Abstract
This article examines state–civil society relations in disaster risk management policymaking in the Philippines. It analyses the extent to which civil society actors can shape policymaking outcomes and how political institutions shape civil society organisations’ strategies, methods, and perceptions in disaster risk management policymaking from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Congresses. Using the novel concept of “co-infiltration,” the article argues that while the institutional factors are important, these factors shape only in part the available political space for civil society and state engagement in policymaking. Instead, institutions’ role in shaping engagement outcomes is viewed as more contingent, as seen in the outcomes of different civil society organisations’ (CSOs) campaigns across different administrations. However, the push by CSOs to remain relatively independent has put them at odds with state actors in a political environment where participation and dealing with disasters have become increasingly securitised.
Introduction: Disasters, Civil Society, and Policymaking in a Weak State
Much has been said in the literature about how disasters reflect the prevailing notions of social and political order (Kelman, 2020). When a state's capacity to respond to disaster impacts is stretched, civil society actors often step in. Participatory governance platforms have provided an opportunity for collaboration between state and civil society actors, but these platforms are also a battleground for ideology, competing interests, and other forms of conflict (Bankoff and Hilhorst, 2009). Thus, disasters can have a paradoxical effect on state–civil society relations: they highlight the opposition between these actors and, at the same time, provide opportunities to collaborate (Aldrich, 2013).
The Philippines is a fertile ground for investigating these dynamics in disaster risk management (DRM) policymaking. It is among the most disaster-prone countries in the world. Between 1990 and 2022 alone, the country experienced 432 disaster events. This affected more than 186 million people, resulting in more than 80,000 deaths, and an estimated USD 24 billion in damages (EM-DAT CRED, 2022). Because of the country's vulnerability to disasters, dealing with disaster impacts is a major part of the national agenda (Delfin and Gaillard, 2008) and has involved civil society actors since the Spanish colonial period (Clarke, 1998). More importantly, it is a policy area where civil society organisations (CSOs) have seen some success.
The more liberal political environment after 1986 saw a massive increase in the number of CSOs in the Philippines (Clarke, 1995). CSOs have played a broad range of roles and are involved in several areas of policy reform. However, violence against civil society actors, which was a major facet of state–civil society relations during the Martial Law period, continued. Individuals and groups suspected to be supporters of Leftist armed insurgency and other “opponents of the state” are suppressed violently (Clarke, 2012).
In the Philippines, the success or failure of policy reforms has been explained in terms of the weakness of formal institutions and elite domination. The so-called “weak state-elitist framework” continues to dominate analyses of policymaking (Brillo, 2011). According to this view, because the state is weak, policymaking is controlled by elites who use their positions to dole out patronage goods to clients in exchange for continued electoral support. The clientelist nature of policymaking, along with other factors, has allowed elite capture to persist. Elite capture of policymaking has also been discussed in terms of the tenacity of elite clans (Anderson, 1988; Sidel, 1999; Teehankee, 2001), booty capitalism by the oligarchy, and the rise of the patrimonial state (Hutchcroft, 1998). The net effect of this is continuing particularism, where policy outcomes reflect elite interests and are generally conservative (Caoili, 2006). The Philippine state, meanwhile, is unable to enforce rules, provide a consistent regulatory framework, and deliver basic services (Abinales and Amoroso, 2017). Clientelism permeates policymaking, and even civil society actors are absorbed into these networks. Civil society leaders who have “crossed over” into the state have either resigned in frustration or have tolerated practices they have formerly protested against (Lewis, 2013). Non-government organisations (NGOs) and their networks were involved in some of the biggest corruption scandals after 1986 (Holmes, 2018). In addition to this, many Philippine CSOs have relied on external funding, risking dependence on aid and depoliticising NGO work (Constantino-David, 1995).
Thus, the prevailing reading of civil society in the Philippines is paradoxical—dynamic yet captured by elite interests (Lewis, 2013). I argue that while elite capture and clientelism describe some features of state–civil society relations in the Philippines, it is an incomplete and narrow account. It overlooks factors such as elite fragmentation, the relative autonomy of sections of the bureaucracy, and the role of populist demands in shaping elite policymaking behaviour and policymaking outcomes (Weiss, 2017). Furthermore, I argue that an overlooked aspect of studying state–civil society relations is the role of political agency among civil society actors. To deal with these gaps, this paper seeks to address these questions: (1) To what extent are civil society actors able to shape policy-making outcomes? Why? (2) To what extent do political institutions shape CSOs’ strategies, methods, and perceptions about their efficacy in working with the state? I intend to answer these questions by examining policymaking in the context of DRM in the Philippines.
Theorising State–Civil Society Relations in Policymaking
The contemporary debate on civil society involves three major intellectual traditions. The neo-Tocquevillian school draws from Tocqueville's notion of civil society that looks at how “voluntary associations” can operate in an environment where the state's role is limited (Whittington, 2001). Putnam et al. (1993) argue that an ideal picture of civil society is made up of a mixture of voluntary groups that provide opportunities for citizen participation. Neo-Weberian institutionalists, on the other hand, argue that the state must be insulated from civil society. Modern nation-states can be labelled “strong” or “weak” depending on their ability to closely approximate the idealised Weberian bureaucracy (Migdal, 2001). The New Left conception is rooted in Gramsci's interpretation of civil society, which underlined the duality of the nature of civil society: it played an important role in ensuring the persistence of capitalism in Europe, but it is also a sphere that could be a venue for the struggle against capitalism (Ehrenberg, 1999).
