The Duterte administration in the Philippines (2016–22) marked the return of authoritarian rule in the Philippines. It was also accompanied by an economic recovery that was better than many expected, at least until the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Both during and following the Duterte period, the country was buffeted by a series of internal and external shocks that called into question the state's legal and social policy contract with its citizens.

We think of this as “contesting the Philippines”—an intense normative and practical struggle to shape (or reshape) some of the Philippines’ most critical institutions: the Constitution, the presidency, the Supreme Court, the free press, regional autonomy and independent regulatory institutions. That contestation intensified under the Duterte administration and continues to the present.

One of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte's signatures was a Manilacentric show of strength through martial law in Mindanao, the roll-out of a punitive anti-drugs policy and asserting executive control over other branches of government and independent agencies. Not surprisingly, the national commitment to the rule of law and human rights was called into question. President Duterte aimed to remove the executive from the constraints of both domestic and international rule of law while using law as a repressive policy tool. The most dramatic expression of this was Duterte's “war on drugs”, which targeted drug dealers but also swept up men in the streets, with the police acting with apparent impunity. At the same time, the administration launched legal attacks on media outlets, journalists and politicians critical of their policies. This period also saw the administration apparently abandoning international law, announcing a withdrawal from the International Criminal Court and declining to exploit the Philippines’ arbitral tribunal victory over China regarding territorial claims in the South China Sea. The result was a precipitous decline in the Philippines’ ranking in the World Justice Project's Rule of Law Index.

At the same time, the Philippines is also particularly vulnerable to regional and transnational influences. The Duterte government initially embraced China as its bilateral partner of choice, notwithstanding China's incursion into Filipino maritime territory. But, by the end of Duterte's term, relations with the United States had improved. The 2017 Marawi siege and its aftermath underscored the vulnerability of the southern Philippines to external terrorist groups, becoming a major setback to achieving sustainable peace in Mindanao and affecting the political settlement in Muslim Mindanao (the Bangsamoro).