Martial law and the origins of neoliberal education in the Philippines
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
4-26-2025
Abstract
Scholarly assessments of Philippine education during the presidency of Ferdinand Marcos understandably focus on its authoritarian bent. What many neglect is how his dictatorship, in partnership with the World Bank (WB), incubated neoliberal education in the country. While there are academic analyses that show how WB loan programmes influenced Marcos’s martial-law regime to reorient the general curriculum to suit the interests of global capital, thus far none has focused on how government policies and fiscal priorities greatly enhanced the position of private school owners and administrators to the detriment of the general public. This essay addresses this important issue by scrutinising key education-related government decrees and laws from the declaration of martial law to the end of Marcos’s presidency (1972–1986) and analysing their impact on educators.
Recommended Citation
Custom Citation: Pante, Michael D. "Martial law and the origins of neoliberal education in the Philippines." Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, vol. 53, no. 3, 2025, pp. 277–290, https://doi.org/10.1080/1359866X.2025.2495771.
