Conflict and Community in Contemporary Sri Lanka

Contents: Introduction. I. Political economy of the conflicts: 1. Peace: Sri Lanka's impossible dream?/Bernard Swan. 2. Colonialism and national space: representations of Sri Lanka/Nihal Perera. 3. From non-news to stale news: an analysis of the global projection of Sri Lanka's ethnic conflict/V. Nithiyanandam. 4. Ethnic conflict and the state in Sri Lanka: a possible solution?/Laksiri Fernando. 5. The growth of Tamil paramilitary nationalisms: Sinhala Chauvinism and Tamil responses/Purnaka L. de Silva. 6. Internationalisation of the Tamil conflict (and its implications)/Rohan Gunaratna. II. Story of the conflicts through the narratives: 1. Reasons for violence: a preliminary ethnographic account of the LTTE/Margaret Trawick. 2. Wearing a dead man's jacket: state symbols in troubled places/Michele Ruth Gamburd. 3. Suite for Kokodicholai, Sri Lanka/Marilyn Krysl. 4. Tigers and temples: the politics of nationalist and non-modern violence in Sri Lanka/Mark P. Whitaker. 5. The changing Amman: notes on the injury of war in Eastern Sri Lanka/Patricia Lawrence. 6. Tamils and Muslims in the shadow of war: schism or continuity?/Dennis B. McGilvray. III. Costs of the conflicts: 1. Determinants of military expenditure in Sri Lanka/P. Edirisuriya. 2. The impact of the civil war on tourism and the regional economy/Jayatilleke S. Bandara. IV. The conflicts in different perspectives: 1. Conflict as a catalyst: the changing politics of the Sri Lanka Muslims/Meghan O'Sullivan. 2. Denigration of the Sinhala people/H.L.D. Mahindapala. 3. Economic liberalisation, social class and ethnicity: emerging trends and conflicts/Siri Hettige. 4. Post-independent political conflicts in Sri Lanka: elites, ethnicity, and class contradictions/Siri Gamage.

"Sri Lanka, known worldwide as the 'Pearl of the East', is today attracting adverse international attention through reports of ethnic violence and endless Guerilla warfare. This collection of essays provides a critical but humanistic perspective on the various dimensions of the on-going ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. The contributors look beyond the obvious conflict between the Tamil and Sinhalese communities and analyse why and how the ideological as well as the material construction of the ethnic conflict has become the major plank in politico-social discourse and in the mobilisation of public opinion in the country."

[Siri Gamage to Senior Lecturer in Multicultural Studies, University of New England, Australia.

I.B. Watson teaches Islamic Studies and South Asian History at the Department of History, University of New England.]