Looking at foreign policy questions from a feminist viewpoint may strike many in even the world of democracy as quite a new approach to studying external policy issues but this perspective has been around for quite some time and it would be in the interest of states and publics to take profound cognizance of it. This is in view of the implications of the perspective for international peace and stability.

Given this backdrop, it was in the fitness of things for the Bandaranaike Centre for International Studies (BCIS) Colombo, a major pioneer in the teaching and researching of International Relations in Sri Lanka, to set off special time to introduce and discuss Feminist Foreign Policy (FFP) recently. The relevant symposium was the final one in a series of forums of importance to foreign and domestic policy issues the BCIS conducted in the course of November this year to celebrate the 50th anniversary of its founding.

Titled ‘Leadership for Peace and Feminist Foreign Policy’, the forum was held on December 9th at the BMICH’s ‘Mihilaka Madura’ under the aegis of the BCIS, headed by the latter’s Executive Director Priyanthi Fernando. Prominent among the members of the audience at the symposium was the Chairperson of the BCIS, former President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga.

The panelists at the forum were Prof. Rangita de Silva de Alwis, Associate Dean of International Affairs, University of Pennsylvania Law School, USA and an Expert Member on the CEDAW and Eva Abdullah, Chairperson, Maldives Policy Think Tank and a former Deputy Speaker of the People’s Majlis of the Maldives. The symposium was moderated by Dr. Radhika Coomaraswamy, former UN Under-Secretary General and Special Representative of the Secretary General on Children and Armed Conflict (2006-2012).

Prof. Rangita de Silva, among other things, pointed to the importance of re-imagining FFP and making it increasingly relevant in the formulation of a country’s foreign policy. She said that going forward, foreign policy will need to be increasingly based on a feminist perspective and there are some major countries of the South and North that have already given their external policies this orientation. It was pointed out that by 2025, France, for example, would be taking this policy direction; that is, the best interests of France’s women would be taken into consideration in the formulation and implementation of foreign policy.

Chile, the same speaker pointed out, a major country of the South, is in the forefront of integrating or merging its domestic and foreign policies with a view to prioritizing the legitimate interests of women in the crafting of its external policy.

Eva Abdullah pointed to the crucial contribution women make to a country’s economy. Women in the Maldives, she said, work 19 hours a day. She cogently elaborated that economic instability is a chief causative factor in the disruption of peace and stability in a country, in view of its subtle capability to undermine a country’s material wellbeing. The latter, in turn, causes social disaffection and unrest. But, generally, the factors seen as undermining a country’s peace are physical conflict and war; that is, overt violence.

However, it is important to come to grips with the less visible or more subtle destroyer of peace, which is economic instability. This form of instability, it was pointed out, has grave long term consequences. For instance, a country’s economic ruin is virtually inherited by every new born infant, since a country in debt is obliged to repay such loans and it falls to future generations to do so.

Abdullah went on to elaborate that economic austerity measures undertaken by a country in debt, for example, while disruptive of peace, exert a deleterious impact on particularly women and other vulnerable groups. After all, the contribution of women to the GDP of a country is inestimable. This is all the reason why women’s issues need to be brought to the forefront of foreign policymaking.

In other words, foreign policy, Abdullah pointed out, is essentially all about the promotion of human rights. Since such rights are insidiously undermined during times of economic austerity; debt issues, which come to the fore during economic crises in particularly the South, cannot be viewed in isolation from women’s issues and external policy.

Thus, the forum raised issues of crucial importance to foreign policy formulation which countries of the South in particular need to take into account very seriously, going forward. At the end of the symposium a Q&A followed where many an issue of relevance was taken up for discussion.

It ought to be clear to the unbiased observer and commentator that a feminist perspective in foreign policy is of crucial significance to the process referred to as democratic development. The latter signifies growth in tandem with redistributive justice. It goes without saying that foreign and domestic policies that do not help in furthering these aims serve no useful purpose. Thus, a feminist foreign policy and its underlying principles cannot be glossed over or ignored in the process of external policy formulation and implementation.

Generally, a woman’s contribution to a country’s GNP and overall wellbeing goes largely undocumented and unappreciated. For example, women work selflessly and silently in their homestead, but no official price tag is attached to such labour which is instrumental in ‘keeping the home fires burning’. Accordingly, the panelists’ observation that foreign policy in the real and feminist sense is essentially all about the promotion of human rights amounts to an insight of great worth.

I’m glad The Island readers liked my Beauty Tips last week – Beat the Heat – and requested for a few more Face Packs to Beat the Heat. Okay, here are a few more very cool homemade face packs:

* Mango Face Pack: In a bowl, add one tablespoon of fresh mango pulp. To this add one tablespoon of cold cream and one tablespoon of cold milk. Whip the ingredients well to form a thick paste. When done apply this paste on the skin, allow it to dry and then rinse it off.

