NWANY Wijesekara https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0391-6220, Dimantha Jayasinghe
Abstract:
Sri Lanka has a strong presence of four major religions and faiths in all walks of life. Acts of violent religious extremism have been reported in Sri Lanka, including the Easter Sunday attacks. Religious leaders can perform a dual role in either contributing to or preventing violent religious extremism. This Facebook survey was conducted from 30 January 2021 – to 09 February 2022 with the aim of eliciting public opinion on the role of religious leaders in transforming violent religious extremism. The total number of respondents was 474, with a large proportion of them being young males from the Colombo district who identified themselves as Sinhala, and Buddhist. Around a quarter of the respondents strongly agreed or agreed that a serious act of violent extremism could happen in their community within the next six months. On the other hand, around 40% of the respondents stated that such an act could occur in Sri Lanka was very high or high within the next six months. In addition, over sixty-eight percent of the respondents strongly agreed or agreed that violent religious extremism is increasing in Sri Lanka. The participants were split between their opinion on religion being a contributory factor or a protective factor for violent religious extremism. When inquired if religious leaders create violent religious extremism or aggravate it, over 56% and 58% of respondents strongly agreed or agreed respectively. In sharp contrast, over 84% of the respondents either strongly agreed or agreed that religious leaders could prevent violent religious extremism. In comparison, over 92% strongly agreed or agreed that they could minimize violent religious extremism. Over 65% of the respondents either disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement that the religious leaders were doing enough to prevent or counter violent religious extremism in Sri Lanka. The findings of this survey point out the need for religious leaders to be more proactively and effectively engaged in transforming violent religious extremism in Sri Lanka.
Keywords: Violent religious extremism, Easter Sunday Attacks, Transformation