Channelling ethnicity through electoral reform in Sri Lanka

Commonwealth and Comparative Politics

Volumn 43, Issue 1, 2005, Pages 34-60

  Shastri, Amita ^a  

^a SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

CONFLICT MANAGEMENT; ELECTORAL SYSTEM; ETHNIC CONFLICT; ETHNIC MINORITY;

ASIA; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; EURASIA; SOUTH ASIA; SRI LANKA; WORLD;

EID: 20644455753     PISSN: 14662043     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/14662040500054362     Document Type: Article

References (46)

1. See Pippa Norris, Electoral Engineering (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004), ch.9.
2. For instance, Bernard Grofman and Arend Lijphart (eds.), Electoral Laws and their Political Consequences (New York: Agathon Press, 1986);
3. and Arend Lijphart, Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in Thirty-Six Countries (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999).
4. Donald L Horowitz, A Democratic South Africa? Constitutional Engineering in a Divided Society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991);
5. and Benjamin Reilly, Democracy in Divided Societies: Electoral Engineering for Conflict Management (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001).
6. The usual pattern of outbidding has consisted of two major parties or blocs trying to mobilise the votes of members of two different ethnic groups. In contrast, the Sri Lankan pattern has consisted of the two major parties seeking to outbid each other for the support of the largest ethnic group (the Sinhalese forming 74% of the population) to the detriment of the next largest ethnic group (the Sri Lanka Tamils forming 12% of the population).
7. For details, see James Manor (ed.), Sri Lanka: In Change and Crisis (London: Croom Helm, 1984);
8. W.A. Wiswa Warnapala and L. Dias Hewagama, Recent Politics in Sri Lanka: The Presidential Election and the Referendum of 1982 (New Delhi: Navrang, 1983);
9. Sri Lanka, Report of'the Commissioner of Elections on the Second Presidential Election of Sri Lanka held on 19th December 1988 (Colombo: Sessional Paper No.4, 1993);
10. and Sri Lanka, Report of the Commissioner of Elections of the Ninth Parliamentary General Election held on 15th February 1989 (Colombo: Sessional Paper No. 1, 1993).
11. Even during this time, the results were constrained by irregularities in the elections in the war zone of the north-east. Despite this, I have included the electoral figures for the north-east in the analysis, because these developments do not seem to have impacted on the ethnic composition of the candidates and MPs chosen for these districts. Each party constructed its party lists for each district in accordance with its particular orientation towards the ethnic composition of the population in the constituency (as it existed in 1981) and the ethnic issue as a whole. The 1981 census figures have been used in this analysis as that was the last complete census done across the island.
12. A. Jeyaratnam Wilson, The Gaullist System in Asia: The Constitution of Sri Lanka (1978) (London: Macmillan, 1980), 43-4, 86-96.
13. Article 94 (1) in Sri Lanka, Constitution of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, 1978.
14. Article 62. In a complex formulation, 36 seats were distributed territorially, four to each of the nine provinces, across the island and 160 on the basis of the population island-wide. The total number of registered voters for an election (based on the register of the previous June) would be divided by 160, yielding the 'qualifying number of electors'. Each district would be entitled to one member of parliament for each qualifying number of electors in its population. Districts with the largest remainder of voters would be allotted any remaining seats to be distributed.
15. Articles 95, 96, 98 and 99. The actual number of seats won by a party was determined in the following manner. After deducting the number of valid votes polled by parties or groups who got less than five % of the votes, the remaining total number of valid votes would be divided by the number of seats allocated to the electoral district minus one (for the bonus seat). This figure would constitute the 'relevant number'. Valid votes won by each party would be divided by this relevant number to determine how many seats it had won in a district.
16. J.R. Jayewardene, Selected Speeches and Writings, 1944-1978 (Colombo: H.W. Cave, 1979), 143-4, 149.
17. Ibid., 149.
18. Ibid.;
19. and Sri Lanka, Report of the Select Committee on the Revision of the Constitution (Colombo: Parliamentary Series No.14, 1978), 143.
20. See also A. Shastri, 'Electoral Competition and Minority Alienation in a Plurality System: Sri Lanka 1947-1977', Electoral Studies (Oxford), 10/4 (1991), 326-47;
21. and S. Bastian, 'The Political Economy of Electoral Reform: Proportional Representation in Sri Lanka', in S. Bastian and R. Luckham (eds.), Can Democracy be Designed? (London: Zed Books, 2003), 196-219.
22. Wilson, Gaullist System in Asia, 17-21.
23. Shastri, 'Electoral Competition and Minority Alienation', 332-3.