Each of these frameworks offers reasonable accounts of state–civil society relations but suffers from several deficiencies. First, there is a tendency to present an overly normative view of civil society. This can obscure analysis of them as components of political projects and counter-projects (Gellner, 1994). Civil society groups can also be uncivil and have been treated as a means to an end (Englehart, 2011). Second is the focus on domain boundary protection against encroachment by other domains when these boundaries are permeable and are constantly renegotiated (Klein and Lee, 2019). Finally, these frameworks view state–civil society interaction as a zero-sum game, where gains by the state are viewed as a loss to societal groups and vice versa. However, as Migdal (1988) has pointed out, these interactions may also be mutually empowering.
On the other hand, institutionalist accounts of the political economy of policy reform argue that institutions are viewed as “rules of the game” that limit the possibility of reform (Grindle, 2000). Policy change can be viewed in terms of policy winners and losers (Ostrom, 2007) as well as the dynamics between incumbents and reformers (Lijphart and Waisman, 2018). While there has been strong empirical support for the new institutionalist accounts of policy reform, many of these studies fail to take into account the role of timing, strategy, and the capacity of reformers to exercise agency and create opportunities for reform even in a hostile policy environment (Grindle, 2001). More importantly, institutionalists (particularly historical and sociological explanations) underestimate the role of policy entrepreneurs in manoeuvring around institutional constraints and undertaking strategies to open up opportunities for reform (Graham et al., 2011).
To address these inherent shortcomings in theories of civil society and institutions in policymaking, I draw from a broader reading of the role of institutions in policymaking, rational choice theory, civil society theory, and social movements theory. I argue that policymaking in DRM may be best characterised as a dynamic process comprising institutions and processes that are shaped by and shape where and how civil society actors can engage the state. As rational actors engaged in an ongoing and dynamic process, state and civil society actors interact in a process of “strategic manoeuvring” with the end goal of getting a policy proposal adopted. Policy actors have three characteristics: capability, salience, and policy preference. Capability refers to an actor's potential to exert influence over decisions. Salience, on the other hand, is the level of importance that an actor places on an issue. Policy preferences, both stated and inferred, refer to an outcome where actors derive a particular utility (Bueno de Mesquita, 2002). DRM policymaking can thus be seen as an iterative game consisting of multiple players with differing capabilities, different levels of issue salience, and with both stated and inferred policy positions. Institutions impose limits on the range of choices available to actors and predispose them to certain courses of action. Thus, how strategic interaction in policymaking occurs between policy actors happens within a particular set of institutions and processes that shape the boundedness of actors’ rationality as well as the actual policy outcomes.
Here, I focus on strategic interaction between actors in DRM policymaking in the following phases: agenda-setting, design, and policy adoption. Defining an issue and controlling the agenda for debate are critical for policy change (Baumgartner and Jones, 2009). On the other hand, policy design is an “exercise in giving meaning,” which frames which policy outcomes and practices are valid (Colebatch, 2018). In its original sense, policy adoption refers to the first introduction of a policy (Grindle, 2001). Civil society actors can be present and engage the state throughout these phases through venues in the legislature and participatory institutions (Mayka, 2013).
Power holders and challengers infiltrate each other's organisational boundaries using different strategic modes to pursue different political outcomes (Klein and Lee, 2019). Here, I use the term “co-infiltration” to indicate that the process of redefining porous and inter-permeable boundaries is mutual and ongoing. This ongoing and dynamic relationship has an impact on the outcomes of the policy process and state–civil society relations writ large. By taking a disaggregated view of the state and emphasising the political agency of civil society actors, I argue that institutions do not lose their boundary formation and maintenance function. Rather, the role of institutions in shaping outcomes of engagement is viewed as more contingent. Figure 1 below illustrates the concept of “co-infiltration” between the state and civil society.
The Concept of State–Civil Society Co-Infiltration. Source: Created by Author.
The above-mentioned factors shape, in part, the available political space for civil society. The openness of this space depends on both formal legal constraints and informal norms (Weiss, 2017). By characterising regime type and state attributes, one can adequately describe the available channels for claims-making (Tilly, 2006). Within regimes, the extent to which policy elites are cohesive shapes whether a single agency dominates or there is bureaucratic pluralism (Atkinson and Coleman, 1989). Thus, regime characteristics affect the types of channels that civil society actors engage in and the strategies they employ. Table 1 shows the possible modes of participation that civil society actors may utilise to shape policy-making outcomes in both formal and informal venues for policymaking.
Civil Society Modes of Political Participation.
Source: Adapted from Weiss, M. L. 2017. Resistance and Resilience: Coping With/Against the State. Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia, 32, 374–404. The examples cited here are illustrative and are by no means an exhaustive list.
Note: aThe National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) is the highest executive policy-making body for disaster response in the Philippines.
