Dr. Christopher Ryan Maboloc's The Politics of Peace and the Mindanao Problem is now available at Jade Book Store in Davao City. The new book traces the roots of historical injustice in Muslim Mindanao and discusses the problem of social, cultural, economic, and political exclusion using the lens of Iris Marion Young and Thomas Pogge. The book can also be purchased online through its publisher, Elzystyle Publishing House.
The Politics of Peace and the Mindanao Problem by Christopher Ryan Maboloc. Foreword by Prof. Goran Collste. Introduction by Dr. Mansoor Limba. 227pp. Published by Elzystyle Publishing House.
BOOK REVIEWS
This book comes at the right time. Dr Christopher Ryan Maboloc focuses on the long-lasting conflict in Mindanao. He explains the background to the present conflict and discusses roads to peace and reconciliation. Dr Maboloc is a scholar in applied ethics. In applied ethics we reflect on today’s moral challenges to find guidance and justified solutions. This book is a fine example of how applied ethics can contribute to our understanding of a moral challenge implying injustice, violence and poverty.
Dr Maboloc refers to the history of Spanish and American colonialism as periods of exploitation and power politics. The clan-based politics and the religious conflicts between Christians and Muslims are other keys to understand the present conflict. As he writes, Mindanao has become the battlefront between a deep historical and political divide. We live in a time of crises and wars and the quest for peace, and peaceful ways to solve conflicts are more needed than ever.
––Dr. Göran Collste
Emeritus Professor, Center for Applied Ethics
Linköping University, Sweden
This book is an important reading for students, scholars, policymakers, peace practitioners, and anyone concerned with the fate of marginalized communities in a plural and conflict-ridden world. Politics of Peace does more than recount a history of oppression—it charts a moral path forward, demanding that social and political structures be reformed and that democratic participation be expanded to ensure that the Bangsamoro and other excluded peoples can build futures of their own making. With this work, Maboloc invites us not just to understand peace, but to commit to it.
––Mihai Lupu
Research Fellow
Yale University Global Justice Program, Connecticut, USA
With his rich knowledge, Dr. Christopher Ryan Maboloc develops an insightful analysis of protracted conflict in Mindanao in the Philippines, integrating communal and national dynamics, colonial histories and the impacts of contemporary global political dynamics. Founded upon superb insight into philosophy, ethics, peace and conflict studies, and Mindanao’s culture and history, Maboloc shows comprehensively how a variety of dynamics and several components have prolonged the conflict including structural injustice, discrimination, marginalization of local people from politics, colonialism, etc. Only when people understand those complex but interconnected variables and dynamics, can we grasp the real picture of the Mindanao conflict and the peace that Mindanao requires for people.
––Dr. Juichiro Tanabe
Professor
Center for International Education, Waseda University, Tokyo
Written in an accessible yet intellectually rigorous style, The Politics of Peace challenges readers to reflect on the imperatives of leadership and the responsibilities of both individuals and institutions in cultivating a just and peaceful society. As a Mindanawon scholar, Maboloc critiques the centralization of power and knowledge production in the Philippines while also exposing the multilayered inequalities among groups in Muslim Mindanao—such as Christians, Muslims, and Indigenous Peoples—as well as disparities within and across these communities. His writing, informed by his own positionality and sense of responsibility, engages readers with decolonial ideas and consciousness. Whether you are a political theorist, a peace advocate, or simply a curious reader, Maboloc’s insights offer valuable perspectives on one of humanity’s most pressing challenges.
––Dr. Asuna Yoshizawa
Research Fellow
Center for Southeast Asian Studies
Kyoto University, Japan
Christopher Ryan Maboloc’s The Politics of Peace and the Mindanao Problem, arguably stands as a pioneering attempt to identify and dissect the historical roots and structural causes of historical injustice wrought upon the indigenous peoples of Mindanao. By astutely using second-order philosophical and ethical critique and analysis to elucidate perennial challenges to peace, and ways to resolve them, Dr. Maboloc’s work will be extremely useful to researchers, policymakers, development practitioners, NGO workers, students, and academics faced by the seemingly elusive quest for peace in the Bangsamoro.
––Dr. Narcisa Paredes-Canilao
Professor of Philosophy and Ethical Issues in Development
University of the Philippines – Baguio, Philippines
The work of Ryan is critical for describing more of the key issues in peace making, so that the diverse and beautiful land and ocean that construct Mindanao, can thrive. It calls on governments (national, regional, local), people in centers of community power and influence, business leaders, youth, people with passion, and all, can revisit their preconceived ideas, examine the research, create new research to contest or confirm the research findings that are presented, and work together for a sustainable future.
––Dr. Darryl Macer
President
American University of Sovereign Nations, Arizona, USA
Dr. Maboloc’s profound work is a fundamental imagery in the peace education landscape. I encourage the various communities of peace educators in Mindanao to refer to his work on our discussion on the Mindanao Problem so we, together with our learners, can articulate well a problem of injustice- poverty in Mindanao- and its resolution, the Tri-people have truly longed for.
––Godiva C. Eviota-Rivera, Ph. D.
Full Professor and Trailblazer of the MSU System-Wide Peace Education
Mindanao State University, Marawi City
In each of his works, Prof. Maboloc speaks not just as a scholar of political theory and ethics, but as a Mindanawon whose roots are deeply embedded in the soil of a long-contested land. This book, however, is more than an intellectual undertaking—it is a moral appeal. A call to remember. A plea to listen.
––Dr. Mansoor Limba, SCL
Associate Professor, Ateneo de Davao University, Philippines
YOU CAN ORDER ONLINE:
THE POLITICS OF PEACE AND THE MINDANAO PROBLEM
Online Price: P550 only (Book Store Price: P660)
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