Polity aims to advance democratic consciousness, gender equality, state reform, and social change in Sri Lanka, while interested in South Asia and the World.
As its predecessor Pravada (1991-2002), Polity is published by the Social Scientists’ Association in Colombo, with critical content on politics, political economy, history, women, ethnicity, sexualities, religion, labour studies, agrarian relations, nationalisms, violence, ecology, and much more.
The Changing Role of Caste in Northern Sri Lanka. Thiruchandran, Selvy. Caste and its Multiple Manifestations: A Study of the Caste System in Northern Sri Lanka. Colombo: Bay Owl Press, 2021, pp. 231 + xii
Reviewed by Kalinga Tudor Silva
Caste in Sri Lanka is something of an enigma to social critics and social researchers alike. People do not justify,...
What is this Crisis?
Ahilan Kadirgamar
Dr. Ahilan Kadirgamar made this presentation at an online discussion on the current economic crisis in Sri Lanka,...
Our broken nation lies before us: ‘The People’s Command’
From the Galle Face Aragalaya bhoomi
Our broken nation lies before us, caught up in an unprecedented social and economic tragedy of incomparable historic...
The IMF in Debt Restructuring, the Resurgence of Austerity, and the Urgency of Fiscal Justice
Bhumika Muchhala
As Sri Lanka officially defaults on its sovereign debt repayments, and enters negotiations with the International...
An Undemocratic Political Deal
FUTA on Ranil Wickremesinghe Appointment
As the national trade union representing university academics, which has stood firmly behind the ongoing people’s...
Locating Labour in Sri Lanka’s Ethical Sourcing: Review of “Garments without Guilt? Global Labour Justice and Ethical Codes in Sri Lankan Apparels” Kanchana Ruwanpura Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2022
Shyamain Wickramasinghe
Garments without Guilt? Global Labour Justice and Ethical Codes in Sri Lankan Apparels by Kanchana Ruwanpura uses an...
Current Issue
Out Now! Vol. 13, No. 1 (2025), LKR800 from the Social Scientists’ Association and LKR1000 from Barefoot and Vijitha Yapa bookshops.
170 pages of analysis, commentary and perspective: the implosion of liberal internationalism; aspirations for, and appraisal of, the NPP government; the long march of the JVP from subversive to sovereign; feminist statements demanding action against misogyny and male violence; the May 2025 local government election and axes of polarisation; US and Lankan narratives on culling USAID; the thriving and prosperous national security state, and its gaze on queers; Richard de Zoysa’s short life, long death, and literary legacy; Asoka Handagama’s Rani and memory against forgetting in struggles against enforced disappearances; avatars of privatisation in higher education; continuities and concerns in AKD’s first budget; anatomization of an economy in permanent crisis; retrieving the political economy of SBD de Silva; an IMF poster-child in the crosshairs of Trump’s tariffs and the Washington Consensus; combating corruption in market mode; caricaturing gay representation in mainstream media; celebrating Bapsi Sidhwa’s itinerary and oeuvre; Indian and Pakistani women speak out against war and hate; the performance of Tamil nationhood in and after war; international law facts and fictions in Filastin; and Iranian voices against Israeli-US warmongering and state repression. Front cover art by Minal Naomi Wickrematunge.
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Archive
Pravada (1991-2002) and Polity (2003-) back issues available here.
Social Scientists’ Association
The Social Scientists’ Association (SSA) was founded in 1977, at a turning point in Sri Lankan politics, economy, and society, marked by among other aspects: the ‘open economy’ market reforms; deepening ethnic conflict; and the growing concentration of executive power. Its initiators were academics from public universities, seeking an autonomous space to grapple with these shifts; and to promote progressive political, economic, and social change.