Undermining the Philippine Global Gender Gap Ranking: The Entrenched Misogyny in Contemporary Philippine Politics as Illustrated by the New Institutionalist Framework The Philippines has continued to enjoy high ranking on the Global Gender Gap Report (hereafter referred to as GGGR) by the World Economic Forum on the subindex of political empowerment. In the recently released GGGR 2021, the Philippines ranked 33rd among 156 countries on the subindex of political empowerment, successfully closing 36.2% of its gender gap (World Economic Forum [WEF], 2021, p. 37). While this percentage seems unimpressive at face value, it is relatively high on the whole index, ranking higher than countries that are more economically developed such as the United States and Australia; economic development has been proven to be a positive indicator of gender equality (Mikkolla & Miles, 2007, p. 47; United Nations Development Programme [UNDP], 2020, pp. 343-344). In the same year, only two months before the release of the GGGR, President of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte, who is notorious for his sexist and “rape” jokes, publicly declared his belief that the Presidency is not a woman’s job as assurance that his daughter, Sara Duterte, will not run for the 2022 Presidential Elections as response to the results of a recent opinion poll from which she ranked highest among the six other preferred presidential candidates (Cunningham, 2021; Gutierrez, 2019). Such public display of sexism and exercise of the patriarchy are no longer estranged in Philippine politics, especially since politics is still an arena dominated by the elite-male (Hega, 2003; Philippine Plan for Gender Responsive Development, 1988, p. 396). Commensurate to this, despite the major progress established by Philippine formal political institutions in establishing gender parity, it is clear that the persistence of informal institutions mainly of conservatism and its derivatives continue to influence Philippine politics against the favor of women. This paper is an examination on the gender parity in Philippine politics through the new institutionalist framework. The following formal and informal institutions have been identified: political representation and pro-women legislation (which is further divided into legislation, implementation, and access to courts) for the formal institutions, and conservatism and its derivatives of the patriarchy, sexism, gender norms, and gender bias for the informal institutions. In this case, we’ll employ Huntington’s (1957, 455) situational definition of conservatism, which is that it is “a system of ideas that is employed to justify the existing social order.” Such identified formal and informal institutions guide the discussions within this paper. Firstly, there are two subcategories under formal institutions: political representation and pro-women legislation, which are also the two indicators that were considered in the GGGR evaluation of the subindex of political empowerment (see WEF, 2021, pp. 76-83). In terms of political representation, the Philippines has had two women presidents over the last 50 years, two more than 119 other countries (Facts and Figures: Women’s Leadership and Political Participation | What We Do, 2021; Hega et al., 2017, p. 8). With the election of women in politics, especially in the presidency, it is expected that they will act in the interest of those with whom they share similar characteristics with (Pitkin, 1967, p. 209). Therefore, it was expected that they will pass pro-women laws and policies. However, this expectation was not fully fulfilled by either of the two presidents, especially when it came to the controversial Reproductive Health Bill that only became a law in 2012 (World Health Organization, 2013). Both women presidents were devout Catholics, and Corazon Aquino, the first woman president, was largely afraid of receiving opposition from bishops, whereas, the second and most recent female president, GloriaMacapagal-Arroyo fiercely advocated for natural contraception methods (Genilo, 2014, p. 1046; Punongbayan, 2018). Evidently, the persistence of Catholic Conservatism prevented the passage of important policies during these women administrations, when the possibilities of passage was expected to be higher than in non-women presidencies. Another expected consequence to the election of women presidents is the role model effect or the role model hypothesis which is the observed encouragement of women to participate in political activity caused by the presence of female politicians (Wolbrecht and Campbell 2007, p. 924). Unfortunately, according to a study conducted by Liu (2018, p. 265), the expected role model effect, which is a phenomenon primarily observed in Western countries, did not accrue in the Philippine context, in fact, the election of women presidents produced an opposite, adverse effect known as the “backlash,” primarily caused by the gender norms in Philippine society. There is a concession to the fact that Liu’s study did not necessarily focus on the Philippines as a single unit of research, however, such findings can be corroborated when we look at the trend of women in politics over the past decades. In fact, the Philippines has yet to achieve the 30 percent “critical mass” in women’s political representation that designates