Political violence in Sri Lanka is not a unique phenomenon. It is a prevalent tendency in many countries of the Third World. Sri Lanka, since 1971, has experienced a sharp escalation of political violence which renders it suitable as a case study of insurgency and guerrilla warfare in developing countries. The author's major thrust is a comparative review the causes, patterns, and implications of the leftwing Insurrection of 1971 and the Tamil guerrilla warfare up to the Indo-Sri Lanka Accord in June 1987. This thesis highlights the salient socio-economic and political factors, underscoring the view that ethnicity is the impetus behind the continuing turmoil in Sri Lankan society. The author's main hypotheses are that the Insurrection of 1971 as well as the subsequent Tamil guerrilla warfare were pre-planned and well-organised, and that the politically violent organisations in Sri Lanka were mainly a result of the emergence of new social forces which came about due to socio-economic and political transformations. The analysis begins with a review of the theories of political violence. Of these theories Huntington's theory of modernisation relates more closely to the origin of the political violence movement in Sri Lanka. The awakening of the earliest guerrilla group, the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (J. V. P. ), in 1971 lay deeply rooted in socio-economic and political factors. The emergence of the Tamil guerrilla organisations stemmed from the long-standing competition between the Sinhala majority and the minority Tamils for limited socio-economic resources and exclusive political powers. The study shows that the socio-economic background of the leaders and members were diverse and often paradoxical, if not at odds to the groups' goals. The ethno-nationalist ideologies, strategies and tactics of the guerrilla organisations, instiled group consciousness and goaded otherwise ordinary citizens to commit political violence. The pattern of political violence in Sri Lanka was a highly emotive expression of anti-establishment and secessionist convictions on the part of the guerrillas. Finally, the study proposes politico-economic reforms rather than military options to cope with the problem of political violence in Sri Lanka.

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This thesis is an ethnographic study of middlemen and business families in a commercial town in central Sri Lanka. What I present is based on almost two years of ethnographic fieldwork, in which I followed entrepreneurial families as they started and developed various businesses, built new homes, found suitors for their children, extended their networks of effective social relations, and campaigned for political office. At the heart of the town, and at the centre of the project, is Sri Lanka’s largest wholesale vegetable market. Through an exploration of vegetable selling, I examine various types of work that transcend the boundaries of the market itself: the work of kinship within business families, in particular dealing with extending families and the task of producing new homes, the work of belonging and status among merchants, and the work of politics in a merchant town. These themes are explored in three ethnographic settings – in the households of business families, at work in the vegetable market, and at social and political gatherings. My account of the activities of merchants and merchant families in Dambulla engages and builds upon a body of anthropological literature on the production of kinship, class, and politics in Sri Lanka against the backdrop of a much broader set of social transformations that have shaped Sri Lanka’s tumultuous post-colonial modernity; notably the war and development, economic and agrarian change, and Sinhala-Buddhist nationalism. The thesis provides new empirical data from ethnographic research into under researched areas of Sri Lankan social and cultural life, such as everyday domesticity and male sociality, as well as life and work in a small town in rural Sri Lanka. The ethnographic material also draws on theories from economic anthropology and economic sociology in its analysis. While some of the bigger questions in the thesis address identity and belonging among merchants, as well as the cultural implications of material change; throughout the thesis I also explore what goes on in houses, which relationships matter, how hierarchies are maintained and circumvented, how people make deals, leverage influence, protest, pursue strategies to get ahead, and transpose local issues onto broader political spheres. This, I argue, is the work that goes into the making of the merchant middle class.

