Demographic transition in Sri Lanka: a spatial perspective

Demographic transition theory involves a lagging fertility transition induced by a leading mortality transition. This article focuses on the linkage between the mortality and fertility transitions in Sri Lanka; it discusses the measurement of areal fertility, demonstrates the use of a measure not commonly used in population geography, and shows areal association between past mortality and recent fertility. The Coale or Princeton fertility indices allow a reasonably good view of structural and behavioral aspects of fertility; the Coale indices examine the contribution of structure to total fertility and the contribution of marital fertility. Although recent fertility decline has been less rapid than the post-war mortality decline, Sri Lanka's crude birth rate in 1975 was the 5th lowest in Asia. Sri Lanka experienced very high crude death rates in 1930, and quite low rates in 1950 and in subsequent years. This demonstrates an association between historic mortality and recent fertility, and that association can be linked deductively to demographic transition theory. In 1930, malaria was endemic throughout the Dry Zone of Sri Lanka, and hyperendemic in several districts. The Spearman rank correlation coefficients reveal the strongest relationship between malaria and nuptiality; this lends evidence to the notion that structural influences on fertility--such as delayed marriage--are more important than influences on marital fertility--such as coital frequency. The evidence suggests that mortalily decline in Sri Lanka led to an increase in fertility in those areas where malaria had been concentrated. This suggests the possibility that measures constituting malaria control or eradication also stimulate increased fertility; therefore, anti-malarial programs must be integrated with family planning.     

Muslim geographies and the politics of purification in Sri Lanka after the 2004 tsunami

In this paper, we argue that the politics of aid in Sri Lanka 'after' the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami accentuated what we call the 'politics of purification'– the fragmented ethnic politics of territoriality – in Sri Lanka's east. The politics of purification entail geographical imaginations of a nation as 'the same people living in the same place'. We illustrate this with a case study on Muslim geographies in Kalmunai Divisional Secretariat division, on the coast of Ampara District, southeast Sri Lanka, where the politics of relocating Muslim families from the buffer zone created the conditions for the geographical imaginations of the politics of purification to play out. At the same time, our study indicates the antinomies of purification and the political fragmentation of Muslim geographies.     

(Dis)connecting Colombo: Situating the Megapolis in Postwar Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is in the midst of a postwar infrastructure boom, with new investment directed into roads, ports, and airports as part of an uneven and contested development process. Taking the transformations unfolding in Colombo as our point of departure, we examine how the vision of megapolis has animated debates on the geographies of connectivity. The postwar Sri Lankan political landscape initially envisioned political integration, which was to be delivered through the expansion of national road networks. The political priorities in the past decade reoriented away from integrating the nation to the strategic positioning of Colombo as a financial trading hub for South Asia. Focusing on Colombo’s flagship Port City project, we problematize these models of development by foregrounding counternarratives that speak to concerns around debt, enclosure, persistent ethnic tensions, and the degradation of coastal ecosystems. Key Words: connectivity, ecological stress, infrastructure, Sri Lanka, uneven development.     

Norwegian Journal of Geography

Öhrling, S. 1975. Prerequisites of Community Development. Examples from two villages in Sri Lanka. Norsk geogr. Tidsskr. 29, 221–236.

The study is concentrated on two villages in rural Sri Lanka, Pelawatte in the wet zone and Kumbukgollewa in the dry. Both are agricultural but differ considerably in their social and economic structure. Production in Pelawatte is subsistence oriented and there are no big landowners in the village. In Kumbukgollewa, however, production being cash crop oriented, mainly paddy, the economy is highly dependent on external markets and furthermore it is dominated by a few landowners. The author is of the opinion that the centre-periphery relationships in Kumbukgollewa have adverse impacts on the efficiency of development programmes. The Sarvodaya movement has organized development projects in both villages. In Pelawatte there seems to be no structural obstacle to the efforts of the movement. In Kumbukgollewa, on the other hand, the dominant role played by the few landowning families is obviously a hindrance to successful development.     

Living situation and integration in a rural area in southern Sri Lanka

Results from field work in Sri Lanka are presented. The main issues covered are aspects of people's living situation, economic and social interaction, and degree of integration on a number of indicators. Living situation implies material well-being, access to resources, education and health, and attitudes towards development. By interaction is meant economic circulation in the study area and between this area and the outside world, geographical mobility of people, and lastly, channels of information. To obtain an easily intelligible measure for comparison over time, the concept integration is used.     

