By all accounts the Philippines were always like this. Lapu Lapu if memory serves was feuding with others before the Conquistadors came, and Spanish rule was marked by constant feuding as it had been before them. American rule the same.

The ONLY WAY (and Wretchard hints at it here) for Filipinos to stop being Filipino (that is violent feuders) is for Filipinos to stop being well, Filipino. Become an acculturated diaspora never strong enough in numbers to bring the culture of the Philippines over.

The Philippines have gifted mankind with some great cuisine, some awful cuisine, very deadly martial arts, and amazing accounts of human bravery. However, like my Scots and Irish ancestors they are stuck in feuding mode and absent a conqueror simply eradicating 90% of their culture or diaspora, they will never change. If Ireland (which was as feud driven as the Philippines, only a lot colder and with even worse food and cooking) could not be other than what it was (a very colorful failure) it is folly to expect anything out of the Philippines or its people.

You can tell a lot about the character of a people by their martial arts (or lack of it). A nation (Scotland until conquest, the Philippines now) that uses a weapons-based system to produce fighters as quickly as possible, using humble tools, is not one that will be ever given to peace or prosperity.

[I agree with Wretchard on Singapore vs. Uganda. It is also of course a reflection on Ugandan people that their nation is a total failure, by all measures that mean anything and can be in fact, measured.]