24. C.R. de Silva, 'Proportional Representation in Sri Lanka', Seminar on Universal Adult Franchise, Sri Lanka Foundation Institute, Colombo, 17 and 18 July 1981, 11.
25. Also published in K.M. de Silva (ed.), Universal Suffrage, 1931-1981: The Sri Lankan Experience (Colombo, 1981).
26. A. Shastri, 'Estate Tamils, the Ceylon Citizenship Act of 1948, and Sri Lankan Politics', Contemporary South Asia (UK), 8/1 (March 1999), 65-86.
27. Preliminary conclusion based on an analysis of the uncertified 1994 candidate lists available.
28. C. Baxter et al., Government and Politics in South Asia (Boulder, CO: Westview, 5th edn. 2002), 355.
29. C.R. de Silva, 'The Elections of 1994 in Sri Lanka: Background and Analysis', The Round Table (London), 334 (June 1995), 207-17.
30. Reilly, Democracy in Divided Societies, 119, 124.
31. Note 3 above. As correctly pointed out by Jon Fraenkel, 'The Alternative Vote System in Fiji: Electoral Engineering or Ballot-Rigging?', Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 39/1 (July 2001), 6.
32. Former Upcountry Tamil Member of Parliament P.P. Devaraj, interview with author, Colombo, 27 June 2003.
33. Election Commissioner Dayananda Dissanaike, interview with author, Colombo, 4 June 2003.
34. I b i d.
35. C.R. de Silva, 'The System of Proportional Representation in Sri Lanka: A Critique', in C. Amaratunga (ed.), Ideas for Constitutional Reform (Colombo: Council for Liberal Democracy, 1989), 212.
36. Devaraj, interview, 27 June 2003.
37. For instance, Devaraj lamented, 'Minorities have got fragmented by the electoral system. If they are united they can bargain more effectively. If divided, then it is to no purpose. Concentration on development to their areas suffers'. Interview, 27 June 2003.
38. These were overtly expressed in the support given to the two major parties by moderate elements of the community living in the south-west. Others supported the moderate party seeking to represent Sri Lankan Tamil interests, the TULF. Younger ex-militant members of the community supported the EPDP, PLOTE and EPRLF, who opposed the LTTE and chose to work through more independent non-violent means, often as allies of the PA, the major party which explicitly favoured regional autonomy within a united Sri Lanka as a solution to the ethnic problem. Other smaller, less clearly defined groups based in the north-east, like TELO, chose to work as political allies and mouthpieces of the separatist and militant LTTE.
39. Moderate Muslims based in Colombo and, to a lesser extent, those based in the EP had always supported the major parties in the centre. Individuals like Shahul Hameed in the UNP and Mohammad Fowzie in the PA remained consistent in their loyalties. They were, however, challenged and pressurised by the more independent stand expressed by the SLMC, led by M.H.M. Ashraff, which favoured more regional powers for the Muslim population in the EP. After Ashraff's death in a helicopter crash in 2000, a leadership struggle ensued between his widow, Ferial Ashraff, who remained allied to the PA, and Rauff Hakeem who sought to play a more independent role (vis-à-vis the major parties) to retain Ashraff's political mantle and leadership of the SLMC. Hakeem subsequently faced factionalism in his segment of the SLMC led by A.L.M. Athaullah, and strategically shifted support from the PA to the UNP before the parliamentary elections of 2001, a position he could reverse at an opportune time.
40. Thondaman's grandson, Arumugam Thondaman, retained the leadership of the CWC, but was far less forceful. His rival, Chandrasekharan, had already joined the PA, and P.P. Devaraj joined the UNP.
41. De Silva, 'System of Proportional Representation in Sri Lanka - A Critique', 213-14.
42. The SLMC and the non-EPDP Tamil parties have done this in each election since 1994. The JVP did so in the 2001 election. On the latter election, see Neil Devotta, 'Sri Lanka's Political Decay: Analysing the October 2000 and December 2001 Parliamentary Elections', Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 41/2 (July 2003), 115-42.
43. S.T. Hettige, Voter Aspirations in Sri Lanka: Conclusions for a Pre-election Survey (September 25-30, 2000) (Colombo: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Publication 45, 2000), 3-4, 39-42.
44. View expressed to me explicitly or implicitly be several public activists, often of the majority community, in summer 2003.
45. The SLMC proposals advocated a lower cut-off point to allow for more Muslim candidates to gain representation (Dissanaike, interview, 4 June 2003; and Devaraj, interview, 27 June 2003). Devaraj expressed a keen desire to explore alternative electoral arrangements which would provide more explicit representation for minority groups - perhaps through ethnic quotas or separate electorates - an idea which found little favour elsewhere besides some segments of Eastern province Muslims (interview, 27 June 2003).
46. Josep M. Colomer, 'It's Parties that Choose Electoral Systems (or Duverger's Laws Upside Down)', Paper presented at the American Political Science Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, 28-31 Aug. 2003.