Securing the Seas: Governance, Law and Strategy in the Philippine Maritime Domain
Jonalyn L. Villasante
24 December 2025
Introduction
The challenge of securing the Philippine maritime domain extends well beyond questions of naval capability or crisis response. As an archipelagic state whose territory, economy, and national identity are deeply maritime, the Philippines confronts a complex security environment in which strategic competition, legal governance, economic vulnerability, and institutional capacity intersect. This commentary examines Philippine maritime security through the lens of governance and strategic integration, drawing primarily on the frameworks advanced by Professor Herman Joseph S. Kraft and Dr. Jay L. Batongbacal, and situating the policy perspectives of ADG Ma. Carmina Acuña and Adm. Rommel Jude Ong within this broader conceptual architecture.
Rather than treating deterrence as an end in itself, the article argues that securing the seas requires safeguarding strategic interests—territorial, legal, economic, and political—through the alignment of strategy, law, and institutions. Maritime insecurity, in this view, is not merely the product of external coercion, but of internal fragmentation that weakens the state’s ability to govern its maritime space consistently and credibly.
Maritime Security and the Problem of State Capacity
The Philippines’ maritime vulnerability cannot be explained solely by asymmetries in military power. As Kraft argues, it is rooted in a deeper condition of “sea blindness”—a persistent tendency to treat maritime space as peripheral to national security planning. This orientation has produced structural consequences: uneven maritime presence, delayed modernization, fragmented enforcement, and weak integration among civilian and security institutions.
Recent tensions in the West Philippine Sea have intensified attention to maritime security, yet responses often remain episodic and incident-driven. Such reactions may manage immediate crises, but they do little to address the underlying governance deficits that enable gray-zone coercion to succeed. From Kraft’s perspective, the central issue is state capacity: the ability to sustain strategic intent, institutional coordination, and policy continuity over time.
Strategy Beyond Crisis: Deterrence as a Governance Function
Kraft’s contribution reframes deterrence not as a matter of force parity, but as a function of governance. The Comprehensive Archipelagic Defense Concept (CADC) emphasizes sustained maritime presence, selective modernization, and alliance partnerships as mutually reinforcing elements of a credible defense posture. Crucially, CADC assumes institutions capable of coordination, signaling, and endurance—features that cannot be improvised during crises.
This framework challenges conventional debates that frame deterrence in binary terms of assertiveness versus restraint. The more consequential question, Kraft suggests, is whether the Philippine state can act predictably and coherently, thereby shaping adversarial calculations over time. Without institutional continuity, deterrence risks becoming symbolic, undermining both credibility and strategic leverage.
Law as the Infrastructure of Maritime Governance
While Kraft interrogates strategy, Batongbacal grounds maritime security in law and governance. He clarifies that the Philippines’ principal challenge is no longer legal entitlement. Through the harmonization of domestic law with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea—most notably via the Philippine Maritime Zones Act and the Philippine Archipelagic Sea Lanes Act—the legal foundations of Philippine maritime rights have been substantially consolidated.
Yet Batongbacal cautions that legal clarity does not automatically translate into effective governance. Authority over the maritime domain is dispersed across overlapping regimes governing fisheries, energy, environmental protection, navigation, and local autonomy. This institutional fragmentation weakens enforcement, dilutes accountability, and creates governance gaps that external actors can exploit.
The critical distinction, in Batongbacal’s analysis, is between legal sovereignty and administrative control. Maritime insecurity persists not because the state lacks rights, but because it struggles to exercise those rights consistently across agencies and jurisdictions.
Strategic Competition and the Safeguarding of Interests
The policy interventions of Acuña and Ong illuminate how these structural weaknesses are tested under contemporary strategic competition. Acuña underscores that China’s persistent use of illegal, coercive, aggressive, and deceptive (ICAD) activities in the West Philippine Sea places sustained pressure on the Philippine state—not only to deter coercion, but to protect the credibility of governance and alliances. Deterrence, in her framing, must be integrated with diplomacy, civilian coordination, and institutional coherence to safeguard strategic interests beyond immediate security incidents.
Ong extends this analysis by unpacking China’s multi-dimensional strategy, which combines hard power at sea with sharp power tactics aimed at influencing domestic institutions, economic decision-making, and public perception. Through alliance-splitting, economic inducements, propaganda, and psychological pressure—illustrated by cases such as Scarborough Shoal and Reed Bank—China seeks long-term strategic advantage rather than immediate territorial conquest.
Against this backdrop, Ong’s call for a denial strategy highlights the importance of preventing adversaries from achieving political, economic, and psychological gains. Denial, however, depends less on escalation dominance than on the state’s capacity to enforce law, protect economic lifelines, and maintain institutional resilience.
Securing the Seas as a Governance Project
Taken together, the arguments of Kraft and Batongbacal, complemented by the policy insights of Acuña and Ong, point to a common conclusion: securing the seas is fundamentally a governance project. Deterrence, law enforcement, economic protection, and alliance management are not discrete tasks, but interdependent functions of state capacity.
Maritime insecurity arises when strategy outpaces institutions, when law lacks administrative backing, and when policy coherence breaks down across agencies and political cycles. Conversely, safeguarding strategic interests requires integrating defense planning, legal governance, economic stewardship, and legislative oversight into a durable framework capable of withstanding sustained external pressure.
Conclusion
Securing the Philippine maritime domain demands more than episodic responses or narrow security measures. It requires a deliberate architecture that aligns strategy, law, and governance in the service of national interests. Legislative priorities such as a Blue Economy Law, a Foreign Interference Law, sustained Philippine Coast Guard modernization, and the fiscalization of the security and defense sectors reflect this integrated approach, linking maritime security to economic resilience, legal authority, and institutional continuity.
Ultimately, safeguarding the seas is not only about resisting coercion but about strengthening the state’s capacity to govern its maritime space with consistency and credibility. In an era of persistent gray-zone pressure and strategic competition, the Philippine maritime domain will be secured not by deterrence alone, but by the coherence and resilience of the institutions that sustain it.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the positions of the House of Representatives, the Senate of the Philippines, or the Development Academy of the Philippines.
