Racing to develop

Over at Lanka Libertarian there is a bit of discussion about the social vs economic development. Sometime ago while discussing Sri Lanka with a family friend who was involved in and led a development organization for most of his life expressed the view that the problems were caused by the social development of the country outpacing economic development. I made a mental note though I wasn’t convinced of this as the causal factor.

The more plausible argument seems to be that the problems faced by Sri Lanka are multi-causal and economic development (the lack of it) was one of the causes. Particularly amongst the educated and meritorious youth who were frustrated by the lack of opportunities for advancement.

Anyway, while googling for a book on SL the new big-brother suggested a link to this paper titled Economic Roots of Political Conflict: The Case of Sri Lanka (pdf) by Sirimal Abeyratne. The Abstract reads,

The escalation of political conflicts in many developing countries and their impact on economic development have been topical issues in recent development literature. The overwhelming emphasis on 'ethnic conflicts' in the literature has, however, precluded analysts from looking at political conflicts beyond their ethnic dimension, in the wider context of the development process. In particular, because of the preoccupation with ethnic roots as the prime source of these conflicts, reverse causation, running from economic policy to political conflict, has been virtually ignored in the debate. The purpose of this paper is to fill this gap through an in-depth case study of the 'twin political conflict' in Sri Lanka - the Tamil separatist war in the North and the Sinhala youth uprising in the South - with emphasis on its economic roots. The findings suggest that fundamental contradictions in the national development policy in the restrictive trade regime of Sri Lanka were at the heart of the country's twin political conflict.[paper (pdf)]

For an academic paper in economics its a surprisingly easy read. I recommend reading it, better yet print it out and keep it under the pillow and read a page or two each night before falling a sleep. More south-asian economics info at ASARC.