The theme for the Sri Lanka Foundation Institute’s (SLFI) Annual Convention in 2003 was titled ‘Youth Aspirations, Democracy and Development.’ Accordingly, a large volume of papers were generated at the conference in relevance to the topic. Nine of them under the title ‘Rights and Right to participate: Democracy, Development and Human rights in Post Colonial Sri Lanka’ were selected and presented in this volume. The subject matter encompasses numerous issues that challenge Sri Lankan polity, such as constitution making, problems pertaining to law and order, education, development and democracy. These issues lie at the heart of Sri Lanka’s polity crisis. The papers are useful guidelines for policymakers for designing a strategy for Sri Lanka’s future.