Beyond the Post-Colonial
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unable to grasp the meaning of this event through their own frameworks, and were interested in reproducing the state’s monopoly on violence, all “national” political parties, both Super Powers, and the regional powers, supported the government’s effort in crushing the rebellion. The prelude to these struggles was the politicization of the university. The boycotting of classes and conflicts in the universities, led by left wing student unions, were common in the late 1960s. Rising unemployment during this period, and insecurity about the future caused by this, is arguably the main cause for increasing student willingness to risk their immediate goal of graduation for longer term political objectives. By the early 1970s, JVP activism had expanded this locus of youth political struggles to include the state-run high school system. Although universities acted as nodes, the most intense JVP uprising took place in the coastal areas between Ambalangoda and Tangalla, and in Kalutara and Kegalla Districts, all of which were rural. (figure 6.1) Tamil separatist movements also moved their base further away from the university to the larger and more rural Jaffna peninsular. These struggles were more dispersed and territorial-based, but waged against a power source centralized in cities. Up to the 1970s, it was the SLFP that largely represented the rural masses and Sinhalese nationalist sentiments. Despite the politicization of rural areas after independence, and the mass participation of rural voters in elections, villagers were not able to use their electoral power to place on the national political agenda issues which directly and deeply influenced their material welfare.18 Nor did the main political parties, which gained their votes, attempt to mobilize these masses or organize them behind a common set of “agrarian” demands. This is evident in the rural base that the JVP was able to construct for itself. Although the JVP itself was not victorious, the 1971 uprising rocked the entire political establishment; it also drew them to the rural areas to negotiate power relations which were supposedly centered upon Colombo. First, it destablized the integrity of the state, making the government in Colombo send troops to negotiate the conflict. This was a crucial turning point in the socialization of violence, once monopolized by the colonial state and later disguised by the post-colonial propagation of the idea that there can be no revolution in a Buddhist country where people are inherently non-violent. Secondly, the uprise drew the attention of the central government to rural areas. The acceleration of rural transformations, particularly land reforms of the 1970s, was largely the government’s reaction to this situation. These, however, did not address the concerns of rural youth, expressed in these uprisings, which was largely the incapacity to leave the poverty of the village, a knowledge and aspiration diffused by W estern, urban-centric education. The struggle was, therefore, not over a land problem, and, despite its rural base, the JVP had no “agrarian program.” 19 The JVP itself had no objective in transforming the national society and space, but creating a place for the youth within it. This was more evident in JVP activism in the 1980s, in which isolated attacks were primarily targeted on regional and local rural leaders of the ruling UNP, instead of on the central state. Their principal