In 1900, Mindanao was a largely sparsely populated island in the Philippines especially in Davao Gulf and American companies had to recruit Japanese workers to done labor for banana and Manila hemp plantation due to scarcity of indigenous (Mandaya) population to do those and it was the impetus for the colonial government in 1920s to populate Mindanao with Visayans and some from Luzon with the process of making Mindanao majority populated by Christians. Japanese settlement in Davao Gulf was one of the reasons why Imperialist Japan conquered the Philippines to gain foothold in Southeast Asia archipelago.

What if they decided to recruit thousands of Southern Europeans (Spaniards, Italians, Portuguese, Greeks, Serbs, or Croats), Lebanese, Syrians, or Jews to populate Mindanao and assure future control of the island for the Philippines by having significant European minority in the periphery like in Santa Cruz province in Bolivia?
 
Wow! You want to see a Mindanao where the majority are descendants of intermarriage between Manobos/Mandayas and Southern Europeans?
 
Wow! You want to see a Mindanao where the majority are descendants of intermarriage between Manobos/Mandayas and Southern Europeans?

It would be interesting for our showbiz industry, if we have millions of Filipinos with pure or mixed Southern European ancestry coming from Mindanao. It would be interesting to our politics too if our periphery is heavily populated by ironically Caucasians like in Santa Cruz, Bolivia.
 
Of course, you need a reason for your average 1919-1920's European emigrants to go to the what is essentially a swat of jungle in the middle of nowhere instead of going to... Chicago? I bet you couldn't use the weather as a recruitment factor.
 
It would be interesting for our showbiz industry, if we have millions of Filipinos with pure or mixed Southern European ancestry coming from Mindanao. It would be interesting to our politics too if our periphery is heavily populated by ironically Caucasians like in Santa Cruz, Bolivia.
But honestly, how could you convince those Southern Europeans to migrate to Mindanao if there's Latin America, principally countries like Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela and Mexico.
 
Why are you interested in whitening up your own country? Are you ashamed?

Not ashamed BTW but I'm just asking a what if had Americans and later Filipino governments encourage immigrants coming from Southern Europe to populate some sparsely populated areas in the Philippines and the effects to PH politics and culture later on.

But honestly, how could you convince those Southern Europeans to migrate to Mindanao if there's Latin America, principally countries like Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela and Mexico.

Just to make American colonial administrators permissive enough to allow foreigners owning real properties and businesses anywhere in the Philippines from the start.

Of course, you need a reason for your average 1919-1920's European emigrants to go to the what is essentially a swat of jungle in the middle of nowhere instead of going to... Chicago? I bet you couldn't use the weather as a recruitment factor.

Cuba which is similar to Mindanao and Negros islands, are attractive to European (especially Spaniards) immigrants and there is no reason why the Philippines cannot attract settlers as long as property rights are assured to them. Even Manuel Quezon contemplated the plan to populate Mindanao with 1 million Jews at most but US State Department and Japanese conquest prevented that plan.
 
In 1900, Mindanao was a largely sparsely populated island in the Philippines especially in Davao Gulf and American companies had to recruit Japanese workers to done labor for banana and Manila hemp plantation due to scarcity of indigenous (Mandaya) population to do those and it was the impetus for the colonial government in 1920s to populate Mindanao with Visayans and some from Luzon with the process of making Mindanao majority populated by Christians. Japanese settlement in Davao Gulf was one of the reasons why Imperialist Japan conquered the Philippines to gain foothold in Southeast Asia archipelago.

What if they decided to recruit thousands of Southern Europeans (Spaniards, Italians, Portuguese, Greeks, Serbs, or Croats), Lebanese, Syrians, or Jews to populate Mindanao and assure future control of the island for the Philippines by having significant European minority in the periphery like in Santa Cruz province in Bolivia?

Isn´t Islam predominant(at least a larg percentage) in Mindanao ? There was quite a lot resistance against foreign powers.
 
What's the disease environment? Who's going to pay for shipping folks half way around the world when there are workers far closer? Why would an Italian rather go to the Philippines (and die of disease, possibly) than to Argentina or the US?
 
To attract Europeans, the wages would have to be high enough to attract European migrants. The cost of ocean passages had decreased with the arrival of steamships, but it is important to remember that most southern European overseas migration was overwhelmingly male, and tended to have a high rate of return. Cuba did attract nearly 700,000 Spaniards between 1902 and 1923, but 80% of these were males, and most of these were temporary agricultural workers, and many left during crash of sugar prices in 1920. Between 1882 and 1923 of the 4,262,594 people who left Spain, 3,318,343 or 78% returned. For Italy, the numbers are 63% of emigrants returned between 1902 and 1924.

The question should be what sort of occupations would have attracted European immigrants to the region? Agricultural work such as that which existed in French Algeria or Cuba did attract Spaniards seasonally, but would it not have been less expensive to attract workers from the rest of the Philippines where labour was more abundant, or even Chinese, Japanese or East Indians? Chinese or Japanese immigrants would be much more likely to use as agricultural workers, as was the case with Hawaii. Between 1878 and 1911 some 16,000 Portuguese from Madeira and the Azores arrived in the Hawaiian Islands, but even this would be a tiny minority of the country.

The Spanish migration to the Philippines was generally very small, and in 1600 there were only around 1,000 Spaniards in the archipelago and and in 1636 there were under 3,000. The high rate of mortality probably was a deterrent as around half died within their first year there. In 1864 there were 4,050 Spanish born in the Philippines, so after three centuries they were still a tiny number. In 1903 there were 4,389 Americans in the Philippines, 2,528 Spaniards and 1,117 other Europeans, there were also 21,239 Chinese. In 1918 the foreign population listed were Chinese, 44,229; Japanese, 8,294; Americans, 5,808; Spaniards, 4,032. In 1939 there were 19,300 whites listed in the census, with 7,645 Americans, 1,961 Spaniards, 761 British subjects, and 542 Germans.
 
What's the disease environment? Who's going to pay for shipping folks half way around the world when there are workers far closer? Why would an Italian rather go to the Philippines (and die of disease, possibly) than to Argentina or the US?

Mindanao has malaria but not that worse than in Sub-Saharan Africa and mountainous parts of the island (Bukidnon province) is suitable for large-scale European settlement (there are around a million inhabitants in that area today). Even Cordillera mountains in Luzon is also suitable for them. If Hawaii was able to bring 16,000 Portuguese with 200-day travel via Tierra del Fuego, why not the Philippines bring Southern Europeans with only 30-day travel via Suez Canal?
 
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