Penetrative analysis of a burgeoning political party

Sri Lanka Freedom Party

A Political Profile

Author: Prof. Wiswa Warnapala

423 pp. Price Rs. 1750

Review: U. E. Perera

POLITICS: Sri Lankan political parties, both major and minor parties, including those parties with narrow regional agendas, have not been studied with a view to highlighting and understanding the pressures under which they function today.

Nearly four decades ago, Calvin Woodward studied the Sri Lankan party system, and several individual parties have been studied and has found that they belong to the parties of the Marxist creed.

Prof. Wiswa Warnapala, who is a recognised academic with an international reputation, has undertaken this study on the Sri Lanka Freedom Party with which he has had an active relationship for more than 35 years.

It was this close association and his close access to the party leadership which motivated him to research into the story of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party. Its role, both in Opposition and Government, in the last fifty years has been extensively studied and this study, from the point of view of its research and documentation, is a pioneering piece of research.

Political parties are instruments of change and modernization; they are active agents of political mobilization.

Their role has a special significance in a third world political setting. Numerous writers have provided theoretical postulates on the role of modern political parties, and Prof. Warnapala, with his wide knowledge on those theoretical expositions, has mastered the ideas of Robert Michels, Maurice Duverger, Giovanni Sartori, Ostrogorski and W.J.M. Mackenzie who have studied this political party as a major agent of political change.

This study about the Sri Lanka Freedom Party has been injected with the ideas of those theorists whose explanations have had some influence on Prof. Warnapala's analysis of the role and expansion of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party as the leading democratic political party of Sri Lanka with an equally powerful popular political foundation.

Dominant party

David Apter, another theorist of repute, once stated that new nations tend to have either a great many parties or a single dominant party. Congress Party of India, at one stage, was the single dominant party which brought into existence the single dominant party system, and it was because of this fact that it, for many years, owed its existence to the all-powerful nationalist movement.

Sri Lankan political parties, though had some relationship to the country's constitutional movement, did not derive much inspiration from the nationalist movement which was totally elitist in character.

The political parties, therefore, were institutions which appeared on the political scene largely to work the parliamentary system of government, and it was in the parliamentary arena that they began to play their major role.

Sri Lankan political parties are primarily electoral competitors and it was the competition for electoral gains which make them aggressive competitors for power.

Despite this feature, two major parties, specially since the formation of the SLFP in 1951, have been competing with each other for political power, and it was this healthy political competition which made the system more competitive in character, and it was because of this feature that the political power began to alternate between the two major political parties, thereby preventing the emergence of a third party capable of challenging the two established parties.

All recent electoral contests amply demonstrate this fact.

Sri Lanka Freedom Party, though existed for more than 50 years, has not been studied, and this deficiency has been corrected by Prof. Warnapala who has now published a well researched and well documented history of the SLFP.

Sri Lankan political parties, especially those of the Marxist creed, have published numerous pamphlets on their activities, and they are collected and kept in their party archives.

Unfortunately, the SLFP, as the author lamented in his introduction, does not possess any party archives, and this creates numerous difficulties for the researcher. Yet the author has been successful in collecting the relevant data to analyse the role of the Sri Lanka Freedom Party.

Its precursor was the Sinhala Maha Sabha which more than a political party, was a traditional populist organization which provided a platform for the emerging alternative leadership of the country.

It was this leadership, in association with the radical elements of the country, brought about the 1956 political victory, with which the SLFP became the leading political agent of social and economic change.

Sri Lanka, unlike other countries in the Asian continent, has not shown a dislike for party government, and it is this belief in party government as a vital concomitant of parliamentary government which provided sustenance to a party system, though fluid in character, to remain in the system as a vital requirement for democratic government.

Party builder

Prof. Warnapala has dedicated the book to Sirimavo Bandaranaike who, with a her astute and committed leadership, was the builder of the party; S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike was only the founder and the philosopher of the party.

It was Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike who with admirable tenacity built the SLFP as a modern political party. It was this role plus the collection of pragmatic policies which made the party more acceptable to the people and it, within a short period, became the party of government.

