Political dynasties are a reality in countries around the world, but perhaps nowhere are they more entrenched than the Philippines. The Philippines Daily Inquirer reported that 83 percent of current senators and 76 percent of house members belong to political dynasties. The phenomenon extends down to local government as well. According to the Philippines House of Representatives’ internal policy and budget research department, 9,852 out of 17,983 local elective posts, accounting for 54 percent of the total, are held by dynasts. Some of the largest and most powerful Philippines political families currently have several members serving in the current congress, including the Tulfos, Villars, and the Marcos-Romualdez clan which is also related to President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
The pervasiveness of political dynasties in the Philippines has frequently been cited as a major cause of corruption, legislative inaction, rent-seeking and other disadvantages to investors and the business community. Academic research has documented the various ways political dynasties in the Philippines undermine the private sector. Mendoza et al. (2022) argue that the private sector is impacted differently based on region and the nature of local industry. They find that dynasties exacerbate poverty most severely in resource-rich provinces outside Luzon, where politicians and economic elites tend to collude rather than compete and block outside investment, stifle competition, and capture extractive industries like mining, agriculture, and forestry for personal gain. In Luzon, where a more competitive and independent business sector exists, dynasties are somewhat constrained in their predatory tendencies because the marginal benefits of encouraging economic growth outweigh pure extraction. Yet even there, the investment climate is burdened by dynastic politicians insulated from accountability who own businesses and are incentivized to use regulatory powers to crowd out competitors and ensure economic gains flow to a narrow circle of powerful families rather than the broader population.
Dynasties also actively corrode the institutional environment for business in subtler but equally damaging ways. Villanueva (2025) documents how dynastic politicians treat public office as a “family franchise,” using state powers to manipulate procurement processes, award contracts to allied firms, and shield members from anti-corruption prosecution. This legal impunity emboldens rent-seeking behavior across the entire political system and raises effective transaction costs for any investor that lacks connections to the right political families. Dynastic officials are routinely confronted with a fundamental conflict of interest between maximizing benefit for their family and maximizing benefit for the public, and in practice, family interest consistently wins. The result is a business environment distorted by favoritism, opaque contracting, and the systematic exclusion of non-aligned competitors — conditions that deter both domestic entrepreneurship and foreign investment.
To break the stranglehold on power by a few prominent families, the Philippines government is currently debating an anti-dynasty bill to regulate the ability of family members holding simultaneous political office. The Philippines Constitution of 1987 contains a provision calling for the prohibition of political dynasties. However, it has never been operationalized by a law from Congress. Efforts to pass a law have come close several times over the past four decades, but the current debate may finally succeed in fulfilling the constitutional mandate.
As of early 2026, the anti-dynasty debate is still fiercely contested. President Ferdinand Marcos — himself a dynastic scion — directed Congress in December 2025 to prioritize an anti-dynasty bill alongside other transparency measures. However, his critics argued that this move was driven less by genuine reformist intent than by plummeting approval ratings following a massive public works corruption scandal. Public support for reform has surged in response, with a February 2026 Pulse Asia survey showing 64 percent of Filipinos backing an anti-dynasty law, up from 54 percent the previous year.
The House subsequently advanced an anti-dynasty bill to second reading in March 2026, before recess until May. However, critics across civil society and the opposition have condemned the measure as deliberately toothless. The bill restricts dynasty relationships only to the second degree of consanguinity, meaning spouses, parents, children, siblings, grandparents and grandchildren, leaving aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews entirely unrestricted. Crucially, the bill also allows one family member to hold office at each level of government simultaneously, meaning a single family could theoretically still field dozens of relatives across national, provincial, and municipal positions at the same time. Opposition lawmakers such as Representative Sarah Elago argue the bill effectively legalizes “fat” dynasties rather than banning them, while Representative Chel Diokno says it allows powerful families to entrench their hold on power further. Even if the House passes the measure, the bill faces its most formidable hurdle in the Senate, which is home to four pairs of siblings who have little incentive to support legislation that would directly threaten their own political futures.
