Keshini Ratnayake
Analytic Paper: Sri Lanka
POL 1500 - section 1
February 8th, 1999
Background Characteristics
To understand why the civil war is happening today, it is important to have a basic knowledge of Sri Lanka's foundation: its history and geography. Sri Lanka's history dates back to 500 B.C., when a group of people now known as the Sinhalese arrived from India. Their prince, Vijaya, conquered the inhabitants and established a new kingdom (Lerner 19). In 300 B.C., Buddhism was introduced into the Sinhalese culture by the son of an Indian Emperor. This religion was adopted by the king as Sri Lanka's official religion (Lerner 20). Around the same time, Tamils from South India started migrating to Sri Lanka, where their Hindu faith came into conflict with Buddhism. The Sinhalese kings tried to stop the Tamils from settling, unable to overlook their religious and cultural differences (Lerner 22). These kings also established a monarchy rule, granting themselves complete power of Sri Lanka's people. The Sinhalese monarchs ruled for many years, until the 1000's when Tamils captured the capital and established their Hindu religion. However, this only lasted for a few years, and control of the country was won back by the Sinhalese (Lerner 24).
Small civil wars between the two groups began as the Tamils set up their kingdom on the Jafna Peninsula. However, these wars came to a halt in the 15th century when the Portuguese arrived and tried to destroy all religions in Sri Lanka. Control was then taken over by the Dutch, and finally by the British for the 17th and 18th centuries (Lerner 27). Britain gave Sri Lanka its original name, Ceylon, and established it as a colony. They held Sri Lanka under their power until 1948, when the people were finally granted full independence (Lerner 31).
Knowledge of Sri Lanka's geography is also very important to its understanding. Sri Lanka is a small island country, located just off the coast of Southern India. Its small size, 25,332 square miles, makes it easy for larger nations to conquer (Lerner 9). Sri Lanka has been desired by powerful nations due to its lush hillsides, which have proved perfect for growing tea, as well as its many naturally grown spices (Lerner 10).
Social and Economic Cleavages
Sri Lanka's history of conflicts between the Tamils and Sinhalese are directly connected to its social and economic cleavages. As Chandrika Ratnayake stated in my personal interview with her, the main social and economic cleavages stem from the differences between the two major ethnic groups. The first group is the Sinhalese, which comprise about 74 percent of the total population (The Economist 41). The Sinhalese are the descendants of the Indo-Aryans from North India. The majority of the Sinhalese people are Buddhists, with a small percentage of Christians as well. They divide themselves into two groups: the High lands and the Low country. Isolation from European influences has resulted in a politically and socially conservative attitude among the High landers. However, the Low country Sinhalese, who have been exposed to many new cultures arriving on the coast, tend to have a broader outlook on current issues in Sri Lanka (Lerner 39). This ethnic group is united by their language, Sinhalese, which is the key difference that has fueled a 14 year long civil war with the Tamils.
The Tamils are the other major ethnic group in Sri Lanka, although they comprise only eighteen percent of the population. Descendants of the Dravidian civilization in South India, the Tamils are distinguished by their Hindu religion and Tamil language. Two-thirds of them are Sri Lankan Tamils who tend to be involved in trade and business. The other one-third are Indian Tamils who usually work on tea estates (Wijesinha 9). However, like the Sinhalese, the Tamils are also united by their language. Hostilities between these two ethnic groups have led to racial riots from the 1950's to the 1980's.
Another cleavage that can be considered both economic and social is the caste system, which is still very much alive in Sri Lanka today. As Ratnayake described, the poor peasants as well as their children usually work as servants for wealthier families. People from the lower class are considered to be absolutely unsuitable marriage partners by the middle and upper classes. Any inter-class marriage or relationship is looked down on or else forbidden by the upper class member's family. Although this is a major cleavage, I choose not to discuss it further as it is not relevant to the civil war that I will be focusing on.
