Table Of ContentPOLITICS,
PROPERTY
AND LAW
in the
Philippine
Uplands
Melanie G. Wiber
Wilfrid Laurier University Press
Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data
Wiber, Melanie, 1954-
Politics, property and law in the Philippine
uplands
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-88920-222-2
1. Ibaloi (Philippine people). 2. Property
(Ibaloi law). I. Title.
DS666.I12W5 1993 306'.089'9921 C93-093986-7
Copyright © 1993
Wilfrid Laurier University Press
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
N2L 3C5
Cover design by Connolly Design Inc.
Printed in Canada
Politics, Property and Law in the Philippine Uplands has been produced from a
manuscript supplied in electronic form by the author.
All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyrights hereon may be
reproduced or used in any form or by any means—graphic, electronic, or mechani-
cal—without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any request for photo-
copying, recording, taping, or reproducing in information storage and retrieval sys-
tems of any part of this book shall be directed in writing to the Canadian Reprography
Collective, 214 King Street West, Suite 312, Toronto, Ontario M5V 3S6.
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations v
List of Tables vii
Preface ix
ONE
Setting the Stage 1
Introduction 1
The Ibaloi 4
The Setting 6
Organization of the Book 9
TWO
"Primitive" Property Systems: Theoretical Issues 13
Communal, Corporate—Unilineal, Bilateral 15
An Alternative Model? 20
Law and Property: The Nature of the Relationship 22
THREE
From Gold to the Cross: Historical Transformations, 1591-1930 .... 27
Introduction 27
Ibaloi Society over Four Centuries 27
FOUR
The Ethnographic Quartet 39
Part One: Social Organization 40
Part Two: Religion 49
Part Three: Political and Jural Organization 52
Part Four: Economic Production 60
Conclusions 76
iii
iv Politics, Property and Law in the Philippine Uplands
FIVE
Property Dispute: A Study of Consequences in Legal Pluralism 77
Land Disputes 79
Water Disputes 82
Gold Disputes 89
Conclusions 90
SIX
Modern Property Relations 93
Part One: Communal Uplands? 94
Part Two: Corporate Entities? 100
Part Three: Private Property? 105
Conclusions 108
SEVEN
Getting Things Straight: Demystifying Property Relations 109
Part One: Legal Pluralism and Property Relations 110
Part Two: Economic Transformations in Ibaloi History 120
Part Three: Individual Strategies and the Rise of Communalism 130
EIGHT
Conclusions 137
Glossary 143
References 147
Index 159
List of Illustrations
Maps
MAP
1. The Philippines with Northern Luzon Indicated xiii
2. The Provinces of Northern Luzon with
Benguet Province Indicated xiv
3. The Benguet Area in the Eighteenth Century Showing
Major Settlements and with the Modern Boundaries
of Kabayan Municipality Indicated xv
4. The Barangays of the Municipality of Kabayan
with Kabayan Poblacion Indicated xvi
5. The Main Sitios of Kabayan Poblacion with
Kabayan Poblacion Central Indicated xvii
6. Kabayan Poblacion Central below the National Road
Showing Major Canals and Terraces xviii
7. Kabayan Poblacion Central above the National Road
with Irrigation and Terrace Layout Indicated xix
Photographs
PLATE
1. Kabayan Poblacion Central viewed from the west xx
2. Land preparation at the beginning of the dry season xx
3. Entrance to abandoned mine shaft xxi
4. Meat preparation prior to distribution at a canao xxi
v
vi Politics, Property and Law in the Philippine Uplands
5. The author participating in canao tayaw (dance) xxii
(All photographs were taken by the author and her husband and used by
courtesy of them.)
List of Tables
TABLE
1. Percentages of Households in Various Income Sources 45
2. Landholdings in Hectares by Income Categories 46
3. Household Expenditures in Agricultural Labour by Labour Type
and by Crop in Person/Hours and in Percentages 65
4. Subjects of 29 Cases of Dispute Resolution in Kabayan 78
5. Landholdings in Hectares by Land-type among Upwardly Mobile
Households of Abiteg Background 118
6. Landholdings in Hectares by Land-type through
Three Generations of Households Descended
from a Single Baknang 119
VII
This page intentionally left blank
Preface
This book documents diachronic processes affecting the property system of a
Philippine tribal group from the Cordillera Central in Northern Luzon (see
Map 1). It examines several broad lines of inquiry which are interrelated: the
organization of a non-Western property system, the effect of political incor-
poration and economic integration on this system, the consequences of legal
pluralism and the individual purposive strategies which make use of such plu-
ralism, and finally, what all of this suggests for anthropological theory and
method in the study of property systems.
I lived in the Philippines from September 1983 until August 1984; much
of that time was spent living and working in one small, Ibaloi community. I
also visited other towns in the province of Benguet (see Map 2) and benefit-
ted from a close association with the Cordillera Studies Center at the Univer-
sity of the Philippines Baguio Campus. The ongoing research of this institu-
tion and the people involved in it were particularly helpful in putting the com-
munity-specific findings of my research into a broader perspective.
I was originally interested in the relationship between the indigenous
organization of irrigation and the rural development potential of irrigation
groups. My approach was to find a community with a long history of irrigated
rice production and to investigate the social organization which facilitated it.
By necessity, this involved examining property rights, particularly access to
resources such as land and water. Property-system research became property-
law research. I was acquainted with the broad outlines of the Ibaloi property
system from my reading; they rely on a combination of productive techniques
involving rice terraces, swidden fields, fruit and coffee orchards and gold
mines. I was not prepared, however, for the complexity of legal notions of
rights and responsibilities which affect individual access to the above re-
sources. The study of this complexity led to an interest in how the property
system had developed. As the Ibaloi are a people with a rich sense of tribal
history relying in turn on an appreciation of the role of individual historical
IX
Description:The Ibaloi village of Kabayan Poblacion combines a subsistence agricultural economy with a market economy that has grown up as a result of subsequent waves of colonization. The Spanish arrived in the sixteenth century, following the trail of gold and slave-bearing Chinese trade junks, and were follo
