A study of nationalism in Sri Lanka as it developed after independence, written as a critical analysis of the social and political forces at work in the country during that period — the years that saw two insurrections in the south and a long civil war in the north.
The approach is historical as well as analytical. The book opens with a brief outline of the country's history from earliest times, giving fuller attention to the British period, in order to trace where the problems that confronted Sri Lanka at independence actually came from. The argument, in other words, treats the post-independence decades as the consequence of something older rather than as a sudden rupture.
It is written in English and will suit readers with an existing interest in South Asian politics and modern Sri Lankan history: students, researchers, and general readers who want an account of the island's communal and political conflicts that sets them in their colonial and pre-colonial context rather than describing them in isolation.
A useful title for anyone building a shelf on Sri Lankan political history, and for readers outside the country who want a local perspective on how nationalism here took the shape it did.
Browse the rest of our book collection.
