Tag: Duterte

“Bringing University to Heel”? An Unprecedented Attack on Academic Freedom in the Philippines

The abrogation of the UP-DND Accord means that the military and police can now enter UP campuses at will. The academic community now faces the prospect of armed military and police presence and constant surveillance. Schools and universities in the Philippines are under attack by a regime that knows no limits to its brutality and violence.

/ February 1, 2021

Duterte has forfeited the Philippines’ EU trade privileges

In 2014, Trade Justice Pilipinas supported the Philippines’ pursuit of favorable trade privileges from the EU, hoping they would deter human rights abuses. Six years later, that hope has disappeared, and so should those privileges.

/ October 7, 2020
Duterte Blame Game FORSEA

Foreign powers, political elites, and ruling regimes enabled Duterte’s rise to power

It is time to stop scapegoating the Left for Duterte’s rise. Instead blame and fight the real culprits – foreign powers, political elites, previous regimes and their policies – and to forge stronger unities and intensify the struggle against the cronyist and dictatorial regime.

/ August 22, 2020
Populist Demagogy Southeast Asia

Mesrob Vartavarian on Demagogy in Southeast Asia: Thaksin and Duterte Compared

Thaksin and Duterte are leading examples of Populist Demagogy in Southeast Asia. Yet, they have both faced embedded elite interests that have mounted formidable defences of their privileges. This has curtailed populist inroads into established power networks.

/ June 19, 2020
Duterte’s Anti-Poetry-FORSEA

On Court Poetry During the Marcos Dictatorship and A Note on Duterte’s Anti-Poetry

Duterte’s aggressive anti-poetry in broken English, Tagalog and Visayan is the truth of today’s politics. And it is also the unmasked truth of the poetry of all of Marcos’ court poets. In other words, Duterte’s anti-poetry is the truth of the poetry of De Vega, Mella and Hufana.

/ April 29, 2020
Philippines home quarantine FORSEA

The Pasaway and Duterte’s Pandemic Blame Game

The Duterte government will never be able to correctly deal with the pandemic unless it recognizes what, not who, the real enemy is. The enemy is not the pasaway, the poor or the rebels.

Taking on the Virus, Talking with his Fists: Duterte’s Unique Approach to the COVID-19 Crisis

Duterte is floundering and clueless as a head of state. His arrogant claim to be the supreme arbiter of life and death over his countrymen has been rudely taken away from him by a virus that has put him in his place.

/ April 8, 2020
Limited Democracy Philippines

Limited Democracy: Elites and Subalterns in Contemporary Philippine Politics

Decades of elite-initiated societal fragmentation have made it far more difficult to mount a coherent progressive challenge to the Philippines’ predatory politics.

/ February 15, 2020
A Tale of Two Warlords- Andal Ampatuan, Rodrigo Duterte, and the Philippines’ Mutating Politics FORSEA

A Tale of Two Warlords: Andal Ampatuan, Rodrigo Duterte, and the Philippines’ Mutating Politics

Local and provincial warlords had been an integral component of national politics since the postwar period. During the Arroyo years, Ampatuan and Duterte increasingly influenced national affairs from afar by dealing out violence in their respective locales.

/ November 29, 2019
Duterte-dictatorship-FORSEA

The PHILIPPINES: INCHING EVER-CLOSER to DICTATORSHIP?

It would do the president good to look at those who came before him, especially the all-popular Marcos, and learn that true power lies in the trust the people have in their leader.

/ June 1, 2019