Re-inventing the Idea of University: Some Reflections and Proposals
There are two reasons that motivated me to select this topic. The first is my desire to share with you my conviction that the ruling idea of university in Sri Lanka needs…
Author: Prof. Jayadeva Uyangoda
Re-Imagining Democracy in Sri Lanka
We at the BCIS began to conceptualize and plan this publication on the experience of democracy in our country at a time when the Sri Lankan people were on the verge of…
Bringing Democracy Back Through People’s Power
Sri Lanka’s politics is at the crossroads. One path opened before the people is that of re-democratisation. It comes after decades of de-democratisation carried out by different factions of the country’s political…
Proposed All Party Government: Some Critical Reflections
President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s proposal for an All Party Government (APG) seems to be in some trouble. Not unexpectedly, President Wickremesinghe’s bland, and sometimes combative, appeals have failed to inspire any particular enthusiasm…
Taking Aragalaya Ideas Seriously
The emergence of Frontline Social Party (FSP) in July as a major voice of the aragalaya (‘People’s uprising/struggle’) movement has led to many negative reactions. Searching questions are being raised and debated…
Parliament and Parliamentary Democracy in Sri Lanka: A Brief Political History
Parliament has been a theme of many political debates in Sri Lanka since the establishment of the country’s first modern parliament in 1947. The narrative of Sri Lanka’s parliament has been intertwined…
A Constitution for a Third Republic? Time to Imagine a Better Republic for Sri Lanka
The government has taken steps to draft a new constitution for Sri Lanka, which is likely to replace the existing constitution , including its recently passed 20th Amendment. Thus, a Third Republican…
A Review: Arumuga Navalar and ‘Heritage History’ Deconstructed
Ratnajeevan Hoole, 2020, London: Thesam Publications, i-xxvii, 327 pages. Professor Ratnajeevan H. Hoole’s book on Jaffna Heritage Histories is a fascinating critique of several strands of invented recent histories of Sri Lanka’s…
The 20A: A Very Wrong Approach to Constitution-Making
Photo Courtesy of Midday The proposed 20th Amendment has several major defects. One of its key faults is that its sponsors and framers have chosen a very wrong approach to constitution making.…
End to Sri Lanka’s Democracy: Shouldn’t it be Resisted?
The debate on the proposed 20th Amendment to Sri Lanka’s 1978 Constitution is gathering momentum. The proposal which has been published in the Government Gazette is indeed a constitutional bombshell, literally. Its…
A Major Shift in Sri Lanka’s Politics
The results of Sri Lanka’s parliamentary election held on Wednesday show a seismic shift in the country’s electoral map as well as the balance of political power in the new legislature. The…
The Nineteenth A: A Legacy Worth Recalling Despite its Impending Demise
Among as many as nineteen amendments introduced to the Constitution of 1978, three stand as having positively contributed to fulfilling Sri Lankan society’s democratic needs. The first is the Thirteenth Amendment. The…
A constitutional solution to the impending constitutional crisis
Photo by AP via ABC News The threefold crisis that our country faces— public health, the constitutional, and political—is exacerbating day by day. In the latest development, a number of soldiers of the…
Sri Lanka’s Presidential Election: Healing the Wounds is the New Task
Photo courtesy Star Online Sri Lanka’s eighth presidential election held last Sunday has produced an outcome that has surprised the winners, the losers as well as the observers. The most obvious, and…
A week that will shake Sri Lanka’s future
Photo by Buddhika Weerasinghe via PRI Who is winning? This seems to be the question many people these days are keen to find an answer to. Whenever this question is put to…