Civil society actors calculate potential risks and rewards, which modes of participation closely fit their political agenda, and provide the highest chance of success (Tarrow, 2011). Individuals may take their claims to traditional and social media, which augments formal channels (George, 2006). Political entryism involves individual civil society leaders crossing over and becoming part of the ruling government in the hope of pursuing changes from within (Lewis, 2013). Even when channels for formal participation have been institutionalised, activists will find mobilisation via protest rallies appealing if they find the costs bearable (Tilly, 2006). The formation of CSO “network organisations” allows organisations to be more visible, have better access to policymakers, and marshal support from allies (Turner, 2011). Institutionalised participation in formal state channels gives civil society actors a voice in formal policymaking channels but also opens civil society actors to co-optation (Rodan and Jayasuriya, 2007). Electoral politics provide both individual and organisational actors the opportunity to engage the state from the inside as policymakers.
Aside from these factors inherent to both state and civil society, I argue that three external factors shape state–civil society relations in DRM policymaking. First, are political-electoral cycles. Elections shape the timing and possibility of policy reform, where changes in the ruling elite may empower some groups while disempowering others (Grindle, 2001). Second, is the role of the donor agenda. Funding from bilateral and multilateral agencies can shape the relationship between the state and civil society (Lorch, 2017). Finally, disasters can be “focusing events” that can open “windows of opportunity” for policy change (Birkland, 2004), especially in cases when civil society actors can demonstrate the inadequacy and ineptitude of the state (Aldrich, 2013).
I posit that the possible characterisations of the nature of relations between state and civil society as a continuum of the following “ideal types”: Accommodation, Co-Optation, Critical Engagement, Exclusion, and Repression. Accommodationist states allow a high level of participation (Ferrer, 2004). Co-optation implies a range of state actions from elite incorporation of civil society into clientelist structures to outright manipulation, to tempering civil society claims-making (Alagappa, 2004). Critical engagement refers to the process in which civil society actors work simultaneously with and against the state (Bryant, 2005). Civil society actors’ push for policy reforms can be met with a change in policy or with silence, dismissal, exclusion, and crackdowns (Rodan and Jayasuriya, 2007).
The study employed a qualitative methodology. Here, I focused on policymaking at the national level. I define civil society organisations (CSOs) as groups that are organised independently of and operate outside of but interact with the state and the market. They are voluntary, nongovernmental, and nonprofit (Abao, 2011). Archival research was employed to gather secondary data, which includes bills, laws, resolutions, and other pertinent documents from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Congresses (2004–2022). These encompass the terms of three Presidents: Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (Thirteenth and Fourteenth Congresses), Benigno Simeon C. Aquino III (Fifteenth and Sixteenth Congresses), and Rodrigo R. Duterte (Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses). An extensive search of the Legislative Information System (LEGIS) 1 of the Philippine Congress resulted in a unique database of DRM policies comprised 3199 measures. A total of thirty key informant interviews with government officials and representatives of CSOs 2 involved in DRM policymaking were also conducted. 3 Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data from the documents and the interviews. The DRM bills were analysed and classified into thematic areas. Interviews were transcribed and coded manually. A master list of all working codes used throughout the study was kept; codes were reapplied to new segments of data each time an appropriate segment was encountered. This allowed for the identification of themes and trends. The themes and concepts drawn were used as the basis for the analysis of all the materials.
Executive-Legislative Relations and Policymaking from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Philippine Congresses
In the presidential system under the 1987 Philippine Constitution, the President is generally considered stronger in relation to the legislative and the judiciary (Teehankee and Calimbahin, 2020). The bicameral Congress, comprised of a Senate and a House of Representatives, is generally perceived as weaker due to patronage, weak party discipline, and inconsistent exercise of available Congressional checks. As the “patron-in-chief,” legislators look for benefits through the President and pass on these benefits to their constituents (Holmes, 2018). Table 2 summarises Presidential and Congressional membership, term limits, districts, and methods of election (Table 2).
Presidential and Congressional Election, Term, and Term Limits under the 1987 Constitution.
Source: Author's compilation from the 1987 Constitution and Congressional data.
The single most important source of the legislative agenda is the President's annual State of the Nation Address (SONA) (Miranda and Bringula, 2021). Regardless of the source of a legislative proposal, a legislative measure may only be introduced by a member of Congress. Of the six (6) Congresses examined for this paper, the Eighteenth Congress is the most prolific in terms of DRM bill and resolution filings. This is partly because the filings in this period included filings related to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). The table below summarises DRM Bills and Resolutions per Congressional Chamber (Table 3).
Disaster Risk Management Bills and Resolutions Per Congressional Chamber, Thirteenth to Eighteenth Congresses (2004–2022).
Source: Author's compilation based on the data from the Philippine Congress.
DRM bills and resolutions of national significance constitute most bills (95.65%) and resolutions (78.85%) filed. This is typical in the Philippine Congress, where legislation catering to broader national concerns enjoys greater attention and has a higher possibility of passage. This also indicates that dealing with disasters is deemed to be a national concern and one that requires a national response.