* Watermelon Face Pack: In a bowl, add half a cup of watermelon pulp. To this add 01 tablespoon of curd. Combine the ingredients and apply the pack on your face. When the pack turns dry, rinse it off with cold water.

* Curd Face Pack: When curd is used on the skin, it will help to improve the skin tone. Apply cold curd on your face and neck twice in a week…when the heat is on. The curd will open your pores and help you to get a natural glow in no time.

* Cucumber Face Pack: Cucumber is the best vegetable that you can use on the skin in the heat. Make a thick juice out of one cucumber, and 03 tablespoons of sugar with 01 teaspoon of curd. When this pack is ready, massage it on to the skin and let it dry. After 15 minutes, peel the face pack from the skin and then rinse with cold milk.

* Pineapple Face Pack: Grind the flesh of one pineapple to a thick juice. Rinse your face with this juice and let it dry. After 10 minutes, rinse your face with rose water and wipe dry. Wait 15 minutes and then wash your face with cold water. This face pack will make you feel refreshed.

Alternate Space

‘To prove that degrees, per se, are worthless. Often, they are honorifics of true scientists or learned scholars or inspired teachers. Much more frequently they are false faces for overeducated jackasses.’ – Robert A. Heinlein 

It is the above quote that came to mind when witnessing the barrage of information coming out on the saga of the Sri Lankan parliamentary speaker Asoka Ranwala’s PhD qualification, or the lack of it. Of course, true to form, we have outdone ourselves – yet again. In Sri Lanka’s case, degrees are not only the “false faces for overeducated jackasses”. Our people who often wear degrees like expensive jewellery are the worst of the uneducated louts, to put it mildly.  The fiasco surrounding former speaker Ranwala’s resignation has also brought to the fore one of the most serious ailments our society has been afflicted with for a very long time, i. e. false pretense for social recognition and/or profit, mostly by superimposing degrees or other perceived qualifications on one’s public persona.  This is not new, but the recent saga has invited a significant degree of prominence. This is not only due to Ranwala’s recently acquired status as the Speaker and the country’s third citizen but, more importantly, as a result of the moral high ground on which the NPP campaigned and was elected to Parliament with an unprecedented majority.

Soon after my undergraduate studies in the 1980s, I met a friend in Pettah who had studied history at the University of Colombo during my time, but was practising medicine in Tissamaharama.  Quackery is part of this same scheme and is better known though it is structurally part of the same cluster of scams. These scams involving non-existent degrees or inflated qualifications usually involve lying to the public. Quite simply, it is a matter of public dishonesty. But politicians and dubious characters affiliated with politics have been the worst culprits in this scam. Sajith Premadas’s bachelor’s degree from the London School of Economics has been an unresolved bone of contention for a long time, and has resurfaced again now. Similarly, Namal Rajapaksa’s Attorney-at-Law qualification (not a degree) from the Sri Lanka Law College after sitting for the final exams in restricted conditions by himself (easily doable under the Rajapaksas) is another well-known case, which also has become part of the debate again.  Ironically, both are now asking the present government to cleanse itself of false degree holders! The demand would have been more believable if the Opposition began its war cry by cleansing itself of its most obvious culprits.

The late Eliyantha Lindsay White, heavily sponsored by the Rajapaksas, who claimed to be a doctor with miraculous healing powers, and Viranjith Thambugala’s alleged PhD and teaching at well-known institutions, including at NASA, are among more recent cases.  None of these people – from Premadasa to Thambugala – have ever uttered anything sensible that can vouch for their alleged advanced formal training.  Nevertheless, they have been allowed to remain untouched, beyond short-lived public outcries, because such fakery is not a crime, but an ethical issue. More importantly, they had enormous political protection. Besides, ethics are of no concern for such people. This, however, was not possible for Ranwala.  The question is why not, and what feeds this ailment in our country.

The short answer to “what feeds this ailment” is, because of the long-standing importance given to education in our country, in the context of which advanced education and university affiliations are taken very seriously beyond simple professional matters.  What these nefarious people from universities and outside are doing is to make use of this broad-based public interest and institutionalized respect, for their own private social and political gain.  Up to now, it has been a safe game to play.

Information available suggests that Ranwala does not even have the bachelor’s degree from the University of Moratuwa, which he had initially claimed.  In his resignation letter, which itself is a fascinating document, he has claimed that he had not been able to collect the paperwork pertaining to his PhD from Waseda University, Tokyo, but he nevertheless has the degree.  But this is late 2024 and not the 15th century.  One does not need to send a delegation bearing gifts to the Vice Chancellor of this Japanese university to get the transcripts and authenticated degree certificates pertaining to any former candidate in any degree programme.  All that was needed in this case was for Ranwala to make that request himself or otherwise authorize someone else to do it and make the required payment.  The information would have come via email in a few days if not a few hours. There is no indication this was ever attempted. If that was done sooner — if the former Speaker’s claims are true — this fiasco would not have reached the heights it did. It also would have saved the government needless embarrassment.

