Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the disconnect between existing agrarian reform initiatives in the Philippines and the local conceptions of land redistributive justice, using the experience of Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) implementation in the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao.

Paper long abstract:

Land is acknowledged as one of the major drivers of armed conflict in the southern Philippine area of the Bangsamoro Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (BARMM), now the sole autonomous parliament in the country by virtue of its unique cultural identity and as a result of decades of peace negotiations. The Bangsamoro Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Agrarian Reform (MAFAR) is the lead agency implementing the national Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP), intended to promote equitable land ownership by providing lands to landless farmers. However, previous studies have argued that historical and contemporary conflict in Mindanao has agrarian rootsm and that CARP is ahistorical and may even perpetuate historical injustice in Mindanao by not acknowledging prior claims. At the same time, post-BOL consultations indicate the need for more culturally-appropriate forms of land governance and redistribution in the BARMM (Fernandez, 2021). This paper summarises research conducted with MAFAR to ask one fundamental question. Is CARP in its current form appropriate to the Bangsamoro context? The 2014 peace agreement provide new powers for innovation and greater localisation, although arrangements still mirror and must be coordinated with national counterparts. Thus, what localised tenure and redistributive justice mechanisms might be appropriate to the Bangsamoro, and how might this inform the development of regional legislation and other land governance initiatives at the regional and national level?