Saturnino (‘Jun’) M. Borras, Jr.

Jun Borras is a political activist who has been deeply involved with autonomous rural social movements in the Philippines and internationally since the early 1980s. He was also one of the founders of the international peasant movement La Via Campesina (today’s most important transnational rural social movement) and was member of its International Coordinating Commission (ICC) from 1993 to 1996. He has also provided advice, in varying extents and capacities, to a government ministry, multilateral and bilateral development institutions, and different donor agencies. Informally and unofficially, he has worked with numerous inter/national NGOs on rural development and democratization issues. However, his main political engagement has been in assisting peasant movement organizations.

His research interests include: i) politics of agrarian reform and property rights, with special interest on comparative examination of classic state-led approaches versus market-oriented policy models, common/public (forest) lands, land registration/titling, indigenous peoples’ land rights, and women’s land rights; ii) rural social movements – peasant movements, rural workers’ associations, NGOs, rural-based political movements – including local, national and transnational networks, with special interest on how such groups have shaped and been reshaped by existing structures and institutions, especially those that relate to land; iii) state-society relations, especially those that pertain to the politics of policymaking and policy implementation of rural development and democratization programmes; iv) rural livelihoods and globalization, with special interest on how market friendly policy reforms have impacted on the lives and livelihoods of the rural poor; v) land-based conflict and violence, and vi) trans/national rural-urban livelihood linkages.

Dr.Borras is the Canada Research Chair in International Development Studies, St. Mary's University, Halifax, Nova Scotia.