Political Cleavages
Sri Lanka's social cleavages between its two major ethnic groups have directly impacted the political cleavages in the government. They begin with a deadly division between the Tamils and the Sinhalese, mainly based on the difference in language. As Rohan Gunaratna stated in his book Sri Lanka: A lost Revolution?, the Tamils have been struggling to make northeastern Sri Lanka a separate nation, where they can live independently with their own language and Hindu customs. In the past, the Sinhalese have passed laws that have led to Tamil oppression in language, education, and employment. This has drastically affected Tamil participation in government - there is little or no representation for them in Parliament (Lerner 34). The Sinhalese continue to push away the Tamils in an attempt to keep their majority strong. According to Rohan Gunaratna, in his book Indian Intervention in Sri Lanka, the Tamils have formed 36 different interest groups, all fighting for an independent nation and to overthrow the Sinhalese government.
It is also important to be informed about the different political parties in Sri Lanka. The Tamil Tiger group as a whole, is officially known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and led by Velupillai Prabhakaran. Their major political party is the Tamil United Liberation Front, also known as TULF (Gunaratna, Indian 10). The Sinhalese have two major political parties representing them. The first is the People's Alliance, which is currently in power with their leader and President, Mrs. Chandrika Kumaratunga (The Economist 39). Then second party is the United National Party, with their leader Ranil Wickramasinge. (Who is my Dad's cousin!) Another less powerful Sinhalese political party is the Sri Lanka Freedom Party, who would like to establish Sinhalese as the national language, but also allow Tamils to have their language in the North (Gunaratna, A Lost 45). One final party, which picked up seven seats in the current Parliament, is the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress.
Political Institutions
The Political institutions in Sri Lanka are directly related to its political cleavages. Conflicts can be seen as the Sinhalese try to exercise power over the Tamils through laws, practices, and legal bodies. First, it is important to understand the way the Sri Lankan government is set up. Officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka has a democratic republic form of government. The President, who is directly elected every six years, appoints the Prime Minister and Cabinet, and also has the power to dismiss Parliament. The Legislature consists of a unicameral Parliament with 225 members, directly elected through proportional representation. Finally, the Judiciary branch consists of a Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, High Court, District Court, Magistrate's Court, and Primary Court. All of the court Justices are appointed by the President which presents an interesting situation (Lerner 37). For the most part, the President has total control over the justice system. She can appoint whomever she wants to - in this case she can exclude Tamils from the system. These are good examples of social cleavages being connected to the political institutions of a country.
In 1983, the TULF boycotted the Legislature because they refused to take a constitutional oath barring citizens from encouraging the establishment of a separate state. Since then, there has been very limited Tamil representation in Parliament. The current Parliament has a total of five representatives out of 225 members.
The Tamil minority in government can be felt and seen through some of the policies and laws that the Sinhalese have passed. The Citizenship Act of 1948 made over 900,000 people unable to obtain citizenship. It denied these people the right to participate in local and national elections, deprived them of employment opportunities, and the right to purchase land. The overwhelming majority of the people affected by this act were Tamils, in what was assumed to be a Sinhalese tactic to keep control of the government (Lerner 33).
The "Sinhala Only" Act made Sinhalese the official language throughout the country, from businesses to government to stores. Thousands of Tamils were forced to either learn the language or quit their jobs (Gunaratna, A Lost 117).
The standardization of university policy prevented many Tamils from entering universities and other means of higher education (Uchiyama 45). The policies and laws that the Sinhalese have made clearly illustrate how social and economic cleavages can lead to political cleavages between two different political parties. This in turn leads to the government: which group gets elected and what laws are passed.
Political Issues
The interconnection among the background characteristics, social and economic cleavages, political cleavages, and political institutions, have all been combined to produce the political issues that Sri Lanka is facing today.
The first issue is of course the civil war that Sri Lanka has been battling over the years. The Tamils maintain that they should have the right to set up their own nation in the north and east of Sri Lanka, while the Sinhalese have not given up trying to control the entire island. Peace talks, negotiations, and contracts have been made, but each attempt has been unsuccessful.
One of President Kumaratunga's proposals is to transform Sri Lanka into a union of regions (similar to the Lander of Germany), which has been supported by politicians all over Sri Lanka. In fact, in January of 1995 she signed a truce with the Tamils, which was violated 100 days later with the massacre of 42 unarmed Sinhalese villagers (Chanakya 4). Nothing seems to work. Under the control of Prabhakaran, the Tamils have murdered Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi, Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa, and the opposition presidential candidate Gamini Dissanayake. Many feel that the elimination of Mr. Prabhakaran himself would end the civil war (Chanakya 5). Bomb after bomb has gone off in Colombo, the center of Sri Lankan politics and government (Albright 6).
