Involuntary Displacement and Resettlement — Policy and ... - CEPA

1 IntroductionThis paper is based on the Making Peace - Keeping Peace study(Thalayasingam et al., 2009) conducted by the Poverty and Conflict (PAC)programme of the Centre for Poverty Analysis. The study focussed on twoaspects of community relations and conflict in the Puttalam district:“Making Peace” − how incidents of conflict in the area have beendealt with in the past.“Keeping Peace” − how communities and local organisations havebeen able to manage conflict and sustain these situations.The study concept was suggested by a local partner, the Vinividha NGOcoalition. They suggested that the conflict dynamics in the district and theirmeans of resolution would provide insights for other actors working withother conflict affected communities. Following many rounds of qualitativedata collection, the team chose six conflict incidents to follow as casestudies. The conflicts were based on issues illustrative of the wider conflictdynamics in the district and were resolved by a range of actors that localcommunities used for this purpose. The choice of conflict lines alsodetermined the geographical focus of the study. It focused on four divisionalsecretariat (DS) divisions − Mundal, Vanathavilluva, Puttalam and Kalpitiya −all with different levels of ethnic heterogeneity and different histories ofhosting internally displaced persons (IDPs).The study finds that the main cause of conflict in the district during the studyperiod (2006-2008) was the deteriorating relationship between the hostcommunity and the IDPs. The study also identified further sources ofconflict, including ethnic identity based competition, religious identity basedcompetition and competition between political groups. This paper focuseson IDP - host relations and its role in conflict in the district.The changing and contested vulnerability is the root cause of many of theconflicts. The host community perceives that many other vulnerable groupsreceive very little support and assistance, while IDPs, despite their long stay,and despite the fact that many of them have significantly improved theirliving conditions, asset bases and commercial links during their longdisplacement, continue to be specially supported. The IDPs and theirrepresentatives contend that they are still vulnerable and retain the112