Sunday Times 2
Compiling Interventions: Lessons in politics
View(s):By Uthpala Wijesuriya
When the war ended in 2009, I was six years old. It was around this time that I started school. In 2013, I did my Grade 5 Scholarship Exam, and in 2014, I moved to a new school. This coincided with a period of collapse in a regime that had come to power on the strength of its political leadership over that war.
At the time, these two events meant very little to me. Yet they were pivotal, in more ways than one, in the context of Sri Lanka’s modern history. At my new school, Royal College, Colombo, I slowly began immersing myself in subjects like politics, history, and foreign policy.
Those subjects got me involved in various clubs and societies at Royal College.
It was around this time that I heard of Dayan Jayatilleka. His reputation as perhaps the country’s foremost political analyst and political scientist, puzzled me, because his name is not mentioned in the local political science curriculum. The more I read about him, the more I wanted to read him.
Apart from his recollections, what struck me most about his writings, was how stridently he maintained a distinction between State and government: institutions that are seen as one and the same, but in reality are not.
Such distinctions helped me “read” and interpret political events in a more nuanced light. His DailyFT column shed light on various other issues, again in that nuanced way which few writers in the country could match. This is not to say that I agreed with all his arguments. But I was certainly struck by them.
In 2020, right after my O’ Levels, I got in touch with Uditha Devapriya, a political analyst who wrote on several subjects I was interested in, including history and art. Caught up in the middle of a pandemic, with nothing much to do, we engaged in discussions on various themes, and promised to each other that we would take up our interests and do something with them after my A’ Levels.
In December 2022, I received a call from Uditha ayya. He had received offers for two research projects, and had accepted both.
“One of them involves Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka,” he told me. He wanted me on board.
So in January 2023, I joined Uditha ayya as we set up camp at his house. He then told me what we were going to do. For all his newspaper and academic writings, Dr. Jayatilleka lacked a collection of his best pieces. Such a collection or anthology required an exhaustive catalogue, and meant hours and hours of combing through archive material.
Thus, every day, we went through one copy of the Lanka Guardian, Economic Review, Nethra, Counterpoint, and Tamil Times after another. All these journals are, I believe, out of print. They shed light on some of the most transformative periods in our history, on events and personalities that shaped our country. It’s safe to say I learnt more about the politics and the political history of Sri Lanka, from these journals than I ever did at school.
Within three months, we came up with something of a comprehensive catalogue. This was followed several months—and several rounds of discussion with Dr. Jayatilleka himself–later with a final selection. From more than 200 essays, we pared it down to 33, and divided them between three categories: Sri Lankan Politics, International Politics, and Personal Recollections. Brainstorming for a title, Dr. Jayatilleka came up with the best possible title anyone could have: Interventions.
For these essays are, at the end of the day, interventions, and important ones at that. Published by Neptune Publications, and launched last Friday, May 3 at the Marga Institute, the collection has something for everyone. Though not everyone will agree with every argument in it, they are all theoretically grounded. As a student of law and international relations, I see them as relevant as ever.
Combing through old journals, shortlisting articles, compiling them thematically, and supervising the final publication have all been exhausting. We can only hope that our labours have not been in vain – that we have presented to students of Sri Lankan and even global politics a book which sheds light on the present moment, on what it means for us and for the world. This is our intervention.
“Interventions: Selected Political Writings” will be available soon at leading bookstores.
For more information,
contact the publishers at
neptunelk@outlook.com,
or the editors at
uanduthoughts@gmail.com.