The strongman as dictator is a cliche that does not help us understand the nuances of leadership. As for Duterte, he immediately made it clear, if elected president, that the Philippines will adopt an independent foreign policy. An article in the New Yorker explains it best when it cited the influential 16th-century Scottish scholar George Buchanan “that a king rules over willing subjects, a tyrant over the unwilling.” That is also what makes a strongman different from a dictator. What kind of strongman is this who goes to shop in Greenbelt where he is mobbed and the crowd wanting to take selfies with him? To this column the best answer to those who doubt that he has the following he needs to be a strongman without being a dictator is best symbolized by the million Filipinos who were at his miting de avance of May 7, 2016.

Source: Philippine Star May 11, 2018 20:03 UTC