Region, Nation and Homeland


Book Description

Movements tell stories of oppression and liberation. They critique the power relations that exist. They offer alternative visions of the homeland they hope to build. This volume looks at the Moro and Cordillera movements as told in their own words. Within and among these movement organizations in the Philippines, their constructed identities and claims for demanding the right to self-determination differed and evolved over time. The author shows the significant intertextuality in the discourse of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, which broke away from the Moro National Liberation Front. She traces the drift to heightened ethnonationalism in the case of the Cordillera Peoples’ Liberation Army when it split from the national democratic Cordillera People’s Democratic Front. She reflects on where these mobilizations are now, and the strands of discourses that have remained salient in current times.




Democracy and Nationalism in Southeast Asia


Book Description

Jacques Bertrand offers a comparative-historical analysis of five nationalist conflicts over several decades in Southeast Asia. Using a theoretical framework to explain variance over time and across cases, he challenges and refines existing debates on democracy's impact and shows that, while democratization significantly reduces violent insurgency over time, it often introduces pernicious effects that fail to resolve conflict and contribute to maintaining deep nationalist grievances. Drawing on years of detailed fieldwork, Bertrand analyses the paths that led from secessionist mobilization to a range of outcomes. These include persistent state repression for Malay Muslims in Thailand, low level violence under a top-down 'special autonomy' for Papuans, reframing of mobilizing from nationalist to indigenous peoples in the Cordillera, a long and broken path to an untested broad autonomy for the Moros and relatively successful broad autonomy for Acehnese.




The Relevance of Regions in a Globalized World


Book Description

This volume provides a unique open inter-disciplinary dialogue across the Humanities and Social Sciences to further our understanding of the phenomenon of regions and regionalism in a globalized world both at the theoretical and empirical levels. What comprises a region? What are the different regional dynamic processes that take place? What is the relationship between the regional and the global? What role does identity building play? Bringing together scholars from various disciplines within and across the Social Sciences and the Humanities to reflect on these questions, the book explores how regions are imagined, constructed, understood, and explained in different academic disciplines. Each chapter addresses these common questions and uses its own disciplinary lenses to answer them. In addition, the volume offers interesting reflections on the academic borders constructed in the study of regions, thus demonstrating the importance of obtaining insights from both social scientists and humanities scholars in order to better understand the relevance of regions in a complex and globalized world. An important work for scholars and postgraduate students in many fields, including political science, international relations, sociology, economics, geography, history and literature, as well as for those interested in regionalism and area studies.







Ethnic Conflicts in Southeast Asia


Book Description

Potentially destabilizing ethnic conflicts continue to challenge nation-states worldwide: The countries of Southeast Asia are no exception. Globalization, population movements and historical and political fault-lines in a tremendously ethnically diverse region, coupled with continuing uneven access to economic development, have seen the resurgence of old conflicts or the flaring up of new ones. Along with violence and the loss of life and livelihood there are also longer-term cross-border impacts to consider in the form of refugees or displaced persons, illegal migrant labour, as well as drug and arms smuggling. Written by country experts, this volume examines ethnic configurations as well as conflict avoidance and resolution in five Southeast Asian countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines and Thailand. Ethnic Conflicts in Southeast Asia is a resource for scholars, policy-makers, NGO personnel, analysts and others who wish to deepen their understanding of the region, or develop strategies to prevent, modulate and resolve such conflicts.




Philippine Politics and Governance


Book Description

20 essays on law and government in the Philippines.




Costly Wars, Elusive Peace


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Pilipinas


Book Description