Resolution of Protracted Conflict and Key Structural Constraints: An Analysis of External Initiatives in The Sri Lankan Conflict

Conflict is nothing new for human civilizations. It is neither a sudden nor an unlikely event rather a very common phenomenon in the present world—ranging from inter-personal squabbles and disputes to inter-state conflicts and wars. Protracted or intractable conflict is much obvious in the post-Cold War period in many countries. Globally it is a fact that more than one-third of the present conflicts, both intra-state and inter-state, are intractable in nature. These conflicts contain at least 25 to thousand plus battle-related deaths per year although number of casualties varies due to the intensity of conflicts. By its nature, protracted conflicts have inbuilt power to escalate, transform, re-emerge and repeated failure to solve the contentious issues. It persists due to the presence of hardcore issues and non-negotiability of those issues that create such a prolonged condition of conflict. Protracted conflict is believed to be difficult to deal with; however, that does not indicate a state of hopelessness. Why protracted conflicts continue for long period despite different efforts of conflict resolution is significant to understand, examine and analyze. From that perspective this article, an outcome of a secondary research, is an attempt to analyze the key structural stumbling blocks of conflict resolution initiatives in protracted conflicts. For analytical purpose this article uses relevant examples of conflict resolution efforts of two external third party mediation initiatives, namely, by India and Norway, in a recently ended (only through military victory) protracted-ethnic conflict—the Sri Lankan conflict, a classic case of identity conflict that has actively been continuing for more than sixty years between the majoritarian Sinhalese and minoritarian Tamil communities.