This book has been divided into seven chapters and it runs to 423 pages, presenting a substantial piece of work. Introduction focuses on the nature of the party system in the country; Chapter I discusses the early beginnings and it covers the period of the Sinhala Maha Sabha which laid a solid foundation for the creation of a new political part in 1951.

The discussion here in this chapter is primarily an examination of the traditional social factors which helped in the construction of a popular foundation for the party. It was the traditional forces which the Sinhala Maha Sabha mobilized in the thirties and forties that helped in the construction of a base, from which the party still derives inspiration.

Chapter II deals with the post-1947 political scenario, the characteristic features of which motivated Bandaranaike to think in terms of an alternative, a democratic alternative to the UNP which, within a short time, displayed loose features of a single dominant party. It ignored the presence of the Left whereas the SLFP, from its very inception, saw the political utility of the leftwing political parties.

Chapter III deals with the formation of the SLFP and it is in this chapter that an attempt has been made to discuss the political and social factors as well as the personalities who were instrumental in the formation of the party. Chapter IV, as we could anticipate, examines the role of the party as a party in power and the changes to which it provided leadership.

The discussion relates to those very forces which interfered with the implementation of its programme and the eventual assassination of S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike, whose demise in September, 1959 made the party leaderless.

Crisis

It was at this crucial stage of the crisis that Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike emerged as its charismatic leader and it was in this phase that the party came to be built as a modern political party and Mrs. Bandaranaike, with a charisma unique to her, never deviated from the popular historic foundations of the party. Prof. Warnapala's analysis shows that he is a strong believer of this fact. He wants the party to remain loyal to its historical foundations.

He, in the course of his analysis in this chapter in which he shows enormous sympathy with Mrs. Sirimavo Bandaranaike, gives much credit for her crucial role in building the party. She led the party for 42 years and it was during the early phase that she, despite virulent opposition from certain elements with links to the Bandaranaike family, managed to keep her hold on the party, and it was her tenacity which saved the party.

Chapter VI, which discusses the period 1970-77, is the major chapter in this book as this section discusses the political and social changes in the post 1970 period.

As the author has rightly mentioned, it was a bolder front two which the SLFP entered, and it, when examined from a historical point of view, made a tremendous contribution to the social and economic development of the country. The author has done enough justice to the period by highlighting the main changes that took place during this period.

The last chapter in the book, Chapter VII, examines the crisis period of the party after its ignominious defeat in 1977. Party experienced a major crisis during this period and the author has gone into all aspects of the crisis.

There were people who wanted to oust Mrs. Bandaranaike saying that she was not progressive enough; there was another group which wanted to oust her saying that she was too socialist in her approach. Both these two standpoints came to be associated with two powerful individuals with direct links to the Bandaranaike family and both strategies failed.

As the author highlights, Mrs. Bandaranaike was interested in the party and she never gave into those disruptive forces and took all measures to defeat those trends. The very people who represented those trends crawled back to the party to enjoy the plums of power in the period of Mrs. Bandaranaike's dotage.

Discussion

The last chapter, therefore, is a detailed discussion on the nature of the crisis which it experienced for nearly two decades. Despite the crisis, Mrs. Bandaranaike was able to maintain the solid base of the party intact, and it was this historical foundation which, in the end, paved the way for the victory in at the 1994 polls. The author says that he deliberately stopped the study at 1994 and he proposes to undertake a separate study to cover that period.

The party, during the post-1994 period, began to travel in a different direction and it became alienated from its historical foundations. It was because of this feature that the JVP was able to eat into the support base in the rural areas. It always remained the mainstay of the SLFP and the emergence of Mahinda Rajapaksa shows that the historical base of the SLFP has been activated again and it is from this base that Mahinda Rajapaksa achieved his victory in 2005. In 2006, it has been renewed with a fresh mandate.

Undoubtedly, Prof. Wiswa Warnapala is the leading political scientist in Sri Lanka.

He has published more than twenty books both in Sinhala and English. This book is a seminal work on the role of a political party in Sri Lanka. He needs to be congratulated for taking the trouble to write this book on the history of the SLFP.

