Features
Historicising the Sri Lanka Law College
By Uditha Devapriya
The book tries to make its contribution to our society, its continuing relevance, clearer. It does this by exploring its historical evolution from multiple perspectives.
It also raises many questions. Perhaps the most important of them is this: how do institutions become relevant to the societies they inhabit, how do they become more representative of the people they serve?
To answer that question, it is necessary to go back in time.
Sri Lanka’s legal system predates the colonial encounter. Historical records, including stone and rock inscriptions, tell us of how our kings and rulers respected the idea of judicial autonomy. Even though it may be anachronistic to apply contemporary notions of law and order, justice and equity, to our past, there is enough evidence to show that these ideals were respected, even reinforced, prior to European colonialism.
The contemporary ideal of legal education, however, is very much a colonial inheritance. Our first European colonisers, the Portuguese, did not bother with educating its subjects, even on the laws they brought with them. Their successors, the Dutch, were more nuanced, going to the extent of codifying customary and indigenous laws in the country.
The historian and archivist Nadeera Rupesinghe contends in her book on Dutch lawmaking in Sri Lanka that the Dutch bequeathed to the country a highly pluralist legal system, one that has not been matched since. If they did not set up a legal education system, they left behind a legal tradition that could help form such a system in later decades.
The British, pioneers of the civil service and the colonial project more so than either the Portuguese or the Dutch, had a different view of the matter. They continued with efforts at codifying customary laws, prominently Kandyan law, but they were driven by a fanatical zeal to ensure deference to their institutions, including their laws and customs.
The 19th century British experiment, of nurturing a narrow circle of elites committed to European customs, manners, habits, and prejudices, thus found a pivot in Sri Lanka, or Ceylon. In Sri Lanka, British officials found an elite quite willing to yield to them, despite the occasional insurrection against their rule. By the time it gained independence in 1948, the country had gained a reputation as the most conservative colony in Asia.
It is against this backdrop that one must chart the history, and trajectory, of the Law College. When, in 1874, the Council of Legal Education was founded, a flourishing middle-class, reformist if not radical in their outlook, had sprung up in the country.
As countless scholars, prominently Kumari Jayawardena, have noted, this middle-class was conservative and nationalist to varying degrees: some preferred to cooperate with the colonial administration, while others vied for reform. Almost all of them were content with their country falling within the orbit of British imperialism.
More than anything, this middle-class sought ways of maintaining their position and prestige. In the last quarter of the 19th century, the professions held a certain appeal for them. Medicine and law in particular seemed to promise affluence, if not status. As the sociologist Ralph Pieris would much later write:
“In Ceylon, specialisation was limited by the narrow range of career opportunities of an elitist kind, the lowest in terms of status being that of graduate teacher, the highest the prestigious Civil Service.”
Between the graduate teacher and the Civil Service, the Ceylonese had much to choose from, depending on their station in life. The middle-class, however, faced a paradox: they lacked the advantages of wealth the colonial elite had, yet were animated by the same aspirations as the latter. In the late 19th century, only medicine, and to a greater degree law, could square the circle and resolve this dilemma.
Lawyers formed an influential group into the 20th century. The Council of Legal Education, the sole body responsible for the admission and regulation of lawyers – Advocates and Proctors then, Attorneys-at-Law now – produced some of the most reformist, and also some of the most conservative, faces of colonial society.
Their intervention, in the context of the struggle for independence, cannot be ignored. When the first political party to call for complete independence from the British Empire, the Lanka Sama Samaja Party, was formed in 1935, it counted among its first batch, so to speak, a doctor and a lawyer – S. A. Wickramasinghe, and Colvin R. de Silva.
To give another example, the much talked about and written on contest for the Educated Ceylonese seat at the 1911 Legislative Council election pivoted on two representatives from this profession: Ponnambalam Ramanathan, the favourite of the Sinhalese govigama elite, and Dr Marcus Fernando, representing the karava bourgeoisie.
Today, of course, things have changed dramatically. Right after or before independence, Sri Lanka’s first Cabinet Minister for Education, Eddie Nugawela, made some remarks about the social composition among students at his school, Royal College.
Since Kannangara’s proposals, Nugawela remarked, “the Royal College is no more a school for the rich and privileged classes.” Observing that 317 of 519 parents worked as “peons, labourers, chauffeurs, and so on”, he concluded that the school had opened its gates to “the lower-middle class.”
It is transformations like these that have made institutions in Sri Lanka more representative, inclusive, and relevant, than they were at the heyday of colonialism. The challenge today is to maintain standards, ethics, and benchmarks while opening these institutions to as many communities as they can.
This is not something we can stop; it is something we must accept.
This book, in its own humble way, attempts to grapple with these questions and issues. It is not meant as a final word on the subject, but rather an attempt that must be followed by many other attempts.
The truth is that the Sri Lanka Law College is an institution that has withstood the test of time. It is currently going through a major bout of reform. One can only hope that as it forges ahead, it remains mindful of its essential task – ensuring a legal profession that is closer to, representative of, inclusive of, and accountable to its people.
We demand accountability from our politicians and elected officials. As the author of the book, I cannot imagine why we should not do the same with our professions and professionals.
Institutions have a large role to play in this. All too often, institutions in Sri Lanka tend to be territorial, sometimes irrationally so. They tend to be averse to collaboration and cooperation, they tend to claim credit for themselves. Sri Lanka is currently at a crossroads in its modern history. If it is to progress, it must abandon this attitude.
Ultimately, it is that hope which resides in this book, and, in its own special way, the future of the Sri Lanka Law College.
Uditha Devapriya is the author of “Uplifting Legal Education in Sri Lanka: 150 Years of Law College”, a study of the Sri Lanka Law College launched on October 18. The book is available at the Law College. Research and compilation for the book was done by Factum, an Asia-Pacific focused foreign policy think-tank where Uditha currently serves as Chief International Relations Analyst. Email: udakdev1@gmail.com