Gendering Violence in the 'Philippine Anthropocene': A Feminist Political Ecology of Disasters

Disasters in the Philippines are often construed as the weather: they are naturalized and normalized; their violent disruptions, though familiar, are sporadic events managed by a weak Philippine state through the central role of the military. While the country ranks most vulnerable to spectacular geophysical, meteorological and climatological hazards, daily experiences of chronic vulnerability and 'slow violence' do not define disasters. But what is a disaster, and how can questions of surviving violent environments be de-naturalized and re-politicized in the present context of the 'Philippine Anthropocene'? This doctoral dissertation is a feminist political ecology project which uncovers the politics of community-based disaster management as practiced by grassroots women leaders in three case studies across the country: their gendered experiences and understandings of disasters; the root causes and material manifestations of intersecting vulnerabilities; and their daily activisms in response to disasters. In collaboration with the Citizens Disaster Response Centre and three of its regional centers, I interviewed women disaster preparedness committee officers of an informal settlement in Barangay Bagumbayan, Taguig City; a village of small-holder farmers in Barangay Malabago, Santa Cruz, Zambales; and an island of small-scale fishers in Barangay Gibitngil, Medellin, Cebu. I draw on embodiment scholarship to enrich critical disaster studies through the use of ethnography, film-making, interviews and kuwentuhan or group storytelling circles in gendered spaces. These methods of 'slow' disaster research attune me to the violence experienced in the everyday by women in marginalized communities including their daily efforts to work for well-being and survival. These are documented in "Barangay Magiting (Village Heroes)", a short film series which accompanies this dissertation. I demonstrate that the practices of community-based disaster management--which encompass daily efforts for community organizing, pre-disaster preparedness, post-disaster recovery, development work, and mobilizing for socio-ecological-climate justice activism--have become an extension of womens daily unpaid care labour for their households and communities. These efforts offer radical albeit limited possibilities for re-centering questions of power in disaster response. Embodied practices of pa-hinga (resting to let breathe) both in disaster research and practice inform a politics of hope in the present context of compounding violence, intensifying weather conditions and state terror.