A thematic analysis of the bills filed reveals that most of the bills filed are in Disaster Response (347) and Disaster Prevention and Mitigation (343), followed by Reorganisation (213) and Disaster Preparedness (141). As mentioned above, COVID-19 was the single most important concern of the Eighteenth Congress. Armed conflict (52) was also identified as a salient concern, with humanitarian crises stemming from armed conflict involving the Philippine security sector and various armed groups. Of the 1634 DRM bills filed from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Congresses, only thirty were enacted into law. Of the thirty laws passed, nineteen were of Senate origin while eleven originated from the House of Representatives. An overwhelming majority (29) were laws of national significance. Most bills filed were pending at the committee level (1144), while a good number were also substituted or consolidated with other bills with similar concerns at the committee level (424). Consolidation and substitution show the importance of the agenda-setting role of Congressional Committees.
Across the six Congresses, presidents have been concerned with three things: (1) the grant of emergency powers to the Executive to deal with disasters and emergencies; (2) funding to deal with disaster impacts; and (3) reorganising/reforming existing DRM institutional structures. The President's legislative agenda is an important factor in determining the passage of DRM Laws. More than half of the laws (16) passed were part of the president's legislative agenda. Of these, eight were “Certified Urgent” by the President, while eight were identified in the President's SONA. This was done through a combination of proactive and reactive powers, as well as patronage. The President can reach into the Congressional legislative calendar by certifying priority measures as “urgent” and garner support from these legislators using “pork barrel” funds. Roll-call voting patterns in Congress tend to be unanimous, and weak party discipline means that majority and minority blocs are fluid. Most legislators engage in logrolling and have, oftentimes, very little incentive to block policy bills, including those of the president (Shin, 2018). In the Senate, of the thirty-two bills passed, only one was not unanimous. In the House of Representatives, of the seventy-six bills passed, fifty-seven were unanimous, while nineteen were near-unanimous.
Presidents in systems with weak parties oftentimes resort to pork barrel to secure support for their legislative agenda (Shugart, 1999). In the Philippines, this dates to the 1920s. In the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Congresses, President Arroyo used the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF) and the Various Infrastructures, including Local Projects (VILP). In the succeeding Aquino administration, the VILP was abolished, but the PDAF was retained in the 2011–2013 budget until a scandal involving a bogus NGO led to the declaration of the PDAF as unconstitutional. After PDAF's abolishment, legislators earmarked infrastructure projects under the Local Infrastructure Program (LIP) budget of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH). Under President Duterte, the allocations for LIP increased by 80% between 2016 and 2022. This allowed him to push through with major legislative priorities in Congress.
The President's superiority in the budget process also allows him/her to include the appropriations items in the legislative agenda that have failed to pass in Congress. In the Duterte administration, this was used to build a total of USD 120 million worth of evacuation centres. The president's ability to issue Executive Orders (EOs) and Administrative Orders (AOs) that allow the President to push forward with reforms that have otherwise stalled or failed in Congress was also utilised for DRM concerns. In the Arroyo administration, this was used to order local governments to reformulate their land use plans and identify relocation areas. In the Aquino administration, this was used to order local government units to mainstream disaster risk reduction in local land use planning and create a task force on water management. Under Duterte, this was used to push for the President's flagship water management projects and the harmonisation of national government relief operations when his push for a disaster management department failed.
Civil Society Organisations and the Policy Enactment from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Philippine Congress
CSOs and the Legislative
Post-1986 civil society in the Philippines has been described as diverse and fragmented (Franco, 2004). Several factors account for this diversity and fragmentation, including Official Development Assistance (ODA), elite philanthropy, religion, the Philippine Left (especially the Reaffirmist and Rejectionist divide within the Communist Party), and the nature of Philippine geography, which favours smaller CSOs and network-building as a strategy (Abinales and Amoroso, 2017; Clarke, 2012). In DRM, CSOs with varied purposes, goals, and programs have been involved in different campaigns to enact DRM policy reforms in the Philippines. A summary of these campaigns and the strategies utilised by CSOs is presented in Table 4.
CSO Campaigns, Strategies, and Status.
Source: Author's compilation of the data from various documents and interviews.
The campaign for the country's Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Law, Republic Act (RA) 1012, began in the early 1990s, but several bills failed to pass from the Twelfth to the Fourteenth Congresses (Agsaoay-Saño, 2010). The campaign expanded when an international NGO, Christian Aid, began using its membership in the Philippine International NGO Network (PINGON) 4 to help create the Disaster Risk Reduction Network, Philippines (DRRNet-Phils), an “umbrella organisation” comprised of 300 CSOs, practitioners, academic units, government agencies, and private sector partners (Brower and Magno, 2011). DRRNet-Phils served as the primary CSO lobby group in Congress and got the support of then-Representatives Rudolfo Biazon and Teofisto Guingona. Two major typhoons in late 2009 left more than a thousand dead and caused damage amounting to an estimated 2.7% of the country's GDP. These major disasters served as “focusing events” and eventually led President Arroyo to certify the bill as “urgent,” leading to its passage in May 2010. The law shifted the country's emphasis from relief to a more proactive approach. The law also created Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Offices (DRRMOs) at the local level and institutionalised the role of CSOs in policymaking in the newly created National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) and its equivalent at the local level (Agsaoay-Saño, 2010).
