Young People, Costs of War, and Stages of Recovery

Present mobilities are shaped by past mobilities, and hence, the costs of war are imprinted on people’s bodies and minds. During the three decades of war in Sri Lanka, people lived in fear and youth were vulnerable in multiple ways.

It may be helpful to consider multiple transitions when referring to a country’s postwar development (Kasumagic 2008). UNDP (2008), for example, characterizes post-conflict countries according to their progress along a range of such transitions: ceasing hostilities and violence; signing of peace agreements; demobilization, disarmament, and reintegration; return of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs); establishing the foundations for a functioning state; initiating reconciliation and societal integration; and commencing economic recovery. In many respects, Sri Lanka could be said to be faring quite well on UNDP’s list: the country’s hostilities ceased, although violent clashes between groups that were not in the center of hostilities during the war have emerged. The Sri Lankan peace is a victor’s peace and a peace agreement has not been signed. Demobilization, disarmament, and reintegration have been a priority for the government, but this has been a secretive activity, and former LTTE cadres have been held in closed camps under strict control with little contact with their families. Return of internally displaced people is taking place, but many have not returned as some areas continue to be contested or are classified as militarily strategic territories over which the military maintains control. Refugees - mainly Tamils in diaspora numbering about a million people - are not returning voluntarily, which may be seen as an indication of the deep fear and mistrust still prevailing among large sections of the population. The Sri Lankan state is functioning and has strengthened its control over institutions in society by centralization. In order to create economic opportunities in a postwar setting (UNDP's final point), the government has initiated rapid economic and infrastruc­ture programs called ⁱⁱUthuru Wasanthaya” (Northern Spring) and “Nagenahira Navodaya” (Eastern Revival). However, the recovery process has been fraught due to differing access to resources and unequal progress in recovery (Brun and Lund 2009; Hyndman 2007; International Crisis Group 2009; Ruwanpura 2009).

For most young people living in Eastern Sri Lanka, the period immediately after the war was - and to some extent still is - characterized by a continuation of militarized political and social relations. This not only causes problems for democ­racy (Goodhand 2012) but also affects the everyday life of people. This is similar to the situation that Vigh (2009) describes for Bissau, where he uses the concept of “navigation” to describe how young urban men survive socially and physically in a conflict-stricken country. Rather than considering their situation an exceptional state (“a radical event”), he points to social turbulence as a regular, ongoing feature of everyday reality and therefore describes it as “radical continuity,” rather than “discontinuity.” In Sri Lanka, although stability is there, the continued monitoring and surveillance of young Tamil people in the former conflict areas, together with the fear it generates of speaking out in public, mean that there is both continuity and change from war to postwar. Some of those continuities are linked to a persistent insecurity and uncertainty in young people's lives. In the following sections, we show how young people navigate this terrain from war to postwar and beyond.

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