ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the authors provide the perennial issues by examining vending developments in Baguio, an upland northern city, and Dagupan, a coastal city 75 kilometers southwest of Baguio. They review studies on the informal economy, advocacy and everyday politics, and governmentality to better situate the channels through which Baguio and Dagupan workers realize livelihood options. To address the unregulated aspects of Baguio's public market trade, in 1992 the Committee on Marketing, Trade, and Commerce prepared an integrated market redevelopment plan. Informality emerges as a style or "set of practices" rather than as a distinct sector. After illustrating how the particular theoretical frameworks inform the interplay between local vendors and government oversight as it plays out within the political economies of both Philippine localities, the authors present more granular ethnographic data about vendor experiences within the two identified communities. They describe research findings and offer future directions of street economies within the urban Philippines.
