The government passed a law on a “shared” national identity among the country’s 55 ethnic minority groups, a move critics say will further erode the identity of people who are not majority Han Chinese and risk making anyone challenging that “unity” a separatist punishable by law.
Called “Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress”, the ethnic minority law aims to forge national unity and advance the rejuvenation of the nation with the Chinese Communist Party at its core, a draft copy of the law showed.
It was passed at the closing session of the annual meeting of the National People’s Congress, China’s legislature by 2,756 votes yesterday, with three opposing votes and three abstentions, according to a Reuters witness.
Officially, China has 56 officially recognised ethnic groups, dominated by the Han Chinese, who account for more than 91% of the country’s 1.4 billion people.
China’s ethnic minority populations – including Tibetans, Mongols, Hui, Manchus, and Uyghurs – are concentrated in regions that together cover roughly half of the country’s land area, much of it rich in natural resources.
The law aims to promote integration across ethnic groups through education, housing, migration, community life, culture, tourism and development policy, the law said.
It mandates that Mandarin is the basic language of instruction in schools, and for government and official business.
In public settings, where Mandarin and minority languages are used together, Mandarin must be given “prominence in placement, order, and similar respects,” the draft said.
“The state respects and protects the learning and use of minority languages and scripts,” it added.
Allen Carlson, an associate professor of government at Cornell University and an expert on Chinese foreign policy, said the law underlined a move towards assimilation.
He said the law is the government’s effort to ensure non-Han communities integrate more with the Han majority.
An editorial in state daily China Daily said that the law had followed a rigorous legislative process, been through multiple readings and consultations with lawmakers and representatives from ethnic minority communities.
“The law stresses the protection of cultural traditions and lifestyles of all ethnic groups... it is misleading to claim that ethnic minorities in China must choose between economic development and cultural preservation,” it said. — Reuters