In the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Congresses, Oxfam and the Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities (ICSC) led a campaign for the creation of an adaptation fund to scale up climate adaptation by local governments. ICSC and Oxfam launched a national signature campaign that garnered at least 20,000 signatures in support of the bill and garnered the support of celebrities like Manny Pacquiao (Green, 2015). In Congress, this campaign involved persistent lobbying, which eventually resulted in Senator Juan Ponce Enrile and Rep. Erin Tañada championing the agenda and filing their respective versions of the bill. Several destructive typhoons hit the Philippines during the campaign and were used to highlight the urgency of the bill. After a one-year campaign, Republic Act 10174, which provided for an annual PHP 1 billion “People's Survival Fund,” was signed into law by President Aquino.
After Typhoon Haiyan hit the Philippines in 2013, an estimated six million of the fourteen million people affected were children. This was the focus of INGOs Save the Children and World Vision Philippines, who came up with signature campaigns, engaged legislators and their staff through field visits, and sponsored policy forums. Persistent lobbying activities in the Senate eventually resulted in Senators Miriam Defensor-Santiago, Teofisto Guingona, Bam Aquino, Loren Legarda, Cynthia Villar, and Ramon Revilla Jr. filing their respective versions of the bill. After more than a year of campaigning, President Aquino signed the bill into law (RA 10821) in May 2016.
However, not all advocacies supported by powerful partners and with a compelling humanitarian case succeed. A campaign conducted by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), Balay Rehabilitation Center, and the Commission on Human Rights of the Philippines (CHRP) sought the passage of a national policy to deal with Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) (Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, 2012). The bill passed in Congress but was vetoed by President Aquino in 2013 because it expanded the power of the CHRP beyond its mandate and opened the state to lawsuits (Bermudez et al., 2021).
In the Duterte administration, CSOs continued to push for various DRM reforms. Taking a cue from the President's bold environmental agenda in his first SONA, DRRNet-Phils launched the “911 Campaign”: nine calls, one agenda, one resilient Philippines (Serafica, 2016). The most salient aspect of this is the creation of a national disaster risk management authority, which aligns with President Duterte's priority of establishing a “Department of Disaster Resilience.” While this might look like a win for CSOs, some provisions of bills in both houses of Congress sought to remove the institutionalised role of CSOs in DRM policymaking. To address the threat of the removal of their hard-earned spot in national and local policymaking bodies, DRRNet-Phils began lobbying in both houses of Congress. They were successful in getting the support of Senator Panfilo Lacson and Senator Riza Hontiveros. In the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Congresses, Senate versions of the bill failed to make it past the Committee level.
The Child Rights Network, taking off from the success of the campaign for the protection of children in disasters and emergencies, began the #ChildrenNotSoldiers campaign on social media (Child Rights Network, 2021). A more direct route of lobbying was undertaken, resulting in Rep. Feliciano Belmonte, Jr. sponsoring the bill. It gained traction in Congress and became law on 10 January 2019.
In the Thirteenth and Eighteenth Congresses, CSO policy preferences are myriad. Some of these have been achieved with the passage of the DRRM Law in 2010 and other supporting legislation. On the other hand, the campaigns for the protection of IDPs, DRM workers, and volunteers, and campaigns for specific funding allocations and reforms have failed to achieve their desired policymaking outcomes. The campaign to establish a national disaster risk management authority, while an important part of the advocacy of CSOs, has threatened the gains in institutionalising CSO participation in DRM policymaking at the local and national levels.
Between the two chambers, the Senate appears to enjoy better legislative success, mirroring presidential priorities that sought more funding and reform in DRM institutions. While in the House of Representatives, the policy proposals focused on disaster relief and preparedness, which were criticised by CSOs in the past. In addition, the prevailing view among CSOs interviewed for the study is that the longer terms of Senators allow them to hone a greater degree of policy expertise compared to their House of Representatives counterparts and that they are less swayed by presidential patronage. Nevertheless, they lobby and serve as resource persons in Congressional Committees in both Houses. Lobbying with legislative champions involves cultivating personal ties with legislators. These include multiple visits to their legislative offices, providing them with data from research done by CSOs, inviting members of their staff to attend information sessions, and, in the case of RA 10121, even providing drafts of proposed legislation.
CSOs and Policymaking in the NDRRMC
The NDRRMC is the highest executive policymaking body for the DRM in the Philippines and is made up of forty-four member agencies, five local government leagues, four CSO seats, one private sector organisation, and one allocated seat for the Philippine Red Cross. It is chaired by the Secretary of National Defense, while four different departments were designated as Vice-Chairs for each of the DRM thematic pillars. Day-to-day operations and coordination are done by the Office of Civil Defense (OCD). DRRNet-Phils and three of its member organisations (Center for Disaster Preparedness (CDP), World Vision Philippines Foundation, and Ateneo School of Government (ASOG) 5 occupied all four (4) allocated seats for CSOs (Brower and Magno, 2011), demonstrating the network's influence in national DRM. A sixth CSO (and a DRRNet-Phils member), Ecosystems Work for Essential Benefits. Inc. (ECOWEB) sits as the National Anti-Poverty Commission-Victims of Disasters and Calamities (NAPC-VDC) representative. The private sector seat is occupied by the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation (PDRF). The selection of the four CSO representatives is defined by guidelines created in 2012 by the national government. Under these, the four CSO representatives should come from the following categories: (a) NGO/People's Organisations (occupied by DRRNet-Philippines); (b) professional organisations or community-based organisations (occupied by CDP); (c) faith-based CSOs (occupied by World Vision); and (d) academic or independent research institutes (occupied by AIS). 6 The selection of the four CSO representatives is defined by rules set forth by state actors. 7 CSO applications are deliberated in the NDRRMC and require an endorsement by a majority of the members. On the other hand, ECOWEB, being a NAPC-VDC sectoral representative, is accredited by the Office of the President.
