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Religion, Conflict and Boundary Politics in Sri Lanka

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Abstract

Boundaries have always been central to the dynamics of armed conflicts. Wars involve the activation and hardening of certain boundaries, thus dividing friend from foe. But despite the efforts of political potentates to carve out clearly delineated impermeable boundaries, people continue to travel across and sometimes challenge these boundaries. In this article, we study the boundary crossing practices of religious actors in eastern Sri Lanka, a multi-ethnic and multi-religious context affected by protracted war and a tsunami. We discuss two case studies, one on local conflict mediation activities and another on post-tsunami humanitarian work, to examine how religious actors engage with boundaries. We find that paradoxically, religious actors derive their ability to intervene in politically controversial issues because of their perceived distance from the ‘dirty’ world of politics. But conversely their religious and institutional identities are threatened when they become too visibly enmeshed in everyday politics.

Les frontières ont toujours été centrales à la dynamique des conflits armés. Les guerres impliquent inévitablement l’ouverture et le blocage de certaines frontières, afin d’établir une division claire entre ami et ennemi. En dépit les nombreux efforts des potentats du monde destinés à établir des frontières clairement tracées et imperméables, celles-ci continuent néanmoins à être traversées, et sont même souvent contestées. Cet article se penche sur les pratiques transfrontalières des acteurs religieux au Sri Lanka oriental, un contexte multi-ethnique et multi-religieux affecté par une guerre prolongée et un tsunami. Nous développons deux études de cas, une portant sur des processus de médiation locale et l’autre sur le travail humanitaire post-tsunami, afin d’examiner comment les frontières affectent les acteurs religieux impliqués dans ces activités. Nous trouvons paradoxalement que la capacité d’intervention des acteurs religieux par rapport aux questions politiques controversées découle de leur distance vis-à-vis du monde « sale » de la politique, mais que leurs identités religieuses et institutionnelles sont menacées quand ils sont trop visiblement mêlés à la politique quotidienne.

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Notes

  1. We understand political entrepreneurs as opportunistic political players who seek to gain benefits and further their political career by providing public goods and patronage to members of their constituency. For further elaboration see Tilly (2003, p. 34).

  2. Timmo Gaasbeek is presently working on more detailed analyses of such processes in relation to the 2003 Muthur riots.

  3. Other sources of funding came from a diaspora group called the Batticaloa Development Society and support from Germany and Canada, directed to IROP via the Bishop. Following the tsunami, they received funding from some international NGOs, as well as support to implement livelihood programmes from Jesuit Relief Services.

  4. Muslim religious leader, interviewed on 14 October 2008, Batticaloa.

  5. Member of IROP, interviewed on 23 September 2008, Batticaloa.

  6. Catholic priest, interviewed on 4 October 2008, Batticaloa.

  7. Part of the empirical material discussed in this section was used elsewhere to analyze and scrutinize the notion of gift (Korf et al, 2010). The analytical angle is obviously different.

  8. We draw here from fieldwork done by Shahul Hasbullah. A more detailed discussion of this case can be found in Hasbullah and Korf (2009).

  9. We draw from the empirical material concerning EHED's work in Maruthamunai from more recent research by Shahul Hasbullah.

  10. Beneficiary of Smyrna's housing programme, interviewed on 15 April 2008, Akkaraipattu.

  11. EHED aid worker, interviewed on 16 April 2008, Kalmunai.

  12. Boundary crossing and transgression in the private sphere may follow very different dynamics, for example in inter-ethnic marriages, a theme, we could not adequately address in this article. We thank Timmo Gaasbeek who pointed this out to us.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Shahul Hasbullah, who was part of the field research team on which this article is built. We partly draw on some of his field material in this article. We also thank Jonathan Spencer, Tudor Silva and Timmo Gaasbeek for ongoing discussions and two anonymous reviewers and the participants of the workshop on ‘Conflict community and Faith: The Politics of Public Action in Sri Lanka’ in Edinburgh, 12–13 March 2009 for useful comments and suggestions on previous versions of the article. Jonathan Spencer provided some particularly thoughtful comments that helped clarify the conceptual focus of the article. Support in the fieldwork by Mr Faleel Haque, Mr Gunapalan and Mr Suresh is gratefully acknowledged. Field work was funded by the Non-Governmental Public Action Programme (NGPA) of the British Economic and Social Science Research Council (ESRC, grant no. RES-155-25-0096). Field work and research time were funded by the Non-Governmental Public Action Programme (NGPA) of the British Economic and Social Science Research Council (ESRC, grant no. RES-155-25-0096) and the Swiss National Science Foundation (grant no. PDFMP1-123181/1).

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Goodhand, J., Klem, B. & Korf, B. Religion, Conflict and Boundary Politics in Sri Lanka. Eur J Dev Res 21, 679–698 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1057/ejdr.2009.41

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