Marielle Y. Marcaida is a Ph.D. student at the Department of Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies of the University of Washington. Her research focuses on the human rights activism of mothers of drug war victims under the Duterte administration’s “war on drugs.”
View the digital version of Marielle’s artifact.
Marielle’s project summary:
This virtual booklet popularizes and visualizes my research on the grassroots activism of mothers of drug war victims in the Philippines through a virtual booklet. While the Philippine drug war primarily targeted men in urban poor communities, women and their left-behind families suffered from the long-term consequences of state violence under former President Rodrigo Duterte’s administration. As the women struggle with grief, trauma, and physical and economic hardships while dealing with state neglect and impunity, they are compelled to organize and mobilize amongst themselves to protect their communities from the police and vigilante killings. In this project, I highlighted the grassroots initiative of a group of mothers in Pateros City, known as the Ronda ng Kababaihan (Patrol of Women), who began to voluntarily conduct night patrols in 2017 to enforce curfews and keep the streets free of potential targets of motorcycle-riding gunmen. Their motivation to protect their families from the killings has led them to serve as the protectors of their neighborhood, mobilizing beyond the threat of the drug war and serving as the partners of the police and the local government during the COVID-19 pandemic and in various community programs geared towards public service. In this booklet, I seek to narrate their story of resistance that would paint the picture of how—amidst a crisis of human rights—it takes a village led by mothers to protect every child’s life.