The NDRRMC's offices are in the headquarters of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), further reinforcing the predominance of the military in DRM, an actor with which CSOs share a relationship of mistrust (Bankoff and Hilhorst, 2009). President Duterte appointed three former generals out of the five (5) Chairs and Vice-Chairs at the NDRRMC, which did not help reduce this friction. This had significant implications for the relationship dynamics in the NDDRMC. First, the “red tagging,” which has happened on a wide scale under Duterte, also implicated CSOs in DRM. Four (4) members of the Citizens’ Disaster Response Network (CDRN), an ally of DRRNet-Phils, were forced to lie low because of security concerns brought about by red-tagging. Humanitarian aid workers belonging to the DRRNet-Phils network working in insurgency hotspots were harassed by state security forces. Second, the red-tagging has caused a dramatic shift in state–civil society relations within the NDRRMC. In 2019, CSOs held an election for a new PO representative in the NDRRMC, which was won by Aksyon sa Kahandaan sa Kalamidad at Klima (AKKMA). However, because some members of the organisation were active in critical campaigns on climate justice, the NDRRMC refused to recognise AKKMA and the results of the CSO election. CSOs were also “kicked out” of some online NDRRMC meetings on COVID-19 as the National Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID) eventually took over. This “falling out” was the result of the decline of the relationship between Duterte and the Left.
The passage of the Anti-Terror Law in 2020 gave state actors further justification to regulate CSO participation. Under the proposed guidelines, current and future CSO members of the NDRRMC need to be vetted by the National Intelligence Coordination Agency (NICA) and can be banned or have their assets frozen on the mere suspicion of involvement in terrorism. The potential for abuse and wanton accusations of supporting the communist insurgency naturally caused an uproar among CSOs. Dialogues by DRRNet-Phils and ECOWEB with NDRRMC-OCD have been successful in pushing back against these guidelines.
Generally, CSOs view being part of the NDRRMC as strategic, allowing CSOs to have a say in national DRM policy. While they are greatly outnumbered by government actors, CSOs find points in the decision-making process where they can shape policy decisions. While representatives of CSOs are present at all levels, it is at the Technical Working Group (TWG) and Technical Management Group (TMG) levels that they can share their ideas across, as not a lot of deliberation happens at the Full Council level. A summary of CSO advocacies in the NDRRMC and their outcomes is provided in Table 5:
CSO Advocacies and Outcomes in the NDRRMC.
Source: Author's compilation of the data from various documents and interviews
The Role of Donors, UN Agencies, and INGOs
The Philippines remains relatively aid-dependent, with international donors able to work productively with local stakeholders (Clarke, 2021). Of the USD 104.3 billion in aid received between 2004 and 2021, USD 17.6 billion (16.89%) was for DRM. The biggest contributors to this are multilateral institutions (USD 13.4 billion), followed by bilateral aid from foreign governments (USD 2.9 billion). Most of these funds (50.53%) became part of the Philippine government's budget, but a considerable amount was also used for programs and projects implemented by UN Agencies, INGOs, Donor Country NGOs, and Philippine NGOs (International Aid Transparency Initiative, 2021).
As previous sections have discussed, INGOs and UN agencies were directly involved in various DRM policy advocacies in the legislative and executive branches. A summary of some of the major DRM policy reform campaigns is provided (Table 6):
INGOs and UN Agencies’ Involvement in Policymaking.
Source: Author's compilation of the data from various documents and interviews.
Most of this involvement comes in the form of funding support, while several INGOs directly lobbied in Congress. Christian Aid, which has worked in the Philippines since the 1960s, has left a considerable footprint in DRM policymaking. It was responsible for helping set up three networks for DRM in the Philippines and various DRM policy campaigns by the time it closed its operations in 2020. Within DRRNet-Phils itself, 11 INGOs are part of the Philippine International NGO Network (PINGON). The Asia Foundation has included DRM into its Coalitions for Change (CFC) as a reform agenda (Sidel and Faustino, 2019). Oxfam is an active supporter of DRRNet-Phils and has campaigned vigorously for the People's Survival Fund and the IDP bill (Cepeda, 2019).
Since the Arroyo administration, many CSOs have become more engaged in DRM-related activities because of the growing need brought about by disaster events, as well as by the increase in funding. Among Philippine NGOs, some sitting members of the NDRRMC directly received close to half of the total amount for Philippine NGOs (USD 46.9 million). However, funding channelled directly to Philippine NGOs constitutes a very small part of donor aid (1.99%). This reflects a global trend where less than 0.2% was channelled directly to local organisations (High-Level Panel on Humanitarian Financing, 2016).
