Recalibrating burdens of blame: Anti-swidden politics and green governance in the Philippine Uplands

Background

Cleared forests in Southeast Asia historically provoke strong reactions, shaping forest governance. Political agendas, often rooted in colonial views, have long criminalized swidden (shifting agriculture) farmers, labeling them destructive "anti-citizens." This perspective persists, causing people to unfairly blame farmers for their traditional livelihood. Recently, climate change concerns, fire risks, and global initiatives like REDD+ aiming to increase forest cover have intensified this blame. Media often conflates swidden fires with larger forest burns. Additionally, sustainable development agendas promoting market-based, "higher value" land uses further marginalize traditional practices like swidden, pushing these communities to the fringes.

Goals and Methods

This research challenges prevailing views that blame poor upland farmers in Palawan, Philippines, for destructive swidden agriculture. Using Stuart Hall’s "politics of representation," the study contrasts how farmers, state, and non-state actors perceive and manage forest clearing and burning. It highlights farmers' careful, knowledge-based burning—essential for their livelihoods—and contrasts this with mainstream portrayals of carelessness and the risks created by illegality. Drawing on 13 months of mixed-methods fieldwork (interviews, observation, ethnoecology), the authors analyze these conflicting perspectives, the socio-ecological functions of fire, and local responses to governance, aiming to shift the blame away from farmers' traditional practices.

Conclusions and Takeaways

This research reveals a complex reality in Palawan where strict anti-swidden laws contrast with local tolerance—an "atmosphere of consent." Local brokers, including rangers and leaders, often mediate these rules out of empathy for subsistence needs, allowing swidden farming to persist as a tolerated crime. Contrary to stereotypes, Tagbanua farmers apply sophisticated ethnoecological knowledge for careful, controlled burning. People often blame these farmers while overlooking much larger forest destruction from industrial activities like palm oil and mining. The authors argue that ending this "swidden blame game" requires recognizing farmers' rights to practice swidden as essential to their livelihoods on ancestral lands.