THE IDENTITY OF CAPITALISTS AND THE LEGITIMACY OF CAPITALISM - SRI-LANKA SINCE INDEPENDENCE

In many Asian countries, the early decades of independence after World War II were marked by tension between 'indigenous' political elites a nd business elites that were in large part alien, or from minority eth nic groups. This tension was one reason for the preference that most g overnments showed for statist and nationalist economic policies. It ha s abated in most cases; political and business elites now tend to purs ue more co-operative strategies. Much of the explanation for this lies in changes in the international political economy that made market-or iented economic policies more attractive to political elites. There ar e in addition internal political reasons for this rapprochement. These vary from case to case, and have been explored in most detail by scho lars in relation to the Southeast Asian countries where Overseas Chine se have dominated larger scale business. This article extends this lit erature by examining the causes of the gradual rapprochement between ' majority' politics and 'minority' business in Sri Lanka.