Policy Players, Preferences, and Strategies
This article argues that the DRM policy process may be best characterised as a dynamic process comprising institutions and processes that are shaped by and shape where and how civil society actors can engage the state. The table below provides a summary of the policy players, preferences, and strategies in disaster risk management policymaking in the Philippines from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Congresses (Table 7).
Policy Players, Preferences, and Strategies in Disaster Risk Management Policymaking, Thirteenth to Eighteenth Congresses.
Source: Author's compilation from various documents and interviews
First, among state actors, the Philippine president is dominant in the policymaking process, with both reactive and proactive powers (Kasuya, 2013). Presidents can “reach in” on the legislative calendar, influencing the speed at which his or her legislative agenda is passed. Presidential access to different forms of pork barrel allows the president to further strengthen his or her hand vis-à-vis a Congress already characterised by majority coalitions in support of the president. Because of the president's dominant position in the policy process, the presidential legislative agenda is a strong determinant of the passage of DRM legislation, accounting for more than half of the laws passed from the Thirteenth to the Eighteenth Congresses. A presidential veto can also put an end to a bill, as overriding a presidential package veto does not happen in the Philippines.
Second, in Congress, disaster risk management is a major policy agenda. Between the two chambers, the Senate appears to enjoy better legislative success than the lower house and has served as a means of “blocking” legislation coming from the House of Representatives. This can be attributed to the fact that DRM is a policy area of national significance. The national constituency of the Senate's electorate and the exclusive jurisdiction of the lower house on local laws unwittingly limit the focus of the Senate to issues of national significance. On the other hand, support for the president's DRM legislative agenda is strongest in the Eighteenth Congress (Duterte) and weakest in the Sixteenth Congress (Aquino II). In both chambers, the role of Congressional Committees is paramount. The life cycle of most of the bills ends at the committee level; the tendency to consolidate or substitute bills creates temporary issue-based coalitions, giving bills a greater chance of passing.
Third, among bureaucrats, presidential appointees tend to be very supportive of the president's legislative agenda, while career bureaucrats tend to push for the agency's mandates. In the NDRRMC, bureaucrats dominate both in terms of numbers and agenda-setting power. The NDRRMC has also retained the predominance of the military as an actor in disaster risk management in the Philippines. In the Duterte administration in particular, presidential appointees to top-level positions have been former military officers. Due to the predominance of state actors in the policymaking process, how are civil society actors able to shape policymaking outcomes?
Overall, CSOs have advanced several policy reforms in the legislative process through persistent lobbying and the effective use of public awareness and media campaigns. In lobbying, the role of legislative champions is paramount in getting a bill passed and in generating legislative support. In the cases of successful CSO campaigns, networks, and international NGOs are central. Several major disaster events provided windows of opportunity for these campaigns to further push for their advocacies. Critical focusing events such as these major disasters can alter the overall national mood and make policy change a priority (De Chavez and Lim, 2025). In the NDRRMC, the record of civil society attempts to influence policies that govern the day-to-day DRM operations in the country is mixed. The predominance of bureaucrats in terms of agenda-setting and sheer numbers puts CSOs in a position where they can only shape policy design through lower-tier groups in the NDRRMC, as well as oppose the adoption of certain policies.
I argue that while the institutional factors above are important, they only shape in part the available political space for civil society and state engagement in policymaking. Regime characteristics, I argue, provide a more nuanced view of the available political space for civil society organisations across various administrations and within presidential administrations. Taking Tilly's (2006) view that regime attributes shape the available channels for claims-making, I examine below some of the Philippines’ key regime characteristics.
First, because the state is seen as the primary duty bearer in terms of dealing with disasters (Bankoff, 2018), state bodies become the primary target of CSO advocacy. The Philippines has been considered by scholars to be a standout example of a “patrimonial state” (Kuhonta, 2008). This weakness has translated to dealing with disaster impacts, providing an opportunity for various local and international actors to step in in the aftermath of disaster events, and influence policymaking in the medium and long term. Thus, states can be quite powerful but not necessarily superior across all dimensions, allowing different types of overlaps and configurations among political elites, bureaucrats, and civil society (Hansson and Weiss, 2018). The fluidity of legislative coalitions means that temporary issue-based coalitions and alliances can be formed and provide openings for CSO lobbying in Congress. In a context where the state is weak and reform is oftentimes based on shifting coalitions, civil society actors often have to “play the game,” i.e. use clientelism as a deliberate strategy of meeting their goals, as part of a larger set of strategies (Lorch, 2017).
Second, across presidential administrations, the overall relationship between the president and civil society can constrain or expand the political space available for claims-making. As Clarke (2012, 60) has argued, the space for claims-making across administrations can swing between “liberal support” and “outright hostility.” As mentioned above, CSOs in the Philippines are quite diverse and fragmented. This fragmentation is not as salient in DRM policymaking and does not lead to open conflict, in the same way as it does in other areas, such as those among environmental CSOs and those involved in the peace process in Mindanao (see, for instance, Manlupig, 2002; Serrano, 2003). Because most of the CSOs in this study are part of one big national network, they exhibit high levels of unity. However, it is worth mentioning that while individual members of the CSOs interviewed for this study have ties or are identified (rightly or wrongly) with the Philippine Left, the organisations themselves steer clear of this link due to potential state surveillance and violence. Thus, at the organisational level, there is a motivation to present a position that is less critical of the state.
