Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

At the end of the nineteenth century, the Philippines was the first country in Asia to be liberated from colonial power. The first anti-colonial revolt against Spanish rule occurred from 1896 to 1898, further extended by the resistance to the American conquest. Ultimately, at the turn of the twentieth century, the US replaced a defeated Spain, initiating a new colonial cycle. The Philippines is comprised of an archipelago composed of 7,107 islands, the vast majority of whose population lives on 20 islands. The geographic dispersion of the Philippines has greatly influenced the history of popular struggles in the country. But one unparalleled historical factor explains the distinctiveness of the Philippines in Asia: an early and prolonged character of direct colonial domination. Colonialism in the Philippines began in the sixteenth century, as in Latin America – 300 years earlier than most Asian countries. The process of formal decolonization was not complete until the aftermath of World War II, as in most of the rest of Asia, but 100 years later than in Latin America. Thus, the Philippines' colonial era lasted an exceptionally long four centuries. Another particularity of the country was that Spain reigned as the dominating colonial power before the archipelago became one of the few direct colonies of the United States, a unique succession for Asia. Colonial powers of the archipelago ... log in or subscribe to read full text