Youth employment and post-war development in Jaffna, northern Sri Lanka

Abstract

Jaffna District in northern Sri Lanka has recently emerged from three decades of violence and isolation, leading to a diverse array of political, social and economic issues. This article critically analyses the links between youth employment and the post-war reconstruction and development of this region. Unemployment among youth is regarded as a potential threat to the stability of the country during the post-war period, and it is argued that only through the active engagement of Sri Lanka’s youth population can the threat of a resurgence in violence be fully eliminated. The article, which is based on recent field research, examines the extent of youth unemployment within Jaffna District, and considers how government, non-government and community-based actors are working together to solve related problems.

Keywords:

• Development
• post-war
• youth employment
• civil war
• Jaffna District
• Sri Lanka

Acknowledgements

Thanks to the Ron Lister Trust for their Research Grant which assisted in the completion of this project.

Notes

1. Izzi, ‘Just Keeping Them Busy?’.

2. UNDP Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka: National Human Development Report.

3. Of the three main ethnic groups (Sinhalese, Tamil, Moors), Sinhalese constitute 74.9 per cent, Tamils equal 16 per cent (separated into two groups: Sri Lankan Tamils, long-settled descendants from south-eastern India; and Indian Tamils (Plantation Tamils), who were brought to Sri Lanka during the British colonial period, 1818–1947), and Sri Lankan Moors equate to eight per cent (Government of Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka Census).

4. Government of Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka Labour Force Survey.

5. Wilson, Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism.

6. Key Informant 6, Focus Group, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 27 February 2015.

7. Pratap, Island of Blood.

8. Roberts, Confrontations in Sri Lanka.

9. Harrison, Still Counting the Dead.

10. Ratnapalan, ‘Memories of Ethnic Violence’.

11. Key Informant 1, Interview, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 24 February 2015.

12. Ratnapalan, ‘Memories of Ethnic Violence’.

13. Selvadurai and Smith, ‘Black Tigers, Bronze Lotus’.

14. Sánchez-Cacicedo, Building States, Building Peace.

15. Uyangoda, ‘Sri Lanka in 2009’.

16. Frerks, ‘The Use of Peace Conditionalities’.

17. Smith, Towards a Strategic Framework.

18. Uyangoda, ‘Sri Lanka in 2009’.

19. Frerks, ‘The Use of Peace Conditionalities’.

20. Downs and Stedman, ‘Evaluation Issues in Peace Implementation’; Collier et al., ‘Post-War Risks’.

21. Athukorala, Sri Lanka’s Post-War Development Challenge.

22. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment.

23. Gough et al., ‘Youth Employment in a Globalising World’.

24. Izzi, ‘Just Keeping Them Busy?’, 106.

25. Urdal, ‘The Devil in the Demographics’.

26. Amarasuriya et al., Re-thinking the Nexus.

27. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment.

28. Urdal, ‘The Devil in the Demographics’.

29. Gunatilaka, Informal Employment in Sri Lanka.

30. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment.

31. Ibid.

32. Thangarajah, ‘Youth Conflict and Social Transformation’.

33. Amarasuriya, ‘Discrimination and Social Exclusion’.

34. Izzi, ‘Just Keeping Them Busy?’.

35. Ibid.

36. Gough et al., ‘Youth Employment in a Globalising World’, 95.

37. Izzi, ‘Just Keeping Them Busy?’.

38. DeVotta, ‘Sri Lanka’s Ongoing Shift’, 1.

39. Wijerathna et al., Beyond the Millennium Development Goals.

40. Uyangoda, ‘Sri Lanka in 2009’.

41. Husain et al., ‘Prevalence of War-Related Mental Health Conditions’.

42. Brun, ‘Finding a Place’; and Mathur, Resettling Displaced People.

43. Mac Ginty and Williams, Conflict and Development.

44. Key Informant 20, Interview, Jaffna, 16 March 2015.

45. Herz and Van Rens, Structural Unemployment; and Diamond, ‘Cyclical Unemployment, Structural Unemployment’.

46. Venezia and Jaeger, ‘Transitions from High School to College’; and US Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Outlook Handbook.

47. Key Informant 6, Focus Group, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 27 February 2015.

48. Fearon and Laitin, ‘Sons of the Soil’.

49. Jones, ‘Diaspora Identification and Long-Distance Nationalism’; and Brun and Van Hear, ‘Between the Local and the Diasporic’.

50. Interview, Jaffna, 5 March 2015.

51. Amarasuriya et al., Re-thinking the Nexus.

52. Interview, Jaffna, 5 March 2015.

53. Ibid.

54. Vodopivec and Withanachchi, ‘School-to-Work Transition’.

55. UNDP Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka: National Human Development Report.

56. Key Informant 6, Focus Group, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 27 February 2015.

57. Key Informant 21, Interview, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 24 March 2015.

58. Kamgnia and Murinde, ‘Employment Creation for Youth in Africa’.

59. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment.

60. Key Informant 7, Interview, Jaffna, 28 February 2015.

61. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment.

62. Key Informant 9, Interview, Jaffna, 5 March 2015.

63. Key Informant 30, Interview, Jaffna, 20 March 2015.

64. Filmer and Fox, Youth Employment in Sub-Saharan Africa.

65. Schweitzer, ‘Overcoming War’.

66. Amarasuriya et al., Re-thinking the Nexus.

67. Key Informant 10 (VisionFund), Interview, Jaffna, 1 March 2015.

68. Amarasuriya et al., Re-thinking the Nexus.

69. Gunatilaka et al., The Challenge of Youth Employment in Sri Lanka.

70. Wickramasinghe, Sri Lanka in the Modern Age.

71. DeVotta, ‘Sri Lanka’s Ongoing Shift’.

72. Cooray, ‘Ethnic or Political Fractionalisation?’.

73. Key Informant 32, Interview, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 29 March 2015.

74. Dissanayake, ‘China’s Strategic Presence in Sri Lanka’.

75. Cooray, ‘Ethnic or Political Fractionalisation?’.

76. Ibid.

77. Tortajada and Biswas, ‘Sri Lanka, India and China’.

78. Rao, ‘The Caste System’.

79. Ibid.

80. Key Informant 30, Interview, Jaffna, 20 March 2015.

81. Key Informant 6, Focus Group, University of Jaffna, Jaffna, 27 February 2015.

82. Rao, ‘The Caste System’.

83. Key Informant 18, Interview, Jaffna, 22 March 2015.