Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
As the US dramatically expands its military presence, colonialist history is repeating itself.
When the news broke in early February that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. had struck a deal to allow the United States to dramatically expand its military presence on the archipelago, many (...)
After he issued Proclamation No. 1081 placing the entire country under martial law, Ferdinand Marcos tried to explain that martial law did not mean military rule. He assured the nation that civilian leadership remained supreme over the military.
Technically, he was right. Marcos, who remained (...)
Most history has generally been written from the point of view of rulers and elites and has little to say about the great majority of the planet’s inhabitants.
Filipino historians’ assertions that history is synonymous with the “truth” are aimed at the viral comment on social media by a mediocre (...)
Solid North ‘bus’ zooms on as political juggernaut.
The Solid North is very much alive and growing, giving president-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr. a rare majority victory
BAGUIO CITY, Philippines – Vice President Leni Robredo loved to read out supporters’ placards during her campaign sorties for the (...)
Analysis: Duterte’s popularity remains undented among people in poorer areas despite attacks on human rights, rule of law and media
Six years ago, the tough-talking mayor of Davao City, known as “the Punisher” because of his merciless approach to crime, was on the brink of taking national power (...)
There’s a gossipy side to history which, unfortunately, interests the public more than the more scholarly, facts-based aspects of historiography. Enter social media, which favors the spread of the more sensational and salacious gossip, and you have it quickly accepted as history.
This is (...)
One hundred twenty-four years after our elders proclaimed the Filipino people’s independence from Spanish colonial rule , we may perhaps view with more understanding, and even admiration, the seemingly strange manner in which they performed that defining act. More specifically, why they invoked (...)
“President-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s designation of known technocrats to manage the Philippine economy raises the issue of whether continuing to rely on this particular group of experts can actually do good for the Filipino people and the country. (...) The opposing view sees the surge of (...)
While a good number of thoughtful Filipinos believe that the May 2022 presidential election is a watershed moment for our country and for generations to come — one that demands the most careful reflection about the kind of nation we want to be — this is not necessarily how the majority of voters (...)
The late dictator Ferdinand Marcos was instrumental in the founding of the New People’s Army. His power moves in Central Luzon set in motion a wave of violence that tore apart the region for the next half decade.
Presidential elections in the Philippines are routinely violent affairs, but the (...)
I am sleepless because of what the Marcoses represent—world-class plunder, torture, and murder—with no acknowledgment, no apology, no repentance, no attempt at restitution. Not even taxes paid on inherited stolen wealth. And yet, here they are, performing civility and restraint, telling us to (...)
On Feb. 22-25, the nation again commemorates those four days – 36 years ago – when Filipinos rose up in determined yet peaceful protest, converged on Edsa and with their own bodies stopped the military tanks and troops dispatched to disperse them. That popular uprising, replicated in other parts (...)
Punishing a handful while the perceived masterminds remain off the hook reeks of impunity.
After nearly 35 years, the Antipolo Regional Trial Court found three soldiers guilty beyond reasonable doubt of murdering labor leader Rolando Olalia and Leonor Alay-ay. It took 26 years before a (...)
There’s a raging debate on social media between supporters and critics of presidential candidate Ferdinand Marcos Jr. His supporters believe that the reign of Marcos Jr.’s father, the late dictator Ferdinand Marcos Sr., was our country’s golden age of peace and prosperity. His critics claim, (...)
“It is up to the peoples of both The Philippines and China to reach across the waters and biases that divide us and build bridges pyloned on ideals of solidarity beyond boundaries, internationalism, mutual benefit, and a commons-based ownership and management of disputed natural resources. One (...)
The Cinema of Lav Diaz
The filipino director Lav Diaz has created a monumental body of work over the past two decades: some sixteen feature films—interspersed with as many miscellaneous shorts, documentaries and film-essays—shot almost entirely in black and white, with running times generally (...)
‘The central role of the United States is now deliberately forgotten or minimized in the mythology of EDSA, but its derailment of a rising revolutionary movement had momentous consequences that played out over the last 35 years’
The EDSA Uprising was really the culmination of a US-orchestrated (...)
’A reign of terror is about to be imposed on the university by idiots whose main criterion for red-tagging you is that if you sound subversive or you are critical of the president and the military, then you must be a rotten subversive’
In every society, there is an institution that plays the (...)
Rizal’s death led to the 1896 revolution. But because he died so young, he also opens himself to a lot of contemporary speculation.
It has become a habit of mine to remember Jose Rizal’s execution by rereading Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo. This year, however, something odd had become (...)
The title of this column is inspired by John Lennon’s 1974 No. 1 single “Whatever Gets You Thru the Night.” I have learned that he himself picked up this line from a black televangelist, Reverend Ike, who, one evening, was telling his late-night viewers: “Let me tell you guys, it doesn’t matter, (...)
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