An Evolutionary Institutionalist Explanation of the Philippines’ Militaristic COVID-19 Approach

The Philippines undertook a “militaristic” approach to COVID-19. This has been attributed, directly or indirectly, to the strong political will of their current president, Rodrigo Duterte. Going against this narrative, this work presents an alternative framing of the issue. Drawing on concepts from institutionalist theory, this work argues that such a militaristic policy should be viewed as a continuation of the long-standing presence of militaristic ideas in civilian affairs. The dominance of such ideas has been normalized, not recently via Duterte but decades ago, owing to the failure to have a genuine liberal democracy after the fall of the Marcos regime. Overall, this work presents a historical grounding, using a new evolutionary framework, as to why institutions or policies — in this case the militaristic COVID-19 approach — come to fruition.