The Arroyo administration started with strong civil society backing, but accusations of electoral fraud and violence against CSOs soured this relationship, especially with those that had supported the ouster of her predecessor, Estrada. Despite this, some of the important DRM reforms were passed during Arroyo's term. The Aquino administration had strong civil society backing, but the pork barrel scam involving bogus NGOs led to a more lukewarm relationship with progressive NGOs. Some of these CSOs continued to work with the Aquino administration as watchdogs and as support groups for the government's public service delivery.
The Duterte administration started with the appointment of several Leftist technocrats. When negotiations with the rebel group failed, these appointees were not confirmed, and this was swiftly followed by a spate of violence against CSOs and the threat of their outright removal from formal roles in policymaking. The Duterte administration marked an important turning point in state–civil society relations. The use of red-tagging was widespread and indiscriminate—no distinction was made between groups that have worked with the government long-term and those that are truly critical of government efforts. The passage of the Anti-Terror Law in 2020 further increased the “chilling effect” of the state's red tagging by introducing additional layers of bureaucracy that securitised CSO participation. This is akin to the Copenhagen School's notion of securitisation, where state actors socially construct a threat and try to move a topic away from politics into an area of security concerns, thereby legitimating extraordinary means against said threats (Buzan, 1991).
Third, the existence of state-designed and operated political spaces had an impact on the strategies that CSOs utilise. By becoming policy insiders, some CSOs have moved toward less conflictual strategies such as advocacy, networking, and alliance-building. Networking in DRM is key for CSOs as they are generally small and therefore give these organisations access to policymakers, a national presence, and national leadership. In these networks, INGOs and donors play central roles. In state institutional spaces, this also meant trying to secure a seat in the NDRRMC and serving as resource persons in legislative committees. In electoral politics, CSOs have served as issue advocates and have openly supported party-list candidates, where, if they win seats, they are unfortunately marginalised in the House of Representatives (Kimura, 2013). Protests related to disasters and climate change still occur, but are confined to limited undertakings, as they have not proven to be a viable organisational strategy for seeking reforms in DRM and open CSOs to threats and more red-tagging by the state.
Conclusion
In this article, I examined state–civil society relations in disaster risk management policymaking across three administrations in the Philippines. By identifying the inherent shortcomings of theories of policymaking, this paper sought to modestly contribute to the understanding of state–civil society relations beyond the framework of clientelism. By examining institutions in policymaking but also going beyond them to include specific regime attributes, the concept of co-infiltration explains the dynamic relationship between institutions and regimes and the extent to which CSOs can shape policymaking outcomes.
Overall, the character of disaster risk management policy in the Philippines has been national. This, I argue, is because the main institutional players in policymaking, the President and Congress (particularly the Senate), and the groups lobbying for them (CSOs) have a national focus. While there is a temptation to ascribe it to a programmatic character, how policy is passed and subsequent patterns of particularistic disaster-related spending point to the accommodation of certain interests. Presidential dominance in the policy process, for instance, has placed a strong emphasis on emergency response and funding for post-disaster rehabilitation and reconstruction, to the detriment of other DRM areas. Reorganisation and reform of institutional structures in DRM also play into the President's attempt to build a legacy within the single-term limit, but will also mean that organisational set-ups are prone to change. CSOs have also couched their campaigns in programmatic terms, although they have sought specific sectoral benefits and protection.
The creation of temporary coalitions with state actors and the creation of the NDRRMC had significant impacts on the ability of CSOs to achieve some policy goals, creating “pockets of efficacy” (see, for instance, Abinales and Amoroso, 2017). From the lens of “co-infiltration,” this can be seen as an opportunity for civil society actors to have a voice in formal policymaking channels and reshape how these channels operate. However, by accepting the legitimacy of the state and choosing to engage in state-defined channels, civil society actors open themselves to co-optation and incorporation. The push by CSOs to remain relatively independent has put them at odds with state actors in a more constrained political environment.
This article utilised a qualitative research design with Philippine national policymaking as a case. Given the limitations of qualitative research, case study approaches, and the limited depth of macro-level studies, future studies can benefit by adopting alternative methodologies. First, systematic comparative research, with a focus on the Indo-Pacific (because of the region's vulnerability to disasters), can significantly expand the research scope and objectives through contextual description, classification, and hypothesis-testing. Second, by drawing insights from game-theoretic approaches, further studies can open up possibilities for predictions of policy and institutional outcomes of state–civil society relations. Third, future research should also examine policymaking at subnational levels to investigate how policymaking dynamics differ within and across localities.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
The author wishes to acknowledge support from the New Zealand Government Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) Manaaki Scholarship for the funding support for the doctoral thesis, from which material for the article is based.
Data Availability Statement
The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available because it is under embargo at the University of Canterbury Library until 2026 but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Ethical Approval and Informed Consent Statements
This study has been reviewed and approved by the University of Canterbury Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) under HEC Ref: 2021/39/LR-PS. Written prior informed consent to participate in the research project and publish the data was obtained from research participants.
Funding
The author received funding from the New Zealand Government Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) Manaaki Scholarship for the research from where material for the article is based on.
