juxtapose it into their own cultural milieu. A lot of this alienated knowledge, for example, can be seen in the discipline of Psychology, particularly in the study of abnormal behavior. Western brand of abnormal Psychology is still largely pro-institutionalization, i.e., treatment of mental and psychological illnesses can only be successful by locking up these people in mental facilities. The deficiency of this treatment becomes more pronounced in the face of the advent of de-institutionalization and social re-integration as potent alternative treatments to replace isolation in mental wards. This practice has long been proven by other non-Western societies who traditionally take care of their mentally-handicapped instead of isolate them. In the Cordilleras, for example, the sapo is a shamanistic practice that aids in speeding up the recovery of someone who has escaped reality. Sadly, few efforts are taken to explore the promise of sapo as an alternative to institutionalization and isolation that the West introduced. Another case in point is the little attention given by the academe to the growing number of researches in Sikolohiyang Pilipino. There are such things as sikolohiya ng pagkalalake (with a female counterpart, I suppose), and these studies are only mentioned in passing – if they are mentioned at all – in Psychology courses presently offered in the university.

Recommendations. Bigger than the ramifications of the neocolonized mind is the task of decolonizing it. Alatas (2003) presented specific steps for breaking down academic dependency, while other writers presented their own recommendations, too. Here, I shall present some concrete steps which I believe would be helpful in decolonizing the Filipino Social Sciences.

Centers of social researches in the Philippines, such as the academe, should encourage and fund studies that focus on exploring indigenous and folk knowledge. The aim here is to remove the stigma of primitivism, backwardness, and inferiority attached to Filipino traditional knowledge and practices. Although methods of research would inevitably remain Western in grounding (the West being the developers of methods we apply in research presently), the results of what we would call the first wave of truly-Filipino exploratory researches would hopefully be able to generate theories and heuristic tools that fit the Filipino culture.

Inoculation could also work in decolonizing the Filipino mind. The teaching and dissemination of information regarding neocolonialism and its subtle forms could and would plant seminal seeds of critical thinking among people. As a saying goes, knowing the enemy is a means of equipping one’s self against the enemy. Awareness is the foremost weapon against the so-called captivity of the mind. The presentation of this course, for example, is an effective means of making people rethink the current situation of theorizing and other knowledge-generating activities that our nation is presently employing.

Aside, the study of World History becomes moot when we apply the Decolonization process in secondary-school Social Studies. World History is not the history of the world; it is the history of the West. Equating the World with the West is not a message we would like our youth to subconsciously imbibe. It would be better to introduce the History of the Philippine’s Indigenous Peoples as an alternative to World History (which is being taught to third year students), since we can not afford the youth to know more about Henry the VIII’s eight wives but be unaware of the struggles of Macli-ing Dulag and his people in the 1980’s to prevent the construction of the Chico Dam that threatened to leave them homeless in their own land. The youth knows about the Scots, the French, the English, the Americans… but little knows of the Tinguian, the Applai, the Gaddang, and the Lumads of the South. This brand of teaching is not education; this is merely schooling. If so, then there is a grain of truth in the saying that many are schooled, but few are educated. In a nation that is still in the process of picking itself up from impoverishment and moral degradation, the last thing we need is a horde of uneducated Filipinos.

***

Other steps could be secured to ensure that the Decolonization movement reaches the Filipino masses. Surely, these must be done if we are to be free of the mentality that only the West has awareness of and concern for things happening in the society. The Filipino is aware, and the Filipino can make sense of her/his world without needing the presence of the West.-

SYMPOSIUM PICTURES!^_^

First day of Paper-Reading in class, where Professor Canilao asked the paper presenters to stand behind the podium and introduce their over-a-month's worth of learnings and a week's worth of hard work. Jumping jiminies!

[July 26, 2007. Thursday]

A student reads her paper before a class of 30+ Social Science enthusiasts.

"So far, so good," quips Professor Canilao, acknowledging the six paper presenters for the day. Let's see how the others fare next meeting.XD

Mark-Anthony C. Tungpalan and Abrillius Raffy C. Laguesma:

Decolonizing Knowledge: The Social Science, Issues, Concerns, and Recommendations.

