Available online 21 November 2022, 102929

Author links open overlay panelAbstract

This article argues that local constructions of risky and safe spaces, as articulated by the notions ‘loob’ (inside) and ‘labas’ (outside), informed popular and political responses to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines, leading to an overemphasis on staying at home and, conversely, a general avoidance or fear of outdoor spaces that was at times reinforced by public health authorities. Practices and policies related to the pandemic response rendered this binary opposition between ‘loob’ and ‘labas’ visible, from regulations concerning the use of personal protective equipment to restrictions of access to outdoor spaces. While this emergent form of bodily proxemics was contested and negotiated over time, its tenacity throughout the pandemic underscores the importance of understanding how people spatialize risk in times of health crises.

Section snippetsBackground

On 11 April 2021, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte was seen jogging, golfing, and motorbiking while wearing a face mask and eye protection on the grounds of Malacañang Palace, his official residence (Go, 2021). The photos and videos came after he had disappeared from public view for over a week, amid rumors of his ill health. The following day, Duterte appeared at a meeting place in Malacañang before the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF), which oversees the country's COVID-19 pandemic

‘Loob’ and ‘labas’

If writing about the enforcement of a new ‘social distance’ in the Philippines were our sole contribution, then this article would be superfluous; one need only produce a picture of the country's Secretary of Health, measuring stick in hand, inspecting outdoor marketplaces to see if distancing protocols were being followed—the same protocols, it must be said, recommended by the World Health Organization (2020) at the start of the pandemic (Malasig, 2021). Our intervention in this article,

Embodied—but negotiable—spaces

Our findings show how ‘loob’ and ‘labas’ are embodied spaces (Low, 2003) that tap into Filipino concepts of sociality pioneered by the psychologist Virgilio Enriquez, where based on the depth and frequency of interaction, people are perceived across a spectrum bookended by ‘ibang tao’ (outsider) and ‘hindi ibang tao’ (one of us) (see Pe-Pua and Protacio-Marcelino, 2000). As demonstrated earlier, ‘loob’ is associated with spaces of intimacy and familiarity—those occupied by ‘hindi ibang tao’,

Conclusion

This article offers the case study of the Philippines to show how local conceptions of space, grounded in understandings of contagion and vulnerability, informed conceptions of risk during the pandemic. While the country's pandemic response was likely shaped by ‘mental models of reality’ forged by decades of scientific orthodoxy (see Greenhalgh 2021), as well as by medical populist policies that favored the dramatized, disciplinary spectacle of face shields, checkpoints, and other modes of

Funding statement

The authors received no funding for this work.

Uncited References

Covar, 2015, Department of Education& Department of Health, 2021, Office of the SecretaryDepartment of Health, 2020, Pasig City sets up sanitation tents outside, 2020, Team and Manderson, 2020.

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge Dr. Glenn L. Diaz for providing the photograph that appears as Fig. 1.

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