Corruption and conflict: connections and consequences in war-torn Sri Lanka

Abstract

In the transition from war to peace, one key challenge is to ensure that those who gained something from the war can be convinced to support the peace. At the same time, however, it is crucial to avoid reproducing corrupt practices and inequalities that fuelled the conflict. The problem of corruption during post-war peace-building has gained considerable attention recently, academically as well as in policy-making circles. This exploratory case study of Sri Lanka traces and problematises the complex linkages between corruption and conflict at the shift from war to peace, building on field research in Sri Lanka before and after the end of the war between the Sri Lankan government and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 2009. The article illustrates how global resource flows and politics have enabled conflict-fuelling corruption in Sri Lanka, and how local experiences of corruption feed into the popular grievances which have both caused and kept the conflict going. The end of the war has not presented a break with the corruption-conflict links of the wartime—and these connections will have implications for reconstruction and reconciliation in the country.

Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Jonathan Goodhand, Michael Schulz, Malin Nystrand and the anonymous reviewers for useful comments on earlier drafts of this article.

Notes

 1. Interview with academic, Sri Lanka, 2008.

 2. Interview with civil society representative, eastern Sri Lanka, 2006.

 3. See Rotberg, Corruption, Global Security and World Order; Le Billon, ‘Corrupting Peace?’; Pugh et al., Whose Peace?; UNDP, Fighting Corruption in Post-Conflict and Recovery Situations.

 4. Le Billon, ‘Buying Peace or Fuelling War?’; Rose-Ackerman, ‘Corruption in the Wake of Domestic National Conflict’.

 5. Pugh, ‘Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace’; Brown and Cloke, ‘Neoliberal Reform, Governance and Corruption’; ‘The Critical Business of Corruption’; Nordstrom, Global Outlaws.

 6. Needless to say, corruption and conflict are very sensitive topics and trust building and the guaranteeing of anonymity to all interviewees is crucial. The interviews took their point of departure in broader discussions of governance and development, in which matters related to corruption and the armed conflict(s) would regularly surface.

 7. Brown and Cloke, ‘The Critical Business of Corruption’.

 8. Ibid.

 9. Pugh, ‘Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace’.

10. See e.g. Nordstrom, Global Outlaws.

11. Pugh, ‘Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace’.

12. Brown and Cloke, ‘Neoliberal reform, Governance and Corruption’; ‘The Critical Business of Corruption’. See also Nordstrom, Global Outlaws.

13. Collier and Hoeffler, ’Greed and Gievances in Civil War’.

14. Gurr, Minorities at Risk.

15. Cramer, Civil War is not a Stupid Thing.

16. Korf, ‘Rethinking the Greed-Grievance Nexus’, 202.

17. Cramer, Civil War is not a Stupid Thing.

18. See e.g. Perlo-Freeman and Perdomo, ‘The Developmental Impact of Military Budgeting and Procurement’.

19. Cramer, Civil War is not a Stupid Thing.

20. Pugh, ‘Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace’.

21. Goodhand, ‘War, Peace and the Places in Between’.

22. Pugh, ‘Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace’.

23. Le Billon, ‘Buying Peace or Fuelling War’, 422.

24. Gurr, Minorities at Risk.

25. Le Billon, ‘Buying Peace or Fuelling War’.

26. Rose-Ackerman, ‘Corruption in the Wake of Domestic National Conflict’.

27. Cf. Collier and Hoeffler, ’Greed and Gievances in Civil War’.

28. The Sinhalese make up three-fourths of Sri Lanka's population of 20 million. The Tamils are divided into two groups: Sri Lankan Tamils who mainly reside in northern and eastern Sri Lanka (13 per cent) and Indian Tamils originally brought as labourers to the tea estates of central Sri Lanka by the British (5.5 per cent). Muslims make up a separate ethnic group of 7 per cent, according to figures from the last but outdated all-island Census of 1981.

29. de Silva, Reaping the Whirlwind; Wilson, Sri Lankan Tamil Nationalism.

30. Gunaratna, Sri Lanka. A Lost Revolution?

31. See Nazemroaya, Great Power Confrontation.

32. http://www.transparency.org/policy_research/surveys_indices/cpi/2009 [Accessed 4 February 2011].

