S.J. Chelvanayakam was one of the most prominent leaders of the Ceylon Tamils before and after the end of colonial rule, and in the early days of their struggle for political and economic equality. The author, who knew Chelvanayakam intimately, analyzes in this work his career and his symbiotic relationship with the Ceylon Tamils, which led eventually to the emergence and reinforcing of a defensive Ceylon Tamil nationalism.
Then in 1947, on the eve of Ceylon becoming independent under a Sinhala-dominated government, he entered Parliament with the aim of protecting the threatened interests of the Tamil minority.
Through a succession of key stages since Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon) became independent in 1948, its Tamil minority, historically concentrated in the north and east but with an important segment in Colombo, became alienated from the Sinhalese majority and, after peaceful opposition failed to secure its rights, resorted to an armed struggle. The Tamil Tigers (LTTE) today appear to hold the key to their people’s future. While they have suffered setbacks, including the loss of the Tamil capital, Jaffna, they remain a potent guerrilla force, able to strike with impunity at both military and civilian targets. The Tigers’ grip on the Tamil population seems secure, as does their overseas support and funding from Tamil exiles in Britain, Canada, and Australia. This book offers a concise history of the Sri Lankan Tamil nation, its culture, social make-up, and political evolution. In a final chapter, A. J. V. Chandrakanthan gives a first-hand account of life and attitudes inside the embattled Tamil areas today. A. Jeyaratnam Wilson teaches in the Department of Political Science at the University of New Brunswick. He is the author of The Break-Up of Sri Lanka and S. J. V. Chelvanayakam and the Crisis of Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism. A. J. V. Chandrakanthan teaches in the Department of Theology at Concordia University, Montreal.
Within the larger context of bitter ethnic strife in Sri Lanka, this timely volume assembles a multidisciplinary group of scholars to explore the central issue of Tamil identity in this South Asian country. Bringing historical, sociological, political, and geographical perspectives to bear on the subject, the contributors analyze various aspects of
Exploring the conflict management trajectories of Northern Ireland and Sri Lanka, this book engages in a discussion that highlights the importance of ‘decolonising’ approaches to peacebuilding and conflict management in deeply divided societies. Existing knowledge on the topic is largely produced in the Western academy, using global North-centric approaches. This book, written by a researcher from the global South who navigates the political life of a deeply divided society in Western Europe, begins a conversation on a new, 21st century re-conceptualization of ethno-national conflict in deeply divided societies, based on a paradigm of decolonising. This book will appeal to policymakers and practitioners in peacebuilding and related areas worldwide, and students of peace and conflict studies, as well as a general readership with an interest in decolonial approaches to world politics.
What is leadership, and why is it so important? In what ways does it look very different in different contexts, and in what ways does it look the same? Malcolm Murfett brings together a range of emerging and established scholars to examine these questions in light of some of the mid-twentieth century’s most intriguing national leaders. In a series of striking biographical chapters, lessons are drawn from the apartheid era in South Africa, Lee’s remarkable socio-economic transformation of Singapore, Castro’s revolutionary overhauling of Cuba, and the playing out of Bandaranaike’s populist agenda in Sri Lanka. The book illuminates what Brezhnev and Nixon were looking for in the Cold War and what happened when the people turned against Nyerere in Tanzania, the Shah in Iran, and Ceauşescu in Romania. These case studies address what leadership meant for the individuals whose record in power is being examined. These are not idealised portraits of ‘how to do leadership’ but warts-and-all portrayals of exceptional individuals who scrabbled their way to the top and stayed there for several years during a period of great change. Business schools have long studied the theoretical axioms of corporate leadership. What this book does, however, is to move beyond the theory into the practical realm of politics and statecraft. This is a fascinating book on leadership that will be of interest for students, researchers, and practitioners studying leadership in business and politics, as well as for students of global history, decolonisation, and the Cold War.
This book examines the intersecting forces of nationalism, terrorism, and patriotism that normalize an acceptance of the global war on terror as essential to maintaining freedom and democracy as defined by white nation-states. Readers are introduced to speculative ethnography: an experimental methodology that bends time and space through the practice of avant-garde poetics. This study conceptualizes terrorism as a place of colonial encounters between soldiers, insurgents, civilians, and leaders of nation-states. The tactics of suicide bombings employed by the Tamil nationalist movement, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, are juxtaposed with drone strikes in asymmetric warfare where violence becomes a means of dialogue. Each chapter weaves seemingly disparate narratives from multiple experiences and sites of war, inviting readers to witness the condition of getting lost in that willful attachment to killing and being killed in service of patriotic pride and national belonging.
Although many scholars have studied terrorism, few scholars have ever studied terrorism from the aspect of its initial origins in social movements. Not only is research concerning this phenomenon outdated, but there has also been no consensus as to what causes terrorism. Many contemporary terrorist organizations were once social movements that formed for a specific purpose using nonviolent tactics to accomplish their agenda. Eventually, terrorist tactics became the method of choice for these once peaceful social movements. Volatile Social Movements and the Origins of Terrorism: The Radicalization of Change, by Christine Sixta Rinehart, focuses on why this transition occurred; why did a peaceful social movement transition to a terrorist organization? The case studies in this book include the Muslim Brotherhood, the ETA, the FARC, and the LTTE. The study focuses on the individual characteristics, group dynamics, and external forces that caused social movements to use terrorist tactics. It is ascertained who made the decision to use terrorism, and why and how that person or group of people ascended to a leadership position within the social movement. After the (person) people, time, and place are found pertaining to the first decision to use terrorism, Sixta Rinehart examines why terrorism became an attractive option for each social movement. Volatile Social Movements and the Origins of Terrorism asks a necessary question for scholars and researchers in counterterrorism and international policy: Under what conditions do social movements resort to the use of terrorist tactics?
An introduction to Sri Lanka's geography, people, early history, foreign rule, independence, and modern history is followed by a dictionary covering the people, places, and events that have shaped the country. Includes a detailed chronology, statistical tables, graphs, appendices, and a detailed bibliography. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