Another issue that is going on right now in Sri Lanka is the censorship rule that is threatening its democracy. On June 5th, 1998, the Sri Lankan government ordered full, strict, censorship of all reports relating to the civil war. Local and international coverage of the war has been prohibited, as well as any discussion by the media of police and military actions. All photographs, reports, and videotapes must be passed by the military censor, army general Jaliya Nammuni. The censorship rule has been condemned by many different interest groups, including the US NGO Forum on Sri Lanka, a non partisan network of organizations in the U.S. working for human rights and peace in Sri Lanka. A letter from the Forum was sent to President Kumaratunga, pleading with her to reconsider the new censorship rule (Young 2).
The United Nations has recently been called into the war in Sri Lanka to examine the discrimination of minorities (the Tamils.) In fact, a UN sub-commission was set up in August of 1993 to handle the issue (Lanka Outlook 9).
From reading through magazines and newspapers from Sri Lanka, it is obvious that mainly all the issues that the country is facing are connected to the war. This war has been the focus of Sri Lankan life for over a decade. Meanwhile, Sri Lanka maintains its third world status and thousands of its people continue to live in poverty. In fact, one third of Sri Lanka's budget is allocated for the war effort.
Why is Sri Lanka having these troubles? Why can't they work through their differences? I feel that it is because the two groups refuse to cooperate with each other. They keep breaking negotiations and compromises. They seem to think that the only way to end this conflict is to kill the other group.
Clearly there are deep interconnections among the five aspects of the analytic framework in Sri Lanka today. I have illustrated how each aspect leads into the next. Hopefully Sri Lankans will be able to turn their many cleavages into constructive differences, before the whole nation falls apart.
Works Cited
1. Albright, Madeleine. "Tamil Tiger Terrorists Truck Bomb Colombo." Lanka Outlook Autumn 1997: 4-6.
2. Chanakya. "Peace Strategy." Lanka Outlook Summer 1997: 4-7.
3. "Civil War Without End." The Economist December 1997: 54. Searchbank. Online. Netscape. 22 Dec. 1998.
4. Gunaratna, Rohan. Indian Intervention in Sri Lanka. Colombo: Gunaratne Offset, 1993.
5. Gunaratna, Rohan. Sri Lanka - A Lost Revolution?. Kandy: Institute of Fundamental Studies 1990.
6. Lerner, Harry J., et al. Sri Lanka...In Pictures. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, 1989.
7. xx. Personal Interview. 27 Dec. 1998.
8. "Road of Blood: Sri Lanka." The Economist October 1998: 39. Searchbank. Online. Netscape. 22 Dec. 1998.
9. "Sri Lanka's Unhappy Birthday." The Economist February 1998: 41. Searchbank. Online. Netscape. 22.Dec. 1998.
10. Uchiyama, Akira. Sri Lanka. Colombo: Kodansha International LTD, 1973.
11. Wijesinha, Rajiva. Civil Strife in Sri Lanka. Colombo: McCallum Books LTD, 1995.
Telephone: (xxx) xxx-xxxx
Date: xx
Time: xx
1. What makes you knowledgeable about Sri Lanka?
-I was born and raised there. I lived there for 20 years and have gone back home several times since then.
2. What is the civil war in Sri Lanka all about?
-The war is between the Sinhala people and the Tamils. It is mainly being fought over the language difference between the two groups.
3. How long has the war been going on?
-The war has been going on for over ten years, but there has always been conflict and tension between the two groups.
4. What kind of tension and conflict?
-Well, a Sinhala person would never marry a Tamil person. It would be looked down upon and the marriage would suffer.
5. Would you say that the Caste System is still alive in Sri Lanka today?
-Oh yes, very much so. The poor people serve as servants to the wealthier. Marriages between castes is pretty much forbidden.
6. What kinds of tactics have the Tamils used against the Sinhalese?
-Bombs. Lots of bombs. They even put one in Central Bank, where xx used to work. If he hadn't been here (in the United States) when it happened, he would have died. He worked right inside the building.
7. Do you think this war is going to end anytime soon?
-I don't know. It's hard to say. Every time they have peace talks, nothing gets solved. I think it's senseless, the way these people keep killing each other. Sri Lanka is not the home I once knew.