33. Wijewardene, ‘The Ultimate Swindlers List’.

34. Wirithamulla, ‘Highlights of Governance Issues’, 13.

35. Wijewardene, ‘The Ultimate Swindlers List’.

36. See Spencer, A Sinhala Village in a Time of Trouble; Moore, The State and Peasant Politics.

37. Interview, academic, 2010.

38. Hettige and Bigdon, Local Governance and Conflict Management.

39. DeVotta, ‘From Civil to Soft Authoritarianism’, 335.

40. Kumara, ‘Sri Lankan Government Launches “War on the Underworld”’; Uyangoda, ‘Gangsterism: Its Political Sociology’.

41. Kumara, ‘Sri Lankan Government Launches “War on the Underworld”’.

42. Fernando, Police-Civil Relations for Good Governance.

43. Sarvananthan, ‘Post-tsunami North & East Sri Lanka’.

44. Nesiah, ‘Taxation without Representation’.

45. Centre for Policy Alternatives, A Survey on Corruption in Sri Lanka.

46. Amnesty, Twenty Years of Make-Believe.

47. See DeVotta, ‘From Civil to Soft Authoritarianism’. Between January 2006 and mid-2008, the Free Media Movement in Sri Lanka documented 16 cases of journalists and media workers being killed, 15 cases of abductions and several cases of detentions and attacks on media workers (Free Media Movement 2008). Reporters Without Borders ranked Sri Lanka 165th out of 173 countries in its 2008 Press Freedom Index—the lowest ranking of any democratic country, http://www.rsf.org/fr-classement33-2008.html [accessed 9 March 2010].

48. See International Crisis Group, Sri Lanka: A Bitter Peace.

49. ADB, Key Indicators: Sri Lanka.

50. AFP, ‘Sri Lanka Plans for Increased Defence Spending’.

51. Wirithamulla, ‘Highlights of Governance Issues 2007/2008’.

52. Wijewardene, ‘The Ultimate Swindlers List’.

53. AFP, ‘Plans for Increased Defence Spending’.

54. See International Crisis Group, Development Assistance and Conflict in Sri Lanka.

55. Hensman, ‘Why are the Vanni civilians still being held hostage’.

56. Cf. Gamburd, ‘The Economics of Enlisting’.

57. Gunasekara, ‘Social Devastation’.

58. Kumara, ‘Government launches “war on the underworld”’.

59. Orjuela, The Identity Politics of Peacebuilding.

60. Interviews, academics and civil society representatives, 2008–2009.

61. Interviews, academic and other key informants, 2008, 2009.

62. Lanka Journal, ‘Basil paid 180 million to LTTE to buy boats’; interview, academic, 2009.

63. Interview with villager in Eastern Sri Lanka, February 2009.

64. See Goodhand, ‘Stabilising a Victor's Peace’.

65. Cf. Lindberg, ‘The Changing Accessibility of Educational Opportunities’.

66. See also Gamburd, ‘The Economics of Enlisting’.

67. Interview, June 2009.

68. Interview, June 2009.

69. Spencer, A Sinhala Village in a Time of Trouble, 214.

70. Citizens Committee for Forcible Eviction of People, ‘Afraid even to say the word’, 6.

71. Interview, June 2009.

72. Cf. Rajasingham-Senanayake, ‘The Dangers of Devolution’.

73. CPA, A Survey on Corruption in Sri Lanka. These figures are likely to be underestimations, but the significant difference between ethnic groups is still noteworthy.

74. Le Billon, ‘Corrupting Peace?’.

75. Spencer, A Sinhala Village in a Time of Trouble, 219.

76. Tsunami Evaluation Coalition , 2006. Joint evaluation of the international response to the Indian Ocean tsunami.

77. See Korf et al., ‘The Gift of Disaster’.

78. Goodhand and Klem, Aid, Conflict and Peacebuilding, 59.

79. Cf. Bastian, The Politics of Foreign Aid in Sri Lanka. Donors have also been accused of supporting the LTTE's war efforts through support to the LTTE-linked Tamil Rehabilitation Organisation and the LTTE's Peace Secretariat during the 2002 peace process, as well as through LTTE ‘taxation’ of subcontractors working in guerrilla-controlled areas.

80. Wezeman, ‘Fuelling the Sri Lankan Conflict’.

81. Jeyaraj, ‘KP: LTTE's Elusive Chief Arms Procurer’.

82. Barron, ‘Four Plead Guilty in Brooklyn’.

83. House of Commons, War and Peace in Sri Lanka, 36.

84. TI, Bribe Payers Index.

85. Cf. Rose-Ackerman, ‘Corruption in the Wake of Domestic National Conflict’.

86. Bulathsinghala and Parakrama, ‘Post Conflict Challenges of Governance’.

87. Cf. Pugh, Corruption and the Political Economy of Liberal Peace.