This thesis examines the impact of e-Business in the B2B segment of the Supply Chain between UK retailers and Sri Lankan manufacturers in the apparel sector. The literature review explored four interrelated themes, two of them informed by an exploratory study. Research collating these four themes is scarce, especially in the apparel sector although there is considerable research on supply chain management and information sharing, which adopts a quantitative approach. However, there is a relative lack of qualitative research into behavioural issues. Based on the literature review, 12 main research questions were formulated. Following a qualitative, approach respondents in five Sri Lankan apparel manufacturers were interviewed in an explanatory study comprised of 35 interviews. An innate analytical framework consisting of themes, attributes and categories (TAC) was developed for data analysis. A conceptual model incorporating three category combinations was developed, disclosing internal, external and holistic reasons for ICT implementation. Analysis of the findings suggests that, more than speed of delivery, visibility of information is the main benefit facilitated by new ICT, compared with traditional methods. The findings indicate that security is the main concern and the main barrier is remote plant location for conducting e-Business. The data indicate that 80 per cent of investigated companies do not have an appropriate level of ICT capability. Moreover, a manufacturer’s communication capability and information sharing are mainly decided by the dependency on the lead firm. Manufacturers that deal with multiple lead firms experience compatibility problems due to the lack of a hybrid system. Manufacturers also need to set realistic expectations for a communication system and employee motivation should be included in the evaluation criteria. In conclusion, building a few longer-term relationships, including an information sharing policy is considered crucial for achieving the true potential of e-Business.

University of Technology Sydney. Institute of Sustainable Futures. / Sanitation in rapidly growing cities of developing Asian countries is a complex problem that often appears intractable and unyielding to standard problem-solving approaches. In this thesis, I provide a conceptual foundation aligned with sustainability to provide fresh guidance towards resolving this problem. I frame urban sanitation in developing Asian countries as a ‘messy’ planning-related problem, characterised by associations with multiple perspectives, key uncertainties and conflicting interests. In recognition that ‘messy’ problems cannot be confined within traditional disciplinary boundaries, the research uses transdisciplinarity as a guiding principle and methodology. It explores how new processes and complex systems ideas relevant for ‘messy’ problems can be applied to resolving urban sanitation. To ground the work in a real context, much of this work is explicated with reference to Colombo, Sri Lanka. My research highlights the role of dominant perspectives and worldviews in the organisation of sanitation practice. A review of sanitation history exposes changing paradigms, and the potential for developing Asian countries to move to radically different practices aligned with sustainability. I demonstrate that conceptions of costs and cost recovery for sanitation depend on perspective, by comparing how neoclassical economics’, ecological economics’ and Buddhist economics’ perspectives indicate different approaches to these, with different alignments with sustainability. By arguing that these perspectives are complementary rather than mutually exclusive, I integrate them to propose necessary principles for sustainable sanitation, namely, that: arrangements for sanitation should emphasise cooperation between stakeholders; efficiency goals should include entropy considerations; society as a whole should live within its means; and ethics and ‘goodness’ should underpin decision processes and choices. The thesis proposes a framework for participation to support decision-makers in resolving problematic sanitation. This supports the principle of cooperation between stakeholders, and the sustainability discourse’s emphasis of democracy and participation in decisions that affect them. It is a learning process based on soft systems methodology, bringing participants with specialist knowledge, stakeholder interests and broader societal values into dialogue that is explicitly designed to be deliberative, that can lead to a path to resolving the problem. Finally, I explore how ethics and ‘goodness’ can be woven into the provision of sanitation services, particularly with private sector actors who can potentially play a key role. I propose that their representation as metaphorical persons within current legal structures be extended so their behaviour is guided by a moral framework like real people in society. I propose that Buddhist economics can provide such a framework, raising expectations of behaviour grounded in ethics and goodness.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of deregulation on financial market efficiency in Sri Lanka. The concept of efficiency used here is due to Fama (1970) who defines an efficient market as one in which prices fully reflect all available information. Given the significant expansion of Sri Lanka???s financial markets in the post deregulation period, efficiency is investigated in the context of these markets. To this end, the study employs a number of standard tests for market efficiency including; the expectations hypothesis of the term structure, the Fisher hypothesis, uncovered interest parity, speculative efficiency, real interest rate equalization and tests of capital mobility. Although the overall results presented in this study suggest that Sri Lanka???s financial markets are not fully efficient, the evidence provides significant insight to the performance of these markets. The main policy lesson to be learnt from this analysis is that financial deregulation will not automatically promote market efficiency unless accompanied by positive policy action to reinforce the impact of these reforms. In conclusion therefore, the study makes a number of recommendations which could help to reinforce the impact of financial deregulation on market efficiency.

