Victor's memory: Sri Lanka's post-war memoryscape in comparative perspective
Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
How are victims of civil wars and conflicts remembered in the context of an illiberal peace? When a violent conflict is ended by the use of overwhelming state force, without benefit of a political process, the victors may seek to control the ways in which the violence is memorialised; while in a war where the insurgents remain in the shadows, public recognition of their losses may be impossible. Using Thailand as a comparison, this study compares the configuration of conflict memorialisation in Sri Lanka, focusing on two Tamil communities where Catholic priests played important roles: Vankalei and Mullivaikkal. In both cases, the Sri Lankan military saw memorialisation as a threat to national narratives about the rights and wrongs of the conflict. Yet in neither case have local people addressed the human rights abuses committed by the LTTE: their narratives emphasise victimhood and evade discussion of agency. Memorials dedicated to those who perished during civil conflicts are likely to be one-sided. Accordingly, the paper argues that an illiberal peace poses particular challenges for historical memory and memorialisation
Original language | English |
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Journal | Conflict, Security & Development |
Volume | 20 |
Issue number | 1 |
Pages (from-to) | 97-113 |
ISSN | 1467-8802 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2 Jan 2020 |
- Sri Lanka, Thailand, memorialisation, conflict, memory, illiberal peace
Research areas
ID: 243546246