The JVP and the UNP are making angry rumblings and, accusations of LTTE-Mahinda pacts and US-Gotabaya Pacts are doing the rounds. Amidst the turmoil the APRC is making feeble attempts to ‘put out something’ by the 15th of March. Most observers of the process are cynical; the APRC is seen as an eye-wash with no real participation by the political parties and no real ability to produce even ‘some good ideas’ for a political solution.
One wonders if there is any discussion about what these ‘political solutions’ mean and how they are going to be translated into do-able practical components by the Sinhalese, Tamils and Muslims with ethnicity deeply etched into their minds. At a time when pluralism and multiculturalism seem to be bandied around it’s a good idea to delve deeper into these words and uncover the many layers. So what is multiculturalism? What does it mean for a person living in Sri Lanka? In an article titled “The Uses and Abuses of Multiculturalism†Amartya Sen discusses the concept of Multiculturalism and how it is assessed (The New Republic/ Issue date: 02.27.06). According to Sen,
One of the central issues concerns is how human beings are seen. Should they be categorized in terms of inherited traditions, particularly the inherited religion, of the community in which they happen to have been born, taking that unchosen identity to have automatic priority over other affiliations involving politics, profession, class, gender, language, literature, social involvements, and many other connections? Or should they be understood as persons with many affiliations and associations, whose relative priorities they must themselves choose (taking the responsibility that comes with reasoned choice)? Also, should we assess the fairness of multiculturalism primarily by the extent to which people from different cultural backgrounds are “left alone,” or by the extent to which their ability to make reasoned choices is positively supported by the social opportunities of education and participation in civil society? There is no way of escaping these rather foundational questions if multiculturalism is to be fairly assessed.
Sri Lankans have a propensity to look at the inherited traditions and people are seen firstly in their ethnic affiliations and secondly the religious. These become hard-core criteria and affect all other aspects from the school into which children will be accepted, the education they receive and even the profession. These criteria are dinned into the minds of children and even anecdotes are taught to children which typify people from other ethnic groups. These two affiliations take precedence over all other connectors, infact the other connectors are mostly ignored. In Sri Lanka ‘reasoned choice’ is a backward murmur.
In this context is it possible for any political solution to be pragmatically implemented in Sri Lanka? Is multiculturalism merely the ability to acknowledge the existence of diverse cultural groups? Should multiculturalism be narrowed down to mean people or groups with different cultures? Should it not be expanded to include the concept that an individual can and should have different ‘cultures’, different identities and not a perspective that is only coloured by an inherited tradition that belongs to a group?
Sri Lanka should encourage her younglings to look at the different identities that they have, to foster these so that the chasm among the ethnic identities could be minimized in the future by the bridges of gender, language, literature, social movements, political affiliations and a million other new more useful connectors.
Editors note: Link to Sen’s original article added.