For foreign investors, the practical question is not whether an anti-dynasty law passes, but what kind passes and how it is enforced. A strong, genuinely enforced law could meaningfully improve the operating environment: breaking dynastic control would reduce the informal pressure on foreign firms to align themselves with connected families before accessing permits, tenders, and procurement opportunities. A more meritocratic political class, elected on policy platforms rather than family networks, would likely produce more rules-based and predictable regulatory behavior, a significant consideration for investors with multi-year project timelines. However, some key stakeholders feel that the gap between that scenario and the bill currently advancing through Congress is substantial.
The local business community clearly feels that the Philippines needs to take a tough stance on political dynasties. In February 2026, a coalition of 31 groups, including the Makati Business Club, the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the Management Association of the Philippines, issued a joint statement condemning a House bill as a “pro-dynasty measure” that falls far short of meaningful reform. Their strong preference for genuine reform carries weight beyond a simple statement of self-interest: local firms navigate the barriers of dynastic politics daily and have a granular understanding of where the real distortions lie. While domestic and foreign capital don’t always share interests, here they largely converge: both benefit from more predictable regulation, open tendering, and lower informal transaction costs. The local business community’s confidence that a strong, enforced anti-dynasty law would improve conditions is not proof that it would, but it is the considered judgment of actors with more direct experience of the system than most foreign investors are likely to have.
But even if a strong anti-dynasty law were passed and strictly enforced, corruption, nepotism and cronyism would not disappear overnight. Political dynasties are one factor undermining the private sector, but other forces like elite impunity, weak and under-resourced institutions, and the high costs of electoral campaigns must also be addressed. In the absence of more comprehensive reform to address other systemic issues, the families with the most entrenched national influence may not lose much of their power because of an anti-dynasty law. Their power flows through informal networks, concentrated wealth, and regulatory capture rather than through the formal stacking of family members in adjacent offices. Removing dynastic politicians from a given position does not automatically remove the underlying patronage networks they leave behind. Furthermore, the regional variation in how dynasties operate means the practical impact of any reform will also be uneven. Investors in resource-rich provinces outside Luzon — where dynastic control tends to be more entrenched and collusive — should expect slower and more contested change than those operating in the more competitive business environment of Luzon.
In the short run, disrupting established family-based power structures may actually create new risks for the business environment. When incumbent dynasties are diminished, incoming politicians may move to establish their own patronage arrangements, rather than a meritocratic system, if other good governance measures are not enforced at the same time. These new networks will demand their own share of contracts, permits and kickbacks, creating a period of unpredictability that can be particularly disruptive for investors with long-horizon infrastructure, energy or real estate projects.
Over the longer term, a credible anti-dynasty law could represent a meaningful step toward a more competitive and rules-based political system, gradually opening space for more meritocratic leadership and reducing the informal tolls that foreign investors routinely face when engaging with government regulators. But to achieve that outcome, the law must be strong enough to genuinely disrupt family-based patronage networks, enforced by institutions that are themselves subject to dynastic influence, and sustained through political transitions that will inevitably bring new powerbrokers with their own interests. None of those conditions can be taken for granted in the current environment. Foreign investors should treat the anti-dynasty debate as a dynamic situation to monitor and not as a problem nearing resolution. When looking towards opportunities in the Philippines, businesses must watch not just whether a law passes, but what it covers, who enforces it, and whether early enforcement actions suggest genuine reform or token compliance.
Image credit: Facebook/Bongbong Marcos
Maxwell Abbott
Maxwell Abbott is a Principal at Meriwether & Co., a specialist advisory firm helping investors and corporations navigate political risk and geostrategy across Asia-Pacific. He brings over a decade of experience combining political risk analysis, strategic intelligence, and on-the-ground investigations across the region, with particular expertise in Southeast Asia.