Westerners have been too influential on almost every field of human knowledge. As Alan J. Bishop critique western mathematics being considered universal and widely accepted by the people from different cultures and perceived to be as a culture-free knowledge. In this assumption, cultures are disregarded for not having the avenues to construct knowledge with regard to mathematics. However, Bishop acknowledges that cultures have the ability to produce their own mathematical system unique from others but is dominated by power knowledge (specifically, mathematics) introduced by the Western dominant thoughts.

Philip G. Altbach added that the Western is too pervasive in influencing other non-western cultures by employing education to penetrate traditional educational system of non-western cultures. Altbach argued that aside from physical colonization there exists mental colonization (colonization of the mind) wherein education is involved.

The article of Syed Farid Alatas strengthens the monopolistic control as well as influence over Third World social sciences. In addition, the dependence of Third World scholars and intellectuals on Western social science is due to the idea that they can not construct original metatheoretical or theoretical analysis thus depending on patterns from researches in the West on research agendas.

Contending debates of the traditionalist and challengers, with regard to crisis in American higher education was laid down by John R. Searle. The basic arguments of the traditionalists are; there are intersubjective standards of rationality; it tries to get rid of the notion of provincialism, the idea that individuals are viewed as a member of the universal human culture, and liberal education should be propagated wherein it criticizes one’s self and one’s community. On the other hand, the challengers argue against the traditionalist that all cultures are not only morally equal but intellectually equal as well. Therefore, they proposed that multiculturalist democracy should be propagated wherein every culture must be represented equally.

As a result of these previous studies on colonialism (specifically colonization of the mind), non-western countries should respond through setting urgent actions to decolonize Western knowledge and values being forcibly impose to them. Decolonization in the social sciences seeks to free us from Western enforced knowledge. On the context of the Philippines, the decolonization process stated through discovering the implications of the colonization of the mind, which is considered as a hidden agenda that penetrates and modifies the indigenous knowledge structures. The Philippine educational system became as a sub-sector and sub structure of the hegemonic global economy wherein the country’s development is widely dependent on hegemonic structures, the Western. Thus, the roles of the Philippine social sciences are the following; first, to open the mind of Filipinos and be critical to foreign (Western) knowledge; second, to offer solutions to social dilemmas.

ISSUE
One emerging issue in the present day condition of the Philippines, is the misused of social research to legitimized the prevailing status quo. Those who hold seats in the government often make use of social researches to preserve the power bestowed upon them. For example, public officials (especially high ranking and high educational attainment) may demand researchers to conduct an assessment of the present condition of the society, where there exists a disturbance and instability in the status quo but through social research conducted by the scholars, the present condition could become the other way around. Politicians being endowed with power could influence and control the researchers to bring out a desirable outcome masking the existent status quo.

Most, if not, some high ranking officials in the Philippine government, for example, the current President of the Philippines (GMA), had acquired education from western schools particularly in Harvard University. The implication of this is that the way of thinking and decision making is mostly influenced by Western perspectives.

RECOMMENDATIONS
The misused of social research to legitimized the status quo should not be tolerated. The focus and purpose of social research should be on bringing out the truth and valid reality in the society and should not be use as a tool to deceive the people. Social research must serve its main functions as a political tool to initiate change in the society. Researchers should uncover the indigenous educational system, or if not, seek solutions to modify the Western perspectives and educational system to become applicable to the Philippine context.

Education from foreign or Western perspectives, specifically if related to the fields of administration cannot be a valid perspective for the Philippine context due to the fact that Western perspective could not at all be possibly applied across cultures for it is culturally-laden. Decolonization should start on the better bearing stage, elementary and high school accompanied by the decolonization in the academe. If such actions are to be successfully initiated, the possibility of developing an educational system, indigenous and uninfluenced by Western educational system, in cooperation with researchers, would be sufficient to start the decolonization process in the educational system and of the Philippines. Colonization of the mind is predominantly situated upon the academy (academe). Therefore, the academe/university and its role in decolonizing knowledge must be addressed. Unless these actions are done, the efforts of decolonizing knowledge and making other knowledge visible do not challenge the very effort/power we maintain to bring them to consciousness and to make them visible.-