Philippine financial standing in 1921: The first World War boom and bust

• Main Author: Ybiernas, Vicente Angel S.
• Format: text
• Published: Animo Repository 2007
• Subjects: Financial crises > Philippines; Cash crops > Philippines; Philippines > Economic conditions; Francis Burton Harrison, 1873-1957; Economic History
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/faculty_research/13408
• Institution: De La Salle University

After the end of the First World War in 1918, when American consumers adopted the policy of “economic normalcy,” the Philippine economy suffered a severe financial crisis. Gov.-Gen. Francis Burton Harrison (1913–1921) maintained that this crisis was beyond the control of any person or government. His detractors disagreed and blamed him for it. Several prominent Filipinos were implicated in fraudulent transactions with government-owned corporations. Critics related these anomalies to the Filipino inability to sustain an independent country. However, to say that the failure to prevent a major financial crash proves a people’s inability to sustain an independent country is untenable. This article shows that the roots of the postwar financial crisis were the war itself and the policies adopted during the Harrison administration. Other issues served to exacerbate the repercussions brought about by these factors.