In this highly original study, Michael Hawkins's Making Moros intervenes in two distinct scholarly literatures: the influential field of postcolonial critique defined by scholars like Ann Laura Stoler and Dipesh Chakrabarty, and the more specialized niche of Mindanao studies. In terms of postcolonial studies, Hawkins argues that the emphasis on the contingencies, tensions, and subaltern appropriations of colonial discourses can sometimes understate the ways in which “broad imperial cultures, discourses, and policies are conceived and developed at the core with remarkable consistency and persistence” (p. 14). In the second of these fields, Mindanao studies, Hawkins seeks to challenge the “strong teleological reading” of the region's history through the prism of ongoing conflicts between “Muslim separatist organizations and the Republic of the Philippines” by restricting his temporal focus to the fourteen-year period of U.S. military rule (p. 10).
To realize these interventions, Hawkins focuses on the intellectual and epistemological foundations of American military rule in the region from 1899 until 1913. In particular, Hawkins identifies “imperial historicism” as “the fundamental philosophy of American colonialism . . . a coherent and reliable discourse informing and underwriting the essential logic of the United States' colonial project in Mindanao and Sulu” (p. 5). “Imperial historicism” entails a conception of history as a universal process of evolutionary development progressing from the “primitive” through the “modern.” In turn, it was the obligation of those societies that embodied progress, such as the United States, to guide places still mired in primitivism, like Mindanao, toward modernity.
With his explication of “imperial historicism” and deft use of “discourse analysis to coax the Moro voice from non-Moro sources,” Hawkins excavates myriad forgotten facets of Mindanao history (p. xi). Making Moros illuminates ethnological surveys, military expeditions, fairs, supernatural contests, and choreographed performances that all served to position Moros as a “primitive” peoples in need of tutelage (p. 20). Especially notable among these were “grand expositions of domesticated . . . savagery and violence,” such as the staged Moro attack on the city of Manila at the 1909 Philippine Carnival (pp. 49–50). Such grandiose demonstrations not only inscribed Moro savagery within a controlled colonial context, but also highlighted traits that they shared with Americans, like “courage, purpose, and an indomitable martial spirit.” These common attributes would help U.S. officials steer the Muslims of the southern Philippines through an “accelerated transition” into modernity (p. 51).
Along with these overlooked aspects of Mindanao history, Making Moros also does an excellent job of elucidating the centrality of capitalism to U.S. colonial projects. According to Hawkins, American officials construed markets as “the most dynamic force for progress . . . in the Philippines” toward historicist modernity, and saw Moros as “natural capitalists” by virtue of their work ethos and inborn “entrepreneurial” spirit (pp. 75, 79). Accordingly, the colonial regime undertook the development of an extensive system of cash-based marketplaces known as the “Moro Exchanges,” as well as a series of competitions at fairs and expositions in which Moros displayed their goods with the hope of winning cash prizes. Hawkins notes that these endeavors stimulated soaring exports, an increase in the production of cash crops like coffee and hemp, as well as the arrival of international banking and shipping concerns (pp. 90–91).
Moreover, Hawkins effectively employs oral history and “deep participant-observation” to show how the influence of “imperial historicism” persisted well after the dissolution of U.S. military rule in 1913 (p. xi). As he demonstrates, the American period in fact continues to occupy a privileged place in the historical memory of Moros even today. Many of the author's interlocutors not only identify American rule with “perceptions of stability, order, and fairness,” they also frequently mention symbolic expressions of American military prowess, like the .45 caliber firearm, with evident nostalgia (p. 134). Some even went so far as to express a desire for the return of American colonialism as an alternative to Philippine rule.
The one flaw that Making Moros occasionally succumbs to is attributing too much power and coherence to American colonial discourses. While U.S. ideologies exerted a powerful hold on Mindanao, Hawkins could have perhaps subjected some of these claims to more scrutiny. Did all of this giddy talk about capitalism, for example, perhaps predispose Americans to sometimes exaggerate the impact of their economic policies? Likewise, Hawkins strains a little too hard to demonstrate the universal coherence of imperial historicist thinking. Although Making Moros argues that the U.S. regime denigrated the Islamic attachments as superficial because it contradicted its vision of Moros as isolated primitives, is it not possible that some American officials acknowledged and even sought to privilege ties with the wider Muslim world? Surely there must have been some fissures in the colonial record.
These very minor shortcomings, however, do not detract from this groundbreaking contribution to the study of Mindanao. With his compelling reinterpretation of Moro history through the lens of “imperial historicism,” Hawkins jettisons the extant preoccupation with violent separatism and offers a valuable “amendment” to the “new imperial history” (p. 131). Making Moros thus constitutes essential reading for scholars of Mindanao, Philippine, and postcolonial history alike.
