ABSTRACT
On the one hand, the 2009 United Nations Human Development Report ranked the Philippines third among Asian countries behind Singapore and Japan in terms of political and economic advances for women. On the other hand, human rights and the political empowerment of the majority of Filipinas have continued to face serious political challenges, particularly since President Macapagal-Arroyo enacted policies and programs that promoted state violence against women and men under guise of a ‘global war against terror’. In this chapter, the authors’ fieldwork exposed him to three aspects of this liberal gender paradox. The first aspect touches on renewed and intensifying militarization involving the Philippine military and other security forces and United States military forces. The second related aspect involves the ineffectiveness of the criminal justice system, which has not thus far convicted and imprisoned any perpetrator of human rights violation during the Macapagal-Arroyo administration. The third aspect involves the organizing by survivors themselves and victims’ family members and relatives.