Fluid territories: Rethinking state territorialisation in Palk Bay,South Asia

The study objective was to gain a better understanding of the transboundary fishing conflict between Indian trawl fishers and Sri Lankan small-scale fishers in Palk Bay using a relational approach to territoriality. The authors employed different ethnographic methods, including open, structured, and semi-structured interviews, and performed a media analysis in order to understand the everyday practices of Indian trawl fishers within the wider geopolitical context of a 30-year war in neighbouring Sri Lanka. The relational approach moves away from seeing cross-border fishing merely as an act of counter-territorialisation. The results revealed that the cross-border fishing underlying the crisis has largely resulted from a complex network of changing relationships between on the one hand Indian trawl fishers and India, and on the other hand Sri Lankan state agencies and Sri Lankan fishers, resulting in a porous international maritime boundary. The authors conclude that this in turn has resulted in a fluid international maritime boundary line.     

Spatial practices of integration and segregation among internally displaced persons and their hosts in Sri Lanka

This article recounts how a group of Muslim internally displaced persons from the Northern Province of Sri Lanka arrived and settled in the North-Western Province of the island. The account is placed in the context of local integration, as one of the so-called durable solutions for refugees and displaced people. It is argued that it is useful to study integration and segregation as related processes. The main focus of the article concerns the development of resettlement villages for displaced people and how this has made it necessary for local people to reconstruct and redefine their places. One particular confrontation that took place between local Sinhalese people and displaced Muslims is discussed, to show how the negotiation of place may become violent. The article concludes by arguing that, in order for the process of local integration to succeed, active participation by all groups involved in the local integration process is a prerequisite.     

Land use/cover changes in the war-ravaged Jaffna Peninsula, Sri Lanka, 1984–early 2004

Temporal and spatial information on land use/cover is a prerequisite for effective planning decisions in the context of social and economic development. Satellite remote sensing data have become increasingly important in the study of land use/cover changes. This paper uses multitemporal satellite data to measure and spatially characterize land use/cover changes in the Jaffna Peninsula, northern Sri Lanka over the two decades from 1984 to early 2004 in terms of potential drivers. Over this period, the Jaffna Peninsula has been impacted severely by armed conflict between the government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. A postclassification method is used to compare land use/cover classes from satellite images using Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to analyze the spatial pattern of land use/cover changes over the study period. Results indicate that the land use/cover pattern has been very dynamic since early the 1980s, showing a remarkable decrease in agricultural land use and concomitant increase in non-agricultural land uses. The ethnic conflict and its consequences, particularly large-scale population migrations, have been the main driving forces for such land use/cover changes in the Jaffna Peninsula. The results of this study are not only important in aiding efforts to reconstruct this area after decades of physical and socioeconomic devastation, but should also prompt similarly urgent studies in other inaccessible war-torn areas of the world.     

The Place of Narrative in the Study of Third World Migration: The Case of Spontaneous Rural Migration in Sri Lanka*

Studies of migration in geography have most often been based on quantitative research approaches. Such studies cannot adequately shed light on the contextuality of migration and the individual decision-making processes involved. Personal narratives express individual experiences within a social context. The story of “Amma,” a female rural migrant in Sri Lanka, shows the role of women in migration, the importance of family ties, the contextual causes of migration, and characteristics of the migration flow per se. Personal narratives have an underutilized potential of capturing the variety of migrants' experiences and the complexity of the decision to migrate.     

An Ecosystem Services Approach to Sustainable Livelihoods in the Homegardens of Kandy,Sri Lanka

ABSTRACT

The Kandyan homegardens, or forest gardens, of central Sri Lanka are diverse, smallholder agroforestry ecosystems that for 2000 years have reflected evolving environmental, economic, and social livelihood needs. An ecosystem services approach interrogated homegarden changes over the last 10 years in 31 Kandyan households. Livelihood strategies favouring homegardens were found to have broader benefits across household, national, and global scales than those favouring commercial simplification or those abandoning cultivation for alternative incomes. Livelihood benefits beyond income included resilience to economic and environmental shocks; food security; and higher stocks of biological and agricultural diversity. This revealed overlooked socio-ecological feedbacks between drivers that frustrated interventions to sustain homegarden livelihoods, including increased wild animal incursions thwarting household climate adaptation and disaster recovery; global organic and fair trade incentives reducing food security and livelihood resilience; and national seed and animal regulations counteracting homegarden sustainability programs. Despite these pressures, households maintained homegarden systems for their cultural, aesthetic and eating preferences. An ecosystem services approach can complement sustainable livelihood approaches by identifying overlooked environmental and cultural benefits; reveal livelihood feedbacks from drivers of ecosystem change; avoid unintended consequences from interventions; and capitalise on synergies between stakeholder priorities.     

