EVERY December 30, the Philippines commemorates the martyrdom of Dr. Jose Rizal—the country’s de facto national hero. I use the term de facto because there is no law, decree, or proclamation that formally designates Jose Rizal as the national hero of the Philippines—unlike other national symbols we have that are explicitly recognized through official policy statements.
As a college lecturer since 2017, my background in political science and international relations gave me the opportunity to teach the Rizal Course. If I remember correctly, the course was assigned to me for a summer class offered by a university in the U-Belt of Manila during AY 2017–2018. Upon receiving my teaching assignment, I first checked the syllabi used by previous instructors who had been handling the course for years.
To be fully honest, I did not appreciate the course content and the pedagogical style used to teach it. I could not find any sense in why students needed to know personal details of Rizal’s private life—his family background, episodes of romance, and even his likes and dislikes. It was honestly absurd to me.
So, I reworked the syllabus. Thankfully, I had access to the UST Library at the time, particularly its rich Filipiniana section. There, I was fortunate to borrow books published by the National Historical Commission that compiled Rizal’s writings. From those collections, I selected key texts—ranging from notes, letters, poems, and essays to excerpts from his two novels—as required readings for my students.
Reflecting on that experience, my resolve to advocate for the removal of the Rizal Course in college only grew stronger. However, before I enumerate my reasons, I want to acknowledge the efforts of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) and its academic consultants to update the course content of the Rizal Course as a required general education subject.
My experience teaching Rizal took place during the transition years in Philippine higher education—before the K–12 generation fully entered university life (around 2017–2019). I was able to peek at CHED’s proposed revised course content prior to its implementation, and I was genuinely impressed—and grateful—that the updated Rizal Course draft for the K–12 generation is framed around the evolution of the idea of the Filipino nation.
If my memory serves me right, the draft also compels students to read excerpts of written accounts about pre-colonial Philippines, including the memoirs of Antonio Pigafetta and other historians—although I think a decolonial lens still needs to be injected, so we avoid a scenario where students become mere receptors of knowledge produced by foreign accounts and chronicles.
With that context in mind, here are my top three reasons why I believe it is necessary to remove the Rizal Course in college.
First, focusing on a single nationalist figure reinforces the fanaticism and the tendency of Filipinos to rely on one individual—almost as a political Messiah who will solve the country’s problems. This is very apparent in the existence of Rizalismo as a religion in the country, protected by the fundamental right to freedom of religion enshrined in the Constitution.
Second, if the goal is nation-building, Rizal—as an ilustrado—largely represents the Tagalog nation. Contrary to popular opinion, the ilustrado-led nationalist movement excluded other ethnolinguistic groups in the Philippines, such as highland communities in the north and the Muslim Moros in Mindanao. The idea of the Filipino nation, as historically articulated, can be deeply exclusive. In fact, significant sections of the Muslim population in the country reject being associated with the term “Filipino.” For more on this point, I invite you to read Filomeno Aguilar’s (2005) article, “Tracing Origins: ‘Ilustrado’ Nationalism and the Racial Science of Migration Waves.”
Lastly, there are other nationalist writings beyond Rizal. Why focus only on a single person? Other heroes—spanning from the Spanish colonial period up to the Japanese Occupation—also produced writings. I believe students should be exposed to these texts and be allowed to think for themselves: which strand of nationalist thought resonates with them, and why? It is also important to acknowledge nationalist writing after the Second World War and during the post-independence era. One thinker that immediately comes to mind is Renato Constantino, especially his essay on “The Miseducation of the Filipino,” which explores how our educational institutions have long been designed to train Filipinos to become subservient to Western interests.
The prescriptions under this third reason are no longer difficult to implement. In 2018, the University of the Philippines Diliman’s Department of Political Science published a fantastic reader titled “Twentieth Century Philippine Political Thinkers.” The project showcases the political thought of Filipino thinkers, with excerpts and commentaries for each featured figure. Included in the compilation are writings from selected postwar nationalist thinkers—Renato Constantino among them.
Here, then, is my recommendation. To be clear: I do not advocate for the removal or sidelining of Rizal. What I want is to transform the Rizal Course into a more inclusive course—one that situates Rizal within a broader, more diverse tradition of Filipino nationalist writing across the colonial and post-colonial eras. Hence, to execute this proposal, it now becomes necessary to amend or repeal Republic Act No. 1425, the law that institutionalizes the teaching of the Rizal Course for undergraduate students.
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Brian U. Doce is a practitioner-scholar with a background in politics and international relations. Aside from being a lecturer in various universities in Manila, Brian has experienced working in the space of business-government relations, policy advocacy, and diplomacy. He is currently finishing his PhD at the Indo-Pacific Research Centre of Murdoch University in Australia. You can reach out to him via his e-mail: scholarbud@gmail.com.
