Weena Gera is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of the Philippines Cebu. Her research projects include governance for sustainable development and urban resilience in Southeast Asia, civil society consolidation, bureaucratic representation and central-local relations in the Philippines.

Paul Hutchcroft, a professor in the Department of Political and Social Change (PSC) at the Australian National University, is a scholar of comparative and Southeast Asian politics who has written extensively on Philippine politics and political economy. He currently serves as Overall Chief Investigator of PSC’s ‘Supporting the Rules-Based Order in Southeast Asia’ (SEARBO) project. Since Hutchcroft first arrived in the Philippines in 1980, he has returned as often as possible and travelled throughout the archipelago: from Basco to Bulusan, Puerto Princesa to Catbalogan, and Zamboanga to Tandag—as well as lots of places in between.