Vigilantism In The Philippines

A THOMISTIC ANALYSIS ON

THE VIGILANTISM IN THE PHILIPPINES

INTRODUCTION

Vigilantism is a long-time legal phenomenon in the society that hides within the shadows of unsolved affliction to avenge the victims of injustice. Its existence is considered as an alternative solution to the problem that caused injustice on the offended individuals. According to the Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice (2002), the term vigilantism is coined from the term vigilante that came from the Spanish origin which means “watchman” or “guard”. A vigilante is someone who takes up the law into his own hands and attempts to enforce it relying to his own conviction of right and wrong. Therefore, the vigilantism is a private enforcement of legal norms through the inactivity

In the article “Violence against Violence: In search of Security and Justice”, Carolien Jacobs and Christy Schuetze (2011) saw the use of violence to counter an existing violence in a way to impose order over the country. That time, the country experiences violence of popular justice and mass protests.

Meanwhile, the state of India and its people were both held culpable on the phenomenal vigilantism in the country in which ordinary people fell into dilemma of choosing which political parties they will believe in to reach state ends knowing that these parties support different vigilante groups. Nandini Sundar (2010) said in her article “Vigilantism, Culpability, and Moral Dilemmas” that vigilantism brought up conundrum on ordinary citizens which of the two they will support, not knowing what these mentioned groups stand for. It seems that both the state and the people share the cause of vigilante groups’ existence. The left-wing groups are classified as self-determined vigilante whose religion and culture were damaged, i.e. ‘hurt sentiments’ (2010, p. 117). The government in which also encouraged countered this and supported right-wing groups—vigilante groups that armed as special police

The government supported vigilante groups for they were effective in fighting the communist party New People’s Army. Some military men and even civilians supported this idea. Different from Silke’s view of vigilantism, the Philippines deal with it as a sort of helping-hand to counter insurgency. In his article “The Vigilantes: How to deal with them?”, Michael Serrill (1987) said that some persons in the military, and even mere civilians are advocating and supporting such groups in order to get rid of the government’s nemesis. In addition to that, “the vigilantes have proved an effective tool for counterinsurgency alongside the still ill-equipped and poorly paid Philippine armed forces” (Serrill, 1987, p.10). Serrill emphasized the existence of vigilante groups to be very functional in battling the threatening New People’s