Decentralization, local autonomy and federalism: A History of Struggle

Diversity as history Our nation’s history before colonization showed that we were then comprised of maritime harbor states that flourished in trade with our Asian neighbors as far away as the present-day Middle East.

These small nations have various settlements outside the harbor center called the balangays ruled by tribal datus or chieftains that are usually allied with them especially in repulsing invaders from the sea. In northern Luzon, various ethno-linguistic tribes in the Cordillera mountain ranges had their own system of governance and culture different from the lowland and maritime states.

Hinduism, Confucianism and Islam also had a great influence in these early settlements from rajahnates, sultanates, and extensions of Chinese dynasties.

The arrival of the Spanish conquistadores in 1521 gradually consolidated these maritime kingdoms under a colonial military government aided by a crusading Church imposing Christianity among the native inhabitants. It was only the Mindanao sultanates that successfully repulsed the Spanish colonizers. These sultanates exercised sovereignty over most of mainland Mindanao and the Sulu archipelago.