State Failure, Regional Autonomy and Muslim Identity in the Southern Philippines
Kit Collier, Faculty of Asian Studies / Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University
Localised state failure in the southern Philippines delivers concrete benefits to national incumbents and regional warlords. Dissolving this Faustian pact requires innovative re-imaginings of what Muslim autonomy might look like. Co-optation of Muslim elites has repeatedly failed to stem the cycle of conflict, and international development assistance serves largely as an anaesthetic. Dominant development and interfaith approaches to peace building depoliticise a Muslim sense of self that is, at root, political. Bangsamoro (Philippine Muslim) self-determination begins with the restoration of pre-colonial trading relationships stifled by state centralism. This paper proposes a new approach to Muslim autonomy that will, at once, reinvigorate local civil society, generate self-sustaining growth, and wean the national state away from its dependency on localised state failure. It will also defuse an increasingly dangerous nexus between separatist insurgency and jihadist terrorism in Australia’s near-northern ‘arc of instability.’
