Constitutional Democracy, Press Freedom, and Human Security: Examining Violence Against Journaists in the Philippines

Abstract

Government failure in handling the protection of journalists and media teams from armed conflict to individual attacks still often occurs in Southeast Asia, especially the Philippines. Such violence raises significant concerns regarding the protection of fundamental rights and press freedom. However, the applicable lead framework depends on the context of the violence. In situations of armed conflict, journalists may receive protection under intrnational humanitarian law, while killings and attacks occuring outside armed conflict are primarily addressed thorugh international human rights law and domestic criminal law. However, journalist massacre activities still often operate to silence information regarding issues of political crimes, corruption and coups which should still be published to the global community. Using qualitative methods, this research focuses on the human security that is threatened by journalists and the media in conflict with constitutional democracy which is connected to the cultural foundations that support the violent acts that occur. Consequently, this research explains the relevance of human security integrated with the constitutional democratic system to explain the fragmentation in the Philippine government system in press freedom and constitutional democracy which is inversely proportional to the massacre of journalists