Institute of Social Order

The Institute of Social Order (ISO) is a Jesuit Social Apostolate established in 1947 through the efforts of Fr. Walter Hogan, SJ in concretizing Church Social Teachings. This resulted in ISO’s rich history of responding to the needs and promoting the liberation of the marginalized sectors in society, including the laborers, the peasants, the urban poor, rural women, the youth, the victims of the tragic Mt. Pinatubo eruption, upland farmers and currently the fisherfolks.

Today the ISO is implementing Community Based Coastal Resources Management (CB-CRM) to empower fishing communities along San Miguel Bay in the Bicol Region and Lamon Bay in Quezon. The ISO assists in the protection and sustainable management of their coastal resources, namely fish stocks, coral reefs and mangrove forests. CB-CRM incorporates ISO’s current strategies, which adopt integrated, community and value based approaches in partnership with the government and other development-oriented organizations. ISO implements this through community organizing, capacity building, resource rehabilitation and protection and livelihood development, among others.

ISO also assists in the advocacy of policies that are geared towards sustainable resources management and that favor the fishers as well. This is done through participatory research which is a grassroots approach to research and seeks to involve the community more in this process thereby increasing their capability to manage these resources. ISO’s advocacy work also extends to the general public by making them aware of and generating support for marine resource protection.

The Institute of Social Order envisions a society that upholds human dignity, sharing and democracy as embodied in the principles of faith-justice, inculturation dialogue reflected in the GC 34 documents of Society of Jesus, the Gospel and the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church.

The ISO is committed to the pursuit of the following:  

• The empowerment of the poor and the marginalized sectors of the Philippine Society.
• The transformation of unjust structures of power in the country through the promotion of a participatory, equitable, gender sensitive and at the same time sustainable development process.

The ISO is dedicated to the pursuit of the following:  

• The education and training of local communities in the fields of social change, human development and management development.
• The organization of communities for livelihood and income generating projects as well as productive employment.
• The provision of assistance to local communities in the areas of social research, organization and technology development.

Contact Information

ISO Complex
Ateneo de Manila University Campus
Katipunan Road, Loyola Hts., Q.C.
Tel No. : 426-6001 local 4829/ 426-6134