Seeing like a church: Reconstruction after Typhoon Sendong in Cagayan de Oro, Philippines

Abstract

In post-disaster situations where there is a weak government, opportunities arise for so-called non-state actors to re-imagine, re-create, and govern portions of society and landscapes. The process of resettling survivors is an improvement project in which certain actors and institutions assume the functions and authority of a shadow state. This paper studies the activities of Catholic trustees in disaster relief and resettlement in Northern Mindanao, Philippines after Tropical Storm Sendong, and asks how and to what ends they engage with purportedly secular humanitarian efforts. It is based on fieldwork in Cagayan de Oro, which used an ethnographic approach and qualitative methods. The intentions motivating trustees’ interventions, and the selection of activities, reveal clear Christian undertones. This unsurprising finding suggests Catholic trustees “saw like a church”; there was a demonstrated intent to govern, in the Foucauldian sense of governmental rationality, guided by the exercise of old and new pastoral power, largely mirroring a Christian social mission. Through their actions, trustees (re)asserted the historical hegemonic position of the Catholic Church in Philippine society. This framing of disaster management challenges mainstream secular discourses and practices of development and disaster management and their treatment of faith-based organizations as just another development actor.