Probing SilencesSexual and Gender-Based Violence in Conflict and Peace in the Philippines

Abstract

Abstract This chapter investigates the case of the Philippines exploring the pattern of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) reports from 1998 to 2016, during the key years in which the government of the Philippines and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF), the largest insurgent group in the conflict-affected island of Mindanao, achieved a peace process. The chapter finds that while SGBV is acknowledged, it is not viewed as conflict-related. Instead, this violence is dissociated from conflict and attributed to the personalized culture of violence, impunity, clan wars, economic disenfranchisement, and displacement that primarily affect women, particularly Indigenous women, in the Mindanao region. Minimal SGBV reporting takes place in this conflict-affected region, and in the few surveys conducted of women in Mindanao, they are reluctant to come forward to report their SGBV experiences.