Abstract

Today’s outward migration of millions of Filipinos has rendered international borders porous and blurred the already thin-line between legal and illegal overseas workers, making both documented and undocumented migrants from the Philippines a responsibility of their government. Every case affecting Filipinos abroad, therefore, is a potential non-traditional security issue because, while migration poses no direct threat to the territorial security of sovereign states, it could threaten the survival of government if left unattended. It could make or unmake politicians, remove officials from public office, or, at worst, strain diplomatic relations between labor-sending and -receiving countries. It’s also an economic issue that spills over to other related cases, such as human rights, sexual and reproductive health topics, national politics, and foreign affairs. The concept of securitization and desecuritization—as advanced by the Euro-centric Copenhagen School and adopted, with some modifications, by the Asia-centric Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, in Singapore—is a powerful tool used by actors in identifying an existential threat to a referent object in migration cases, and in resolving the issue at hand.