Commonwealth coming of age

January 9 marks the 27th year anniversary of the Commonwealth as a form of government of the Northern Mariana Islands. January 15 is coming-of-age day in Japan when 20-year-olds are ceremonially accepted as adults. Both celebrations are officially observed today in the CNMI. There is no official connection between the two but their conjunction this year raises the question: What does coming of age mean for the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands?

Sam McPhetres, our senior resident social studies guru, in characteristic northern European fashion, defines Commonwealth first for what it is not. It is not any variation of monarchy and dictatorship. Nor is it anarchy, though some may suggest that it function like one. “It is something very different from all of them, a special kind of democracy,” he writes in his book on CNMI Civics.

So, what model of governance have we adopted? In the U.S.A., Massachusetts, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky identify themselves as Commonwealths. The distinction however, is lost on how they may be different from any of the other States of the Union. Since 1952 Puerto Rico has identified itself as a U.S. Commonwealth. In 1978, the CNMI followed. Both are autonomous local governments federated with the U.S. government. There was the U.S. Commonwealth of the Philippines in 1935 but it gained political independence in 1946, though unreconstructed nationalist would say that Wall Street remained to manage a substantial portion of the nation’s wealth.

Anyhow, how then must we understand what being a Commonwealth entail? Commonwealth, “commonweal” in archaic English, means common good. One may trace the development of this understanding from the Romans. The landed gentry in their struggle against the monarchy insisted that res (real thing) publicus (public) must undergird governance. A republican form developed with a Senate consisting of the settlers who held the land, the patrician wealth. The plebeians, non-land holding Roman citizens, but nevertheless urban players in cosmopolitcan Rome assembled as Tribunes. They exercised veto powers over the Senate. They insisted that laws be written and made public, precurser of constitutional law.

The Greeks named this governance by demos, by the common people. Abraham Lincoln would forcefully echo this principle when he intoned at Gettysburg that the Union is a “government of the people, by the people and for the people.” The C.I.A. factbook characterizes the CNMI as a “commonwealth in political union with the U.S.; federal funds to the Commonwealth administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of Insular Affairs.” A rather limited though accurate perspective, it begs the question of who we, the present citizens and residents within the CNMI, say we are.

The tension between the common weal (plebe/proletariat/citizen) and dictators (kaiser/tsar/caesar/sir) litters the history of worldwide political development. Republican (separation of powers) and democratic (public welfare for all) institutions seem to be prevailing but entrenched dictatorial domains continue and authoritarian lapses remain a seductive though aberrant organizational option. We are often reminded of Thomas Jefferson’s aphorism on government’s size and power: “A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have.” Behaviorally, politicians tend to be more patrician than plebeian. The leaders of the new Commonwealth took to the style of the TT commissioners moving about in their chauffeured limos rather than developing pedestrian accessibility befitting a populist government. Whatever else one can say of Gov. Babauta, at least, his occasional trotting jogs on the Beach Road pathway breeds familiarity of the top executive officer.

In any case, we begin the first of the annual four C legal holidays, continually raising the question of who we say we are as a political unit: Commonwealth (January), Covenant (March), Citizenship (November), and Constitution (December). Obviously, this is more than just a political question. It is cultural and economic as well. So, how might we gauge if our Commonwealth has come of age?

In the “sustainable economic and ecological development” community, the word “stakeholder” is a primary category to delineate critical players. Who are our Commonwealth’s stakeholders?

Election-wise, only registered voters. That means citizens, a minority of CNMI residents. Patronage in government follows. In the nature of things, it is bloated, inefficient and ineffective, and HR-confined primarily to the voting population. Ownership of land is also limited. Constitutional affirmative action temporarily favors a few, for perhaps, a couple more generation. But even those real estate that are not in the public domain, formal records and informal claims are often at odds, which burdens the Courts and strain blood relations.

Nevertheless, from a decision-making perspective, non-voters exert immeasurable influence on island life. As an example, the seemingly systematic proliferation of Korean-owned Mom and Pop stores indicates an economy beyond the purview of the Chamber of Commerce. There is an economy at the street level that is free market led. Informal decisions in financing, merchandizing, and trade are being made outside of formally regulated structures.

Ours had been an economy that enjoyed the competitive advantage born out of trade and tariff headnotes. The fundamental economic question of how the CNMI society supports itself produces a picture of an externally dependent society. Its food chain extends all the way to the poultry farms of the eastern seaboard of the U.S.A. With locally available alien farm labor, at least, some plots are now being cultivated. Still, children’s toys come from Guangdong environs. The local garment factories produce for the U.S.A. market. Local consumer use inexpensive products from Southeast Asia and China. External investor propelled economies that do not have locally retentive structures that circulates money fast and around longer before it exits, project a picture of plenty without the reality of retained profits and benefits.

For local governance (operations and public services) the CNMI is often characterized as a quadrant of Washington, D.C., subject to the changing demands of the military, foreign relations, insular affairs appropriations, and the whimsical winds of commerce. In a time of broadening stakeholders’ participation through the decentralization of federal structures (at snail’s pace) and local autonomy claims and practices by the civil society sector (at email speed), it is the cultural mix of the Commonwealth that offers the possibility of “a special kind of democracy.” Indeed, and especially now that the main source of revenue from the garment industry is in rapid decline, the Commonwealth appears anew to be a fresh work in progress. Humanities-related concerns best take creative heed, lest we are relegated to becoming just an accidental Commonwealth, subject to the waves of global tsunamis, rather than an emerald isle of sunny dispositions out to construct an earth-friendly and humanity-affirming sustainable habitat.

Are we coming of age? How self-sufficient are our support systems? How self-reliant and self-determining are our decision-making procedures and processes? How broadly do we engage the participation of formal and informal stakeholders so that there is a sense of ownership in living within the CNMI?

For now, we trust Marianas Visitors Authority has kept an eye on the Japanese coming-of-age festivities and offered pleasant expressions of the same on island. After all, Japan provides us with the majority of our transient residents most times of the year. It is time to intentionalize their participation, not only as gawking tourists but also as participant travelers in the ongoing life of the Commonwealth.

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Vergara is a Social Studies 6th grade teacher at San Vicente Elementary School and writes a regular column for the Saipan Tribune.