substantial influence, as only 23.13 percent of the elected candidates from the 2019 National and Local Elections were women, in proportion to the 76.87 percent of seats won by men (Commission on Elections, 2019; Dahlerup, 1988, p. 280). The second discussion is focused on pro-women legislation, which consists of three subcategories: legislation, implementation, and access to justice. Firstly, the Philippines has had notable progress in terms of landmark pro-women policies, such as the Magna Carta for Women Law that provides a set of comprehensive plans, programs, and policies that abolished discrimination for women (The Magna Carta for Women [hereafter referred to as MCW], 2008) and the Reproductive Health Act which recognizes gender equality and women empowerment in terms of basic reproductive health access and services (Simon, 2013, p. 4). Moreover, systematic analysis of the previous Family Codes had concluded that is has increasingly become less discriminatory towards women over the decades (Feliciano, 1994, p. 559). However, it is significant to understand that pro-women legislation is two-fold; it includes the passage of the laws as well as their implementation. While it is difficult to assess the full and genuine implementation of these pro-women policies, the existence of conservative beliefs and its derivatives of the patriarchy, gender norms, and gender bias are identified as barriers for proper implementation. Firstly, when it comes to the RH Law, it was temporarily suspended from implementation after receiving serious backlash from the conservative Catholic church (SC Stops RH Law Implementation, 2013). Secondly, on a study on women laborers in electronic export processing zones, it was reported that only 25.8 percent reported their knowledge of the existence of MCW (Crispin B. Beltran Research Center, 2015, p. 24), which serves as a great barrier to proper implementation. Lastly, the third branch that constitutes pro-women legislation is women’s access to justice. In line with this, the same phenomenon of conservatism, the patriarchy, gender bias, and gender norms preventing women’s full and proper access can also be observed. In fact, in a program developed by former Supreme Court Associate Justice Adolfo Azcuna (2006, p. 5) in conjunction with the UNDP Justice Process Framework, he identified eight forms of gender bias that permeates the third stage of the justice process; these are the following: double victimization, negative attitudes towards female victims, gender insensitive rules and procedures, trivialization of gender crimes, gender stereotypes affecting court actions, legal discrimination, under representation of women, and sexist treatments of women in Courts. In this case, gender bias is the differentiation between men and women and the unique and unjust treatment that they received according to their gender (Mukherjee, 2015, p. 76). To corroborate this, a study conducted by Lobusta and Santos (2014, p. 4) have found out that 15.71% of the respondents have expressed their fears of feeling shameful in situations of violence as stated in the Violence Against Women and Children Law. Therefore, while laws are in place, the prevailing social norms prevent women from filing complaints or bringing their abusers to justice. This makes it apparent that despite considerable success in pro-women policies, conservatism, gender bias, and their many forms continue to subsist, preventing the proper implementation of such laws and the achievement of justice for women. Now that we’ve identified the current status of women’s political empowerment in the Philippines by examining the status of formal institutions and its interactions with informal institutions such as conservatism, the patriarchy, gender norms, and gender bias, it is pertinent to discuss where such informal institutions originate from in Philippine society. A. Conservativism affects the passage and implementation of pro-women legislation and it is also the overarching informal institutions from which smaller informal institutions such as the patriarchy, gender norms, and gender bias, are derived from. 1. Philippine society is still very much a conservative country, dominated by the Catholic Church. 2. Catholic beliefs dictate that women are subordinated to men and maintains the sanctity of the family. 3. It gives rise to its derivative informal institutions such as sexism and patriarchy. 2. This is amidst the separation of the church and the state, which, Philippine government has regularly tip-toed around. A. Gender norms, a derivative of conservatism, has further boxed women and prevented them from entering politics. 1. These gender norms dictate that women should be confined to their homes as the “ilaw ng tahanan.” 2. This has also led to the conceptualization that politics is a “man’s game” and that women should stay out of it. B. Gender bias, another derivative of conservatism has led to the systematic discrimination of women in the justice system. 1. This exists because of the inherent preference for sons in our society. a. Patrilineality and patrilocality still prevails in Philippine society. 2. This is the inherent preference for men and against women in our society. 3. In our justice system, this manifests in the form of victimization, negative attitude toward women victims, and gender insensitivity.