All students of politics should read this book which gives wonderful insight into the working of the party system in Sri Lanka. Prof. Warnapala, though a Minister in the Government, has shown his commitment to an academic research by producing this pioneering piece of research on the role of a political party in Sri Lanka.

Exciting story of the motion picture

Chitrapataye Kathava

Author: Aruna Gunarathna

Published by Fantasy Factory 45/87

"Manum Madura",

Milco Mawatha,

Nawala Road,

Narahenpita, Colombo 5

278 pp. Price Rs. 475

Review: R.S Karunaratne

CINEMA: Aruna Gunarathna perhaps would go down history as the first author to have written a comprehensive history of the motion picture in Sinhala. Many books are available on the subject in English but up to now nobody thought of writing the history of the world cinema in Sinhala.

Aruna is not only a film buff but also a journalist obsessed with cinema. His knowledge of cinema is extensive and the present work amply proves that point.

Chitrapataye Kathava begins with the events that led to motion pictures. In order to achieve the illusion of motion, many problems in optics, chemistry and even human physiology had to be overcome. Lenses, projectors, cameras, and roll films had to be invented.

Although the history of the cinema spans about 100 years, many attempts had been made to show moving pictures even in the mid - 17th century. For instance, Athanasius Kirscher, a German priest, conducted experiments in projecting a visual image by passing light through a transparency. He put on a "Magic lantern" show at the Collegio Romano in 1645. It took more than 200 years to develop a method to capture photographs in motion.

A major breakthrough was made in the 19th century when Eadweard Muybridge was hired to photograph moving horses by setting up 24 still cameras. By 1895 French audiences were seeing brief motion pictures projected on a screen by August and Luis Lumiere.

Aruna Gunarathna discusses such developments with appropriate illustrations. Then he moves on to deal with cinema as a mass medium. Some movies such as Life of an American Fireman (1903) The Great Train Robbry (1903) and A Trip to the Moon (1902) became classics.

The early movies were silent and language posed no problem for the audience. People also realised that going to the movies was relatively cheap. Stereotyped plots, overdramatised acting and slapstick humour promised a universal appeal. When people embraced the new medium of cheap entertainment, cinema soon became a powerful mass medium. With the addition of sound and music, movies became even more powerful than the existing media.

The book shows how the movie industry reached its zenith - popularly referred to as the Golden Age - and its temporary setback during the Second World War.

The author has gone beyond what is found in standard text books on cinema. For instance, he discusses how the new industry developed in India, Europe, Japan, France, the United States and Germany. He says at the initial stages Indian producers could not find an actress to act in films.

The book is full of interesting episodes: Forty cameras used to film Benhur, film fans commit suicide on the death of an actor, and Charlie Chaplin gets death threats.

Film fans, directors, technicians, actors and actresses and general readers would benefit immensely by reading Aruna Gunarathna's Chitrapataye Kathava. It is topical, innovative and well presented in a reader-friendly format.

A child's adventures in a lost world

I wish I had....

Author: Navin

Elantha Wijeyratne

Creative Printers & Designers:

3 A, Bahirawakanda

Road, Kandy.

Review: M. B. Mathmaluwe

FICTION: A book of animal pictures of remarkable excellence has reached this writer's hands: what is surprising about it is that the brief text in it has been written and all the illustrations in it have been designed, painted and lavishly presented by a ten-year-old boy presently residing in Australia and attending school there.

What is noteworthy about this book is that it is consistent with what educational psychologists say about the development of a child's mind; it is said that at a certain stage in the growth of a child, he can get deeply interested exclusively, with certain chosen fields or things, may be, birds, animals, cars, planes etc., so that he would go on reading, finding material about them, reproduce them may be, in drawings, paint, clay or in writing, in whatever medium he is most proficient and is easily available to him. It can become an obsession with him and would soon get familiar with an astonishing volume of knowledge about it.

