Pressure politics

Discovering the power of utilizing the mass media to exert pressure on politicians is usually attributed to Wayne Wheeler, the de facto leader of the Anti-Saloon League.

The Eighteenth Amendment creating Prohibition might well not have passed if a secret ballot had made it impossible for the league to have punished the "disobedient" at the next election (Sinclair, 1962, p. 110).

In the Philippines, after the assassination of Benigno "Ninoy" Aquino Jr. in August 1983 at Manila Airport (now called Ninoy Aquino International Airport), Jose W. Diokno, the leader of the opposition against the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship, through his umbrella organization the Kilusan sa Kapangyarihan at Karapatan ng Bayan (Movement for People's Sovereignty and Democracy) Organization or KAAKBAY that was formed in March 1983, used pressure politics to sway and battle the Marcos dictatorship.

KAAKBAY used a publication called, "The Plaridel Papers" to pursue their ideology of pressure politics or mass protests as a peaceful form of resistance.

[3] Many of those who boycotted were participants in this peaceful revolution and even led the people to Malacañang Palace, after the Marcos family escaped in exile via helicopter to Hawaii.

KAAKBAY led by the Diokno family started the coalitions to oppose Marcos and relied on pressure politics, serving as what Diokno called a "parliament-of-the-streets".