This thesis deals with the question of people's participation in rural development in Sri Lanka with specific reference to the district of Anuradhapura. When we consider people's participation in rural development it is essential to understand the meanings attached to the concepts of development, rural development, participation and decentralization. Therefore, Chapter 2 of this thesis concentrates on these concepts. The nature and degree of people's participation depends in great part on the socio-economic and cultural aspects of the people who live in the region or the area. Therefore, Chapter 3 deals with the significance of the rural sector in Sri Lanka and investigates income levels, nutritional status and employment, the village society, and the socio-cultural patterns of Sri Lanka. This chapter especially considers the socio-economic and cultural situation which effects people's participation in Sri Lanka. The importance of rural development is discussed in Chapter 4. This chapter explains the scope of rural development in Sri Lanka. In this case the chapter concentrates on the history of rural development, decentralization, and integrated rural development programmes. Also it describes the organizations which already exist in the rural sector in Sri Lanka. Chapter 5 discusses Anuradhapura district as a case study and it mainly deals with the situation and basic features, such as agriculture, economy, population, education and labour force. Also, it describes the administrative structure of the district with special attention to political structure, Kachcheri and divisions, other departments and the Buddhists temple. Institutional capacity and effective participation in Anuradhapura district is discussed in Chapter 6 in order to analyse the effectiveness of organizations in the district. To achieve this objective Chapter 6 discusses the integrated rural development project in Anuradhapura district and the reasons for people's non-participation in it. The thesis concludes that people's participation is an essential ingredient of successful rural development in Sri Lanka but there are a number of constraints. Some recommendations to promote the people's participation are given in the conclusion.

<p>This thesis is based on material gathered during a field study in rural Sri Lanka, a Minor Field Study, (MFS) during April-May 2007. The core of the thesis deals with conceptualisations of empowerment and how they can be interpreted contextually from the perspectives of motherhood. The interplay of gender discourses with structural dimensions are analysed to see how these work to uphold ideals whilst posing contrary demands on mothers. Part of the focus has thus been to look at how discourses are adhered, aligned and adjusted to in various ways as strategies for survival in the context of poverty and marginalisation. The way social constructions perpetuate asymmetrical power relations as natural and normative is also discussed since this is central to how gender discourses are produced, upheld and reproduced. This study initiates in the every day experiences of mothers living in absolute poverty. Through narratives and participatory observations of their daily experiences contextual discourses, structural dimensions and agency are analysed. Their experiences are viewed as interconnected with the wider perspectives of political, economic and social conditions locally and globally. Analysis of these experiences against contextual discourses and structural implications attempts to identify possibilities and potential for empowerment. By raising central issues to the mothers regarding segregation, marginalisation and vulnerability, a more contextual understanding of how empowerment is constrained and facilitated is hopefully achieved. Furthermore, how women in this study respond and relate to these issues and whether empowering experiences can be traced even where overt challenges are absent. Finally, the thesis addresses the complexity of carrying out a study of this kind, where the prerogative to define and conceptualise lies with the researcher, the beholder, representing through this very role inequity in the division of power and privilege.</p>

This thesis is based on material gathered during a field study in rural Sri Lanka, a Minor Field Study, (MFS) during April-May 2007. The core of the thesis deals with conceptualisations of empowerment and how they can be interpreted contextually from the perspectives of motherhood. The interplay of gender discourses with structural dimensions are analysed to see how these work to uphold ideals whilst posing contrary demands on mothers. Part of the focus has thus been to look at how discourses are adhered, aligned and adjusted to in various ways as strategies for survival in the context of poverty and marginalisation. The way social constructions perpetuate asymmetrical power relations as natural and normative is also discussed since this is central to how gender discourses are produced, upheld and reproduced. This study initiates in the every day experiences of mothers living in absolute poverty. Through narratives and participatory observations of their daily experiences contextual discourses, structural dimensions and agency are analysed. Their experiences are viewed as interconnected with the wider perspectives of political, economic and social conditions locally and globally. Analysis of these experiences against contextual discourses and structural implications attempts to identify possibilities and potential for empowerment. By raising central issues to the mothers regarding segregation, marginalisation and vulnerability, a more contextual understanding of how empowerment is constrained and facilitated is hopefully achieved. Furthermore, how women in this study respond and relate to these issues and whether empowering experiences can be traced even where overt challenges are absent. Finally, the thesis addresses the complexity of carrying out a study of this kind, where the prerogative to define and conceptualise lies with the researcher, the beholder, representing through this very role inequity in the division of power and privilege.

Bachelor's thesis. / Format: PDF. Bibl.