Child's mind

Before dealing with the book and its contents, it would interest readers if something is said about the growing child's mind. It will readily be admitted that a child's mind is uncluttered with all the lumber that an adult's mind is invariably burdened with, which we have gathered over the years with our experiences gained from community-living, civilization, education, learning etc. which, in turn, dictate our thoughts and actions, instead, a child's mind remains free.

That does not mean therefore, his mind is blank, on the contrary, it is most restless, curious, and teeming with ideas and images, he lives in a fascinating and colourful world of his own, in that world of imagination and innocence, he lives with numerous fairies, demons, giants, magicians, also, there are birds and beasts that talk, giants and witches that come flying through the air, may be, riding on broomsticks!

That is the time he seriously and genuinely believes that when he is asleep, the cow jumps over the moon. This is his real world where he continuously lives. Nobody has captured this world of the child for us better than the great English poet wordsworth in his poem, "Ode on the Intimations of Immortality" where he says:

"Heaven lies about us in

our infancy....

The earth, and every

common sight,

To me did seem

Apparelled in celestial light."

Adults have no right to scoff or laugh at the behaviour and beliefs of childhood, instead, for the healthy growth of his mind, he needs the sympathy and understanding, and even participation from adults for, after all, this is a passing phase in his development and he will soon outgrow it and start looking beyond his own mind.

Coming back to the book, it may be said, it is the result of the 'adventures' of this child in his world of 'make-believe'........ a true portrayal and recording of that world he had roamed for, it is not the gifted child's wish to keep this world and his experiences in it, to himself, he would wish to share it with others.

What he sees with his mind's eye, he would give expression to, in whatever medium that is available to him, the excellence of which, of course, would depend upon each individual child's richness of imagination and facility with which he can handle his chosen medium, whether it be in pain, drawings, clay or in writing, his creative talent is thus manifested.

Sense of perception

As said at the outset of this paper, a child can get closely familiar with his subject; with his keen sense of perception, add to this, his uncluttered mind he would soon be equipped with an astonishing corpus of knowledge about it.

The pictures in their dazzling colours, as is only natural for children to use, in this book are ample evidence to this. In this case, the knowledge that this boy has gathered about pre-historic animals by reading a book about them he had received on his fifth birthday from a doting aunty of his. That was the beginning of his pre-occupation with dinosaurs. As is always the case when a child makes some pursuit his hobby, his knowledge about dinosaurs, whom he calls his 'Pets', is truly amazing. Here is what he says about just one of them in his book:

"Capable of peering over a three-storeyed house, the Brachiosaurus (He helps those of us unable to pronounce that Jaw-breaking word thus: BRAK-ee-o-sawr-us."!) was one of the tallest animals ever known. As the fore limbs were much longer than the hind limbs, this herbivore had a huge reach just like a giraffe, only much longer."

Animal monsters

That is how he deals with one of these animal monsters he has so vividly painted in his book. In his little introduction to it he says:

"Have you ever wished having a dinosaur as a pet? Well, I have. Since I received a Book of Dinosaurs from my aunty on my fifth birthday, I have been fascinated by these Pre-historic lizards... Let me tell you about my favourite Dinosaurs...."

That then, is the genesis of this book. Incidentally, in the picture he makes painted so graphically, he shows his favourite dinosaur stretching its unusually long neck to eat leaves upon a tall tree and, he himself (the author) is shown shinning up its long neck to pluck some ripe fruits on the branches! On every page opposite an illustrated page, he carries, both in English and Sinhala, his refrain, "I wish I had a Pteranodon (or the name of any other dinosaur it is) so that I could fly on its back and fly my kite high up in the sky."

As for the pictures, their draughtsmanship, choice and use of colours leave nothing to be desired. Experts say, child art is close to primitive art because primitive man's mind too, is unburdened of learning, education and others' experiences. In his well-documented book, "Primitive Art" Deonard Adams, an authority on the subject, says: "The drawings of children are genuinely primitive." (P. 78).

This primitiveness, however, in no way diminishes the quality of the child's aesthetic sensibility and is only a transitory period in his development, whereas in the primitive man it is permanent. The book is beautifully brought out with a thick glossy cover, in art paper.