But this also opens another more important question.  That is, why did the NPP wait for so long to get their man to relinquish his duties as Speaker, and that, too, with a somewhat non-committal resignation letter, with its spokesperson Nalinda Jayatissa deliberately evading questions by journalists. Some of its Ministers, like Wasantha Samarasinghe and Deputy Minister Namal Karunarathna, went to the extent of issuing an unnecessary threat amidst much bravado that they have the numbers in place (which we the people had given them not too long ago) to defeat any no-confidence motion by the Opposition.  What this means is that the NPP was willing to compromise its own ethical standards for the protection of one person and his possible dishonesty. This was not merely a debate over a certificate.  More crucially, it is about lying in public to all of us and getting elected because some voters would have voted for him assuming him to be a learned man. I am sure it is this belief in the integrity and the perceived qualifications of its man that the JVP was moved to appoint Ranwala as the Speaker when there were many better qualified people in Parliament to hold that responsibility, but without such dubious baggage.

Ultimately, this is about the confidence in the man, others like him and by extension the government itself.  Not just this incident, but the lackluster way in which it was handled by the NPP and the way in which its JVP members at large justified Ranwala’s status publicly and vociferously have only done one thing: it has created a needless rupture in the moral high ground with which the NPP was ushered into power. All indications are, he was protected within the government until it was no longer possible (with an impending no-confidence motion and widespread bad press) because he was an important member of the JVP.  None of us are doubting the work he has done tirelessly for years for the betterment of the JVP in considerably difficult times and with risks to his life. But would the same position be adopted if the individual concerned was from another entity within the NPP?

It seems there are many more Ranwalas in Parliament now in the ranks of the NPP. Since the eruption of the Ranwala saga, their degree and professional claims on social media handles and platforms they control have disappeared, opening more questions about their integrity than any answers. These degree claims were also part of their campaign arsenal.

Again, the lead for this was provided by Ranwala himself by discontinuing his LikedIn page as soon as the fiasco emerged.

But to be clear, the incident has so far only dented the government’s moral high ground, and it has not been dismantled – yet.  But if the government is serious about maintaining this hard won moral high ground and the trust people had placed in them, then, it needs to clean shop right now.  People who have lied during their campaigns claiming for themselves degrees and qualifications they do not have, should be identified via a thorough disciplinary investigation and made to resign or be removed. But not only from their positions in the government but also as MPs. The same applies to Ranwala. After all, we did not vote for them to be Ministers, Deputy Ministers and Speaker, but to be MPs.  Needless to say, all this should also apply to similar dishonest people in Opposition if they have any interest at all in reinventing themselves within slightly higher moral standards.

There is no point in arguing as some in the JVP’s public and social media bandwagons have already begun that these are not crimes and others have done it before.  We know all this.  But we did not vote this government in for it to tread along the same dubious and treacherous path other worse culprits have tread before.  That moral high ground that the government once had, and which I think can still be retained, must clearly be retained if it is to do what it promised all of us. But it must be done with effort and sincerity and not with nonsense and bravado. And to do so, we must be shown the government is serious about corruption at all levels.  Public dishonesty is the worst form of corruption. This cannot be an excuse for any reason simply because some of the culprits might be their own. For us to be led by elected leaders, we have to have trust in their integrity.  If not, what would be the difference between this government and those who came before but were booted out decisively?

I hope the President was serious when he said recently in public that the government will deal with all people appropriately within its ranks if they have done anything wrong.  Public dishonesty is ethically wrong, Mr President; it is morally repugnant though it is not illegal. It cannot be an excused for leniency whatever the pressures within might be.

A former student told me recently I should not be too critical of the government as it is doing its best.  I damn well have the right and the responsibility to be exactly this: critical but with self-reflection.  I voted for the NPP and went public for the first time in my life asking people to do so, too, as we as a country needed serious change. But in that same address to the public, I also said that if the government deviated from its principles we supported, we also had the right to object, come to the streets and look for alternatives.  Hopefully, that future will not come.  Hopefully, another Gotabaya saga will not come, which fortunately is in the mind of the President, too, going by his many public statements since the parliamentary election victory. The only way to ensure that this government governs effectively and with dignity is to be honest in public, to be honest in private, to be honest in words, and to be honest in action. Personally, I still have considerable hope for this regime.  But it needs to call off its over-enthusiastic and unenlightened public bulldogs drunk with the power of victory and majoritarian euphoria and begin to grow up politically and morally and not be caught up in the corrupt politics of the past. They also need to realize, most of us did not blindly vote for the JVP but for the JVP-led NPP.  Erasure of this crucial fact would be a serious mistake from which neither the NPP nor the country would be able to recover.