City, Environment, and Transnationalism in the Philippines: Reconceptualizing “the Social” from the Global South

263 Pages·2022·9.277 MB·English

by  Koki Seki

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Koki Seki
City, Environment, and
Transnationalism in the
Philippines
Seki presents an ethnography of uncertainty and precarity experienced by peo-
ple in urban, rural, and transnational, communities in the Philippines as a case
study of social protection without the possibility of a robust welfare state.
He deals with topics including urban poverty, natural resource management,
and transnational migration. Throughout these chapters, Seki elaborates on the
modes of security and protection that people living at the margins of global
capitalism create through mobilizing their sociality and networks. He traces the
emerging configuration of “the social”, a collectivity and connectedness that
ensures a sense of security in life among people. The social can be defined as an
idea or institution, which had enabled formal and impersonal solidarity such as
that which provided the underpinnings of the modern welfare states of the West
during the mid-20th century. In the 21st century, however, the social in this
context is experiencing a fundamental reconfiguration as it faces deepening inse-
curity, risk, and the precariousness under the neoliberal governmentality. What
are the contours of the social emerging in an “unlikely place” of the Philippines
amid contemporary insecurity and precariousness? The book tackles this ques-
tion squarely through the analytical concept of the “vernacular public sphere”.
A vital resource for scholars of the Philippines, and of anthropology of devel-
opment, social policy, and civil society in the Global South more widely.
Koki Seki is Professor of cultural anthropology and Southeast Asian studies at
the Graduate School of Humanities and Sciences, Hiroshima University, Japan.
Routledge Studies on Asia in the World
Routledge Studies on Asia in the World will be an authoritative source of knowl-
edge on Asia studying a variety of cultural, economic, environmental, legal,
political, religious, security and social questions, addressed from an Asian per-
spective. We aim to foster a deeper understanding of the domestic and regional
complexities which accompany the dynamic shifts in the global economic, polit-
ical and security landscape towards Asia and their repercussions for the world at
large. We’re looking for scholars and practitioners – Asian and Western alike –
from various social science disciplines and fields to engage in testing existing
models which explain such dramatic transformation and to formulate new the-
ories that can accommodate the specific political, cultural and developmental
context of Asia’s diverse societies. We welcome both monographs and collective
volumes which explore the new roles, rights and responsibilities of Asian nations
in shaping today’s interconnected and globalized world in their own right.
The Series is advised and edited by Matthias Vanhullebusch and Ji Weidong
of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
Eldercare Issues in China and India
Edited by Longtao He and Jagriti Gangopadhyay
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization
Exploring New Horizons
Edited by Sergey Marochkin and Yury Bezborodov
Humour in Asian Cultures
Tradition and Context
Edited by Jessica Milner Davis
City, Environment, and Transnationalism in the Philippines
Reconceptualizing “the Social” from the Global South
Koki Seki
Find the full list of books in the series here: https://www.routledge.com/
Routledge-Studies-on-Asia-in-the-World/book-series/RSOAW
City, Environment, and
Transnationalism in the
Philippines
Reconceptualizing “the Social”
from the Global South
Koki Seki
First published 2022
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa
business
© 2022 Koki Seki
The right of Koki Seki to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
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Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-1-032-12382-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-12383-7 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-22427-3 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003224273
Typeset in Galliard
by KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.
For Keiji, Ryoji, and Chat

Contents
List of Figures ix
List of Pictures x
List of Maps xii
List of Tables xiii
Preface xiv
1 Introduction: Towards the “Vernacular Public
Sphere” in the Global South 1
PROLOGUE TO PART I
Urban Poverty and Clientelism 25
2 Association Eroded? Land Tenure Programme
for Slum Residents and the Clientelistic Connection 29
3 “Investments in Human Capital” Adrift: Conditional
Cash Transfers and the Clientelistic Connection 62
PROLOGUE TO PART II
Conservation and Emergent Community 93
4 A Community Disciplined: The Institutionalisation
Process of Coastal Resource Management 101
5 Emergent Community: The Process of Contextualising
the Coastal Resource Management Regime 119
6 Crafting Livelihood under the Neoliberal
Eco-governmentality: Life History of
a Visayan Fisherman 136
viii Contents
PROLOGUE TO PART III
Mobility and Connectedness in Transnational
Social Field 153
7 A Woman and the Community of Empathy: Life
History of a Widow of an Overseas Migrant Worker 159
8 Migration as Practice of Differentiation: Focusing
on the Identity of the Middle-Class Professionals 169
9 “The Family” in Contestation: Identity Construction of
1.5-Generation Filipino Children in the United States 186
10 Transient Solidarity: A Case of the Movement
to Revise the “Migrant Workers and Overseas
Filipino Act of 1995” 209
11 Conclusion 220
Bibliography 228
Index 242
Figures
1.1 The “vernacular public sphere” as the focus of this study 17
2.1 Actors and flow of the CMP as of 2009 38
3.1 Organisation of 4Ps 64
4.1 Fish coral (baklad) 113
5.1 Trawl fishing 123
5.2 Beach seine (suwayang) 128
5.3 Kinship relationship of the fishermen utilising Isla Codel 131