Beautiful Baguio: What happened?

As the country’s “summer capital,” Baguio’s fame rests on its reputation for being a green, cool, and pristine refuge to people from the lowlands. Baguio has represented a sanctuary for romantics and authors, especially those who are eager to escape the hustle and bustle of megacities like Metro Manila. It is a place to unwind, decouple from your stressful daily routines, and gather your creative juices before you unleash them onto your artistic canvass. 

Having spent my childhood years in Baguio, the city has always been a special place to me – awakening my keenest and most intimate childhood memories. Of course, my mom and aunts, who were fortunate to live in Baguio during its heyday from the 1950s to the 1970s, have never failed to remind me of how my generation has mainly witnessed the mountainous city’s gradual decline. They always talk about how Baguio used to be a clean, sophisticated (thanks to the positive infrastructural and education legacy of American colonial era), less populated, and a quiet place – a true city of pines. 

To be honest, initially I was slightly dismissive vis-à-vis their opinions, thinking that they were perhaps driven more by nostalgic impulses than factual historical observations. (After all, older generations always tend to think their time was cooler and more “authentic” than ours, don’t they?)   But as years go by, it has become increasingly difficult to find a green and pristine place in Baguio. What you find instead are pockets of pristine and green havens surrounded by a jungle of concrete and congestion.   The city has been overwhelmed by often unbearable traffic, precarious levels of pollution, unplanned and spontaneous construction activities, rising temperatures, and clientelist politics. 

Baguio’s exceptionalism 

Baguio’s clear blue skies, towering pine trees, highly hospitable climate, and rows of lush green mountains embracing the city have always rekindled an inexplicable sense of calm and joy in my often tempestuous soul. It also has a unique history. Much of the lowland Philippines (with the notable exception of Muslim-majority regions of Mindanao) was carved out of Spanish colonial imagination and brutal rule. 

But it was mainly American colonial rule that “developed” and incorporated Baguio – and the larger Cordillera Region – into the fabric of the Filipino nation-state. Given its unique (and more recent) encounter with the Western civilization, Baguio developed slightly different sets of institutions compared to other parts of the Philippines.  While the extractive nature of Spanish colonization had very limited developmental impact on the rest of the country, the Americans, leveraging advanced technology and a more benign form of colonialism, left a largely positive and inclusive legacy in places like Baguio. 

Beyond its topography and history, Baguio also stands out for its demographic makeup and socio-economic profile. It is a place where, at least historically, majority of people belong to the middle-income stratum and the aspiring middle classes; it is bereft of the mindboggling inequalities that afflict other major cities in the country. Widespread poverty and ostentatious display of wealth are considerably less visible in Baguio than places like Metro Manila. 

Aside from being a tourist destination, Baguio is also a higher education hub, attracting tens of thousands of students from across Northern Luzon and beyond, with Saint Louis University, University of Baguio, University of the Cordilleras, and University of the Philippines- Baguio representing the leading local educational institutions. Thanks to its wide network of universities, relatively affordable living expenses, and attractive climate, thousands of students from the Middle East and Northeast Asia, particularly South Korea, have chosen to study in Baguio in recent decades. As a result, the city has a strong cosmopolitan culture. 

It is a city of fashion, cafés, and probing intellectual discussions. I have I had one of my most spirited discussions (and debates) not during my visits to Tokyo, New York, or Munich in recent years, but with vivacious and cerebral acquaintances in Baguio. Due to the absence of glaring class divisions, Baguio has managed to cultivate a highly educated middle class composed of talented artists, academics, professionals, and students. It also has a burgeoning civil society, composed of environmentalists and scores of progressive activists.   

While extreme economic inequality has facilitated the emergence of powerful networks of clientelism in other parts of the country, where political dynasties effectively serve as parallel state institutions, Baguio, in contrast, has the ingredients to become a bastion of vibrant local democracy anchored by an energetic middle class and a cosmopolitan culture. 

‘Modernization without development’

But as times goes by, Baguio has come to gradually resemble other urban centers in the country.  It is suffering from what leading American intellectual Francis Fukuyama calls “modernization without development.” Baguio’s economic growth and incorporation of new technology and lifestyles has gone hand in hand with the deterioration of overall living standards, growing inequality, as well as increasingly oligarchic political institutions. 

Small and chic boutiques have given way to large malls, which have dominated the city landscape – often at the expense of precious trees and space. With people’s lives increasingly pivoting around major commercial centers, the city is often paralyzed by traffic congestion and shopping mayhem. During holiday seasons, Baguio’s traffic is, quite astonishingly, even more suffocating than that of Metro Manila! 

Sometimes, it takes half an hour or more to travel a few hundred yards, as scores of cars jostle for space and negotiate Baguio’s narrow and steep alleys. While the number of automobiles and tourists has increased, the city’s infrastructure has failed to keep up. There is hardly any advanced public transportation infrastructure, while the road system has been essentially frozen in time – going back to the American era. 

Across the urban centers and beyond, the city has transformed into a construction site. Bulldozers and trucks have relentlessly shaved beautiful mountains into unpleasant real estate projects, while informal settlements have precariously expanded across the city, even in landslide-prone areas. For years, the city has also struggled with dealing with garbage disposal; there are also serious concerns over the availability of (affordable) clean water, especially as the city expands well beyond its natural capacity. 

Much of the problems of the city has to do with the inability of its political institutions to cope with growing demand for space and services. Clientelist politics is also increasingly visible in the city. Ahead of upcoming elections, local politicians have engaged in an infrastructure bonanza. Paved roads have been ruined across strategic sections of the city, exacerbating Baguio’s already notorious traffic jam. It’s not clear whether most, if not all, of these road “reconstruction” activities were even needed or wise to pursue.  

In the end, much will depend on how Baguio’s middle classes and progressive civil society groups systematically advocate for the preservation of the city’s endangered environment and mobilize in favor of more sustainable city-planning and inclusive political institutions. What is at stake is no less than the future of tens of thousands of residents of one of the country’s most beautiful cities.  – Rappler.com

The author is an assistant professor in political science at De La Salle University, and the author of “Asia’s New Battlefield: US, China, and the Struggle for the Western Pacific.” “The author’s views are strictly his own, and do not necessarily represent the institutions he is affiliated with. He can be reached jrheydarian@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter: @Richeydarian