1986 'People Power': The spark in Manila that led to world-changing events, 'Iron Curtain' meltdown

Manila: After Adolf Hitler, the murderous dictator of Nazi Germany, and Hideki Tojo, the murderous dictator of Japan during World War II, there emerged Ferdinand Marcos Sr., the murderous dictator of the Philippines.

Other lesser Hitlers emerged in Asia, the Americas and Europe.

Then after decades of darkness, came the EDSA "People Power" revolt, which sparked a sea-change.

It's a narrative that Hitler wanna-bes everywhere — from Maduro to Pinochet, Noriega and Duterte desperately sought to smother beneath layers of bombastic, cruel rhetoric, yet failed to extinguish.

Following are the 10 events surrounding the 1986 EDSA People Power revolt that continue to resonate with ordinary people around the world.

Mired in tonnes of debt, a severe lack of hope and a deadly crackdown on dissent, millions of unarmed Filipinos gathered along Epifanio de los Santos Avenue (EDSA), forcing dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr into exile and restoring democratic rule under Corazon Aquino.

It became the world’s most successful nonviolent uprising of the late Cold War.

What's changed? The EDSA revolt led to the 1987 Philippine Constitution, which allows no strongman or woman, to rule beyond 6 years, single-term. It replaced the 1973 'Mickey Mouse' Constitution imposed by Marcos Sr. who impoverished the Asian country and turned the Philippines into a supplier of housemaids to the world to keep dollars flowing, while neighbours like Singapore and Malaysia built stronger economies.

Although the "Iron Curtain" would formally collapse years later, 1986 marked the psychological turning point: authoritarian regimes began to lose legitimacy, and peaceful resistance gained global credibility.

The "Iron Curtain", a phrase popularised by Winston Churchill in 1946, describes the symbolic and physical, ideological, and military division of Europe into two separate areas — Western capitalist democracies vs Eastern Soviet-dominated communist nations — following World War II.

What's changed? While the Iron Curtain symbolised a stark the contrast between Western democracy/capitalism and Eastern communism/totalitarianism, 1986 marked the start of its meltdown. Communism in Eastern Europe "withered away", flipping the vision of Karl Marx, the intellectual father of socialism/communism.

In Poland, the Solidarity movement—suppressed in earlier years—regained strength after 1986.

What's changed? By 1989, Poland would hold partially-free elections, the first crack in Eastern Europe’s communist bloc.

Mikhail Gorbachev, leader of the Soviet Union (today's Russia) expanded glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring), making clear that Moscow would no longer crush uprisings with tanks — as it had in Hungary (1956) or Prague (1968).

What's changed: Gorbachev's decision to allow elections with a multi-party system and create a presidency for the Soviet Union began a slow process of democratisation.

Instead of communism spreading, democracy began to spread — from Manila to Warsaw. The deadly, Satanist, egotistic, envy-driven communist ideology lost its currency.

What's changed: EDSA showed that people power could defeat a regime without civil war, inspiring opposition movements worldwide.

In Yugoslavia, the post-Tito system started unraveling after 1986, as nationalism replaced communist unity — eventually leading to multiparty politics and, later, violent breakup in the 1990s.

What's changed: Yugoslavia is gone.

Though it would fall in 1989, the Berlin Wall was already doomed by 1986 as Soviet policy shifted and Eastern European regimes lost the will to enforce isolation.

What's changed: East Germany is gone. Germany became one.

Figures like Pope John Paul II (JPII) emboldened Catholic-majority societies — the Philippines and Poland especially — to challenge atheistic or authoritarian regimes using moral, not military, force.

What's changed: JPII stressed that true change comes from culture, not just politics, leading to a focus on re-educating a "culture of death" on issues like abortion and marriage.

During the failed 1991 August coup, communist hardliners and military elites attempted to overthrow Gorbachev and stop the failing reforms. 

What's changed: The reforms launched in the Soviet Union after 1986 paved the way for the peaceful dissolution of the USSR in 1991, transforming Russia from a communist superpower into a post-Soviet state.

From Manila (1986) to Berlin (1989), the world learnt a powerful lesson: Dictatorships could fall without armed revolution — if legitimacy, loyalty, and fear collapsed at the same time. It didn't work everywhere all the time. But the power of a peaceful, nonviolent, civil-driven regime change, and transitioning power through peaceful mass mobilisation rather than bloodshed can no longer be ignored.

What's changed: This era shifted global politics toward democracy, proving that united citizens can topple dictatorships. The key lesson: despots, regardless of strength, rely entirely on the often temporary political will to defend them, making peaceful, mass-mobilised resistance a powerful strategy.

1986 EDSA wasn’t just a Philippine milestone — it was the opening chapter of the Cold War’s peaceful conclusion.

EDSA helped prove that the will of ordinary people could dismantle extraordinary systems of control, accelerating the fall of murderous dictators and reshaping the global order.