Urban growth in South Asia

The author discusses urbanization in Southern Asia during the period 1950-1980 using U.N. estimates. Urbanization in the region as a whole is compared with trends in other developing regions, and differences among the experiences of seven countries of Southern Asia are examined. Tabular information is provided on urbanization levels and urban population growth rates for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.     

Strategies and structures in integrated rural development planning - a critical review of a dissertation

This article reviews Reidar Dale's doctoral thesis ’Organisation of Regional Development Work; Strategies and Management in District Integrated Rural Development Programmes in Sri Lanka’, presented (unpublished) at the Department of Geography, Oslo University, in October 1991, the present writer being faculty opponent. The purpose of the article is to communicate major points in the dissertation, which is likely to cause renewed attention to Integrated Rural Development in the Third World, and critically to review the thesis as such, particularly its methodological qualities.     

Maritime network dynamics before and after international events

Investigating the influence of international events on global maritime networks is a challenging task that must comprehensively incorporate geographical, political, and maritime sciences. Understanding global maritime network dynamics is an initial and critical step in this investigation. This study proposes an automatic identification system (AIS)-based approach to understanding maritime network dynamics before and after international events. In this approach, a spatiotemporal modeling method is introduced to measure the similarity in shipping trends before and after international events. Then, a spatiotemporal analytic framework is proposed to understand the maritime network dynamics by grouping similar situation, and assessing possible indirect effects within a network. Finally, three case studies of international events, military conflict, lifted economic sanctions, and government elections, were used to investigate the observed network dynamics possibly affected by international events. The results indicate that container, tanker, and bulk shipping between India and its connected countries all declined more than 69% after military conflicts between India and Pakistan in August 2015. Tanker shipping between Iran and the United Arab Emirates increased 51% after economic sanctions on Iran were lifted. Container shipping between Sri Lanka and Singapore, Malaysia, and India increased more than 74% after the general election in Sri Lanka. These investigations demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed approach in assessing the possible effects of international events on maritime network dynamics.     

重大事件发生前后的海运网络动态分析（英文）

Investigating the influence of international events on global maritime networks is a challenging task that must comprehensively incorporate geographical, political, and maritime sciences. Understanding global maritime network dynamics is an initial and critical step in this investigation. This study proposes an automatic identification system(AIS)-based approach to understanding maritime network dynamics before and after international events. In this approach, a spatiotemporal modeling method is introduced to measure the similarity in shipping trends before and after international events. Then, a spatiotemporal analytic framework is proposed to understand the maritime network dynamics by grouping similar situation, and assessing possible indirect effects within a network. Finally, three case studies of international events, military conflict, lifted economic sanctions, and government elections, were used to investigate the observed network dynamics possibly affected by international events. The results indicate that container, tanker, and bulk shipping between India and its connected countries all declined more than 69% after military conflicts between India and Pakistan in August 2015. Tanker shipping between Iran and the United Arab Emirates increased 51% after economic sanctions on Iran were lifted. Container shipping between Sri Lanka and Singapore, Malaysia, and India increased more than 74% after the general election in Sri Lanka. These investigations demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed approach in assessing the possible effects of international events on maritime network dynamics.     

Geographies of eviction,expulsion and marginalization: stories and coping capacities of the Veddhas,Sri Lanka

This paper identifies why the Veddhas, the indigenous population of Sri Lanka, have been exposed to forced relocation and marginalization at various historical junctures. Their history is a dramatic story of eviction, expulsion and marginalization, and a sad story of deprivation, ethnic discrimination and lack of human rights. The disempowerment of the Veddhas primarily relates to the dominating powers of authority of the Sri Lankan State and its effectuation of detrimental development policies and practices. The key concepts of marginalization, eviction and expulsion are discussed in relation to an analytical model illustrating how external and internal factors, collective capabilities and individual characteristics interact on and influence people's coping capacity. Veddhas in two villages have given accounts of their understanding of the situation. It is concluded that the disempowerment and disappearance of the Veddha culture are due to ignorance and the unwillingness of the State to procure an enabling environment that would improve the coping capacity of its indigenous population.     

