Disrupting the “Tamil diaspora-terrorism” paradigm: the political mobilisation of younger generation Tamils in the London diaspora

Abstract

ABSTRACT Following three decades of armed conflict, the Government of Sri Lanka (GoSL) defeated the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in 2009. The victory was framed as a successful counterterrorism operation, yet, the GoSL’s military campaign in the Tamil-populated Northern and Eastern Provinces of Sri Lanka, faces credible allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. As the armed conflict reached its apex, the Tamil diaspora mobilised politically across the globe and the participation of younger generation Tamils (YGTs), namely, those who were born outside their parents’ country of origin, or had settled outside of their ancestral homeland as children, caught the attention of scholars and analysts. Within this small pool of literature, the pervasive and problematic counterterrorism-inspired concept of “radicalisation” surfaced. This article contributes to critical debates on terrorism by analysing the cursory application of a radicalisation framework to the political mobilisation and perspectives of YGTs. Based on critical ethnographic research on YGT activism in the London diaspora, this article provides an alternative to criminalising and marginalising approaches by utilising an emotion-based conceptual framework, derived from social movement studies, to unearth and understand the complex mechanisms, contexts, and processes surrounding their political mobilisation.