Session 7
Institutions, Inequalities, and the Philippine State
Peoples, Processes, and Power – The Quest for Inclusive Politics
Moderator: Leslie Advincula-Lopez
October 14, 2020 (Wednesday)
3:00 PM to 5:00 PM
Analyzing Civic Technology as a Tool to Empower Citizen Influence and Deepening Democracy: Theory and Practical Recommendations
Czarina Medina-Guce
Ateneo de Manila University
This study engages the literature on civic technologies away from the well-documented role of ICTs to promote efficiency and effectiveness of government, and towards civic technology’s function in enabling citizen participation in the context of deepening democracy. In the Philippines, various civic technologies have been used in the past decade to implement fiscal openness national policies, primarily through crowdsourcing feedback to vet and augment government data on project procurement and implementation. However, such practice falls short in enabling ICTs as a “claimed space” (Gaventa, 2006) of citizens for engaging government. Through the analysis of a civic technology program pilot implementation in 282 municipalities for local infrastructure projects, I argue that to empower citizens to influence government agenda and resources substantially, civic technologies need to shift from using citizen feedback to benefit government project monitoring and evaluation to also facilitating civil society agenda-setting and claim-making. This can be concretely accomplished by (a) ensuring government and civil society co-management of civic technology projects at national and local levels, (b) closing the ‘feedback loop’ by facilitating appropriate response of appropriate government agencies, and, (c) accounting for citizen satisfaction both on the government response and the civic technology itself. These points are analyzed against the backdrop of the challenges of shrinking civic spaces and community mobilization in the Philippines.
Pressing Issues: Oppositionist Expression in Mr & Ms During the Marcos Dictatorship
Sarah Jessica E. Wong
Ateneo de Manila University
Most people do not expect to turn to a women’s magazine as a source for political commentary; such was the reason why women’s magazines were allowed to operate under the strict censorship laws of the Marcos dictatorship. However, one women’s magazine—Eugenia “Eggie” Apostol’s Mr. & Ms. and its supplements—managed to push the envelope by including political (at times oppositionist) content magazine after the “lifting” of Martial Law in January 1981. This was particularly evident in the magazine’s response to certain events in the Marcos dictatorship, such as the fraudulent election of 1981. Mr. & Ms. managed to balance its oppositionist content with features on the Marcoses, which might have contributed to its success against closure and persecution. However, Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr.’s assassination opened the floodgates of oppositionist dissent, resulting in an explosion of anti-government criticism and the creation of two political supplements: Mr. & Ms. Special Edition and Mr. & Ms. Series for Justice and National Reconciliation.
Sarah Jessica Wong graduated
cum laude with a Bachelor’s Degree in History at the Ateneo de Manila University in 2015. Since then, she has done extensive research work for government agencies, non-profit organizations, research projects, and historians. She is currently pursuing a Master’s Degree in History at her alma mater while she works as a teaching assistant at the Department
of History. Her main research interests include cultural history, women’s history, and food history.
But What Do You Meme? An Exploration of Online Protests on the Cybercrime Law in the Philippines
Christine Anne Cox
Ateneo de Manila University
Christine Anne R. Cox is a full-time instructor at the Communication Department, School of Social Sciences, Ateneo de Manila University, teaching courses in Media Studies, Communication Theory, Research and Social Change. She earned her Master's Degree in Communication from the Ateneo de Manila and is currently pursuing her PhD Communication in U.P. Diliman. Her research interests are in the following areas: activism, communication and social justice, culture and communication, digital media and social networks, and new media literacies.
In the new media environment, it is important to focus on the challenges of social actors in using media as a tool and platform for political activism and expression, especially in times of institutional crises and events. One such event is the legislation of RA No. 10175, or the Cybercrime Prevention Act (CPA), which saw various offline and online protests by Filipinos who perceived the controversial law as a possible gateway to target critics of the government and stifle freedom of expression. This study analyzes online practices and activities in reaction to CPA and how these define new modes of political and public agency. In particular, this study focuses on texts and images found on Facebook and Twitter, and how these online strategies are intertwined with a more traditional repertoire of collective action. It also highlights the diffused participation in political and civic practices embedded in the everyday lives of social actors. Online protests using social media, despite their much-criticized weak ties and slacktivism-enabling character, can play a role in offline political action but need to be interpreted within the broader social and political contexts surrounding activism.