Abstract:
Sri Lanka has been a focus of international attention since July 1983 due to the ongoing
civil war, which has claimed over 60,000 people since it broke out. The civil war and
associated ethnic violence has not only claimed human lives, but also delayed social
advancement and economic prosperity in this island nation once regarded as a model
for a developing nation. Despite international intervention for a ‘peaceful solution’ the
country is at crossroads with an uncertain future. This paper will explore the possibility of
moving beyond the irreducible categories of ethnicity and show how other peoples have
overcome similar violent political conflicts elsewhere emphasising the possible lessons
for Sri Lanka.
When we look at intractable conflicts around the world, we often find political actors who
are entrenched in their own battles for power. This power manifests itself in a number of
ways such as, territory, voting rights, special concessions, language rights, cultural
rights, as well as several other political expressions of a struggle for power and authority.
In many cases, the struggle for power must take on an ethnic dimension in order to
ensure that the conflict is one between two distant ‘others’. Without this dimension it
might not be possible to negotiate on a type of universality and core values that bind
‘ethnicities’. In this paper we will draw out the similarities of these conflicts to some
aspects of the civil war in Sri Lanka in an attempt to provide a set of comparative political
tools for the understanding of similar conflicts around the world.
