| dc.description.abstract | This thesis aims to research Sri Lankan Tamil diaspora activism in the victor’s peace context of Sri Lanka. In this regard, this thesis examines how the British Tamils Forum (BTF), a London-based Tamil diaspora group, uses collective action to engage in the transitional justice processes in Sri Lanka, from 2009 up to June 2016. BTF’s activism in this context should be perceived in relation to the contested nature of transitional justice, where the victor’s peace has led to diverging views between the Tamil diaspora and the Sri Lankan government on how to perceive ‘justice’ and achieve reconciliation in the post-war context. To examine how the BTF engages in collective action in relation to transitional justice, this thesis uses the analytical concepts of ‘mobilising structures’, ‘framing’ and ‘political opportunities’ to study BTFs ‘iii-campaign’, which strives for the establishment of an ‘international independent investigation’. The findings of this thesis illustrate the strategical agency of the BTF in their collective action endeavours, in the way they restructured and ‘legitimised’ their organisation to gain access to the political establishment, constructed their own reality regarding the Tamil marginalisation and seized new supranational political opportunities to engage in the transitional justice processes and reposition themselves in the post-war context. | |