Back and forth with hopes and fears: Sri Lankan men's narratives on gender and mobility in transnational livelihoods

Although in the past Sri Lanka has had a higher number of women migrant workers, recent statistics show that the gap between the percentages of female and male migrants is decreasing. Since 2007, male migrants have outnumbered female migrants. The article explores how Sri Lankan men have responded to the increased economic needs of their families and lack of proper income-generating activities within the country by engaging in transnational livelihoods, as well as how their roles and identities are contested and negotiated through labour migration. The study is based on men's narratives on their reasons for migration and their experiences of transnational labour migration. The concepts of hope and life course are used to analyse the intertwined relationships of gender and mobility in transnational livelihoods. The author identifies that men's mobility is motivated by their hopes of fulfilling traditional gender norms as providers and protectors of their families in combination with their new identity as successful men. Further, the study provides evidence that men's mobility is not only gendered but also a repeated act during their life course. The study contributes to strengthen research on mobility and gender by adding men's perspectives on transnational labour migration.     

Tsunamigenic incisions produced by the December 2004 earthquake along the coasts of Thailand, Indonesia and Sri Lanka

Field observations and satellite images indicate that tsunami waves exhibit specific patterns during flooding and recession forming characteristic incisions in the coastal landscape. To study these incisions we analyze high resolution remote sensing images of the coastline of Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka impacted by the tsunami of December 26th, 2004. The analysis sheds light on the different mechanisms by which currents scour incisions during the flooding and receding phases of a tsunami. During flooding the high velocity flow indents the levees of existing tidal channels and bays, leaving short flood scours. The receding water then dissects the coastline with equally spaced return channels widening toward the coast.     

Mobility in marginalized spaces: Manoeuvring for survival among the Veddas in Sri Lanka

In Sri Lanka the indigenous population, the Veddas, are rapidly losing their traditional habitats due to cash cropping and infrastructure development, and they are being forced to find new means of living. The purpose of the article is to show how mobility is an inherent characteristic of the new economy in the country and that mobility is gendered. The author documents how one group of Veddas has become immobilized (Dambane study village, which has turned into a tourist site) while another group has been forced to be more mobile (Henanigale study village, where emigration is increasingly practised) due to the same development policies. The study reveals that the market-led economy has caused spatial fixations that limit people more than they liberate them. These fixations take place in the domestic sphere as well as in the villages and they change gender relations, showing that mobility is intertwined with social processes that change local structures and relationships. In the case of the Veddas, living in marginalized places conditions their motility. Mobility is therefore a selective process and as much about the fact of moving as it is entangled with meaning and the power to produce (im)mobility at different scales.     

A geographers' imperative? Research and action in the aftermath of disaster

After the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 a number of academics published texts in attempts to make sense of the disaster. Frustrations and feelings of inability to do something useful to assist were expressed. The academic discussions arising from the disaster may be linked with more general discussions around conducting relevant and responsible research in the social sciences. This paper addresses the role of researchers in the aftermath of the tsunami disaster in Sri Lanka and explores how the debate following the tsunami can move on to refine researchers' roles in geography by way of participatory action research (PAR), a research strategy that has received limited attention in research on disasters. The paper begins by situating the debate in the spatial politics of humanitarian work and academic research. Then discussions that arose among geographers in the aftermath of the tsunami are presented and potentials for conducting responsible research by engaging with the field are introduced. In the final section, starting with the notion of responsible research, how PAR can potentially bring us forward in developing principles and tools for more responsible geographical research in the context of emergencies is discussed.     

"拓展亚洲国际河流跨境水与生态安全合作"国际学术研讨会在大理召开

The International Workshop on "Expanding Transboundary Cooperation for Water and Environment Security in Asia's International Rivers" was held on December 10-14, 2005, Dali, Yunnan, China. It was organized by Tsinghua University, the World Bank Institute (WBI), the United Nations University (UNU) and Asian International Rivers Center (AIRC). A total of over 60 scholars from the USA, Canada, Australia, Finland, Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, India, Sri Lanka, Iran and China participated in this workshop. The topics include seeking reasonable utilization and sustainable conflict resolutions related to transboundary water resources, and transboundary eco-security maintenance; expanding cooperation between Asia and the rest of the world on international river issues, identifying potential opportunities; and possibility of a common research agenda for addressing environment changes in Mekong River Basin.