Gina Lopez’s appointment, a Duterte masterstroke

You’d agree that there’s no exaggeration in saying that Regina Lopez’s appointment as secretary of the environment and natural resources department (DENR) if you had heard of and understood that phenomenon political scientists call “regulatory capture.” This is the bigger conceptual box where the more familiar “corruption” is.

The term “regulatory capture,” though, is somewhat vivid, as it refers to the very common situation in developing countries in which regulatory bodies are “captured” by business entities and even individuals to further their own interests, to the extent of bending the laws these bodies are supposed to implement.