What Xi Jinping's new law on ethnic groups in China says
Approved today by the National People's Congress, the legislation turns the president's views on the "sinicisation" of the 56 officially recognised groups into law. Han identity is defined as the "trunk”, while other cultures are compared to "branches and leaves." Putonghua, standard Chinese, will be taught starting in preschool. Tibetans, Uyghurs, and Mongolians fear that their identity will be further repressed.
Milan (AsiaNews/Agencies) – On the final day of the "Two Sessions" in Beijing, the National People's Congress, China’s legislative body, approved the "Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress," a measure strongly supported by President Xi Jinping that aims to give a legal basis to China’s policy of "sinicisation" of ethnic minorities.
On paper, the law claims to promote education and housing policies to integrate China’s 56 officially recognised ethnic groups, who are dominated by ethnic Han. Critics argue that the piece of legislation risks alienating people from their own language and culture.
Case in point: The legislation requires all children to be educated in Mandarin from kindergarten through high school. Previously, students could follow much of the curriculum in their native language, such as Tibetan, Uyghur, or Mongolian.
Ethnic Han represent more than 90 per cent of China's approximately 1.4 billion people. Beijing has long been accused of restricting the rights of ethnic minorities in regions such as Tibet, Xinjiang, and Inner Mongolia, in order to forcibly assimilate them.
Xi's vision in the matter is structured into 12 fundamental principles, known as the "Twelve Duties”.Prominent among them are the need to build a strong sense of national community, defined by the key expression Zhonghua minzu (中华民族), promote a “shared spiritual home”, and encourage greater interaction and integration among different ethnic groups.
The doctrine looks at ethnic issues through the lenses of national security, stressing the duty of all groups to protect social stability and the unity of the state.
Another central element is the concept of the "Four Pairs of Relationships," which describe the relationship between the dominant Han culture and minority cultures. According to this, China’s main culture is the "trunk" of the tree, while ethnic cultures are “branches and leaves”. As Xi noted in a major speech in 2021, only with deep roots and a strong trunk, can branches thrive.
The new law is intended as a foundational regulation in the field of ethnic policies. But, as is often the case with laws of this kind in China, the text does not lay out detailed rules or precise sanctions, but rather contains statements of principle and policy guidelines addressed to a wide range of state and social actors.
Still, its significance is not merely symbolic. By incorporating Xi's doctrine into the legal system, the law will provide it with a more solid legal foundation and will be able to justify future government policies in this regard.
The text includes a lengthy narrative preamble of more than 800 characters, something found in only a handful of Chinese laws, such as those regarding regional ethnic autonomy and the special laws of Hong Kong and Macau.
This preamble proposes a historical narrative according to which China's diverse ethnic groups have built a unified multiethnic state through over five thousand years of shared history. What is more, these communities have managed to preserve a shared civilisation despite foreign aggression since the 19th century.
The text credits the Communist Party of China with guiding all ethnic groups towards independence and equality, developing a model "with Chinese characteristics" for addressing ethnic issues.
One of the most recurring themes in the law is that of "a sense of community of the Chinese nation," which appears dozens of times throughout the text and is defined as the foundation of ethnic unity.
The document calls on all public and private institutions, as well as citizens, to contribute to the construction of a shared national identity. And several chapters outline the ways in which the government intends to achieve these goals. The first area is education and culture.
The law promotes citizens' identification with the homeland, the Chinese nation, traditional culture, and the Communist Party through patriotic education programmes, the dissemination of the national culture, and the promotion of Chinese cultural symbols.
Great care is also given to language. The text reinforces the use of Putonghua, standard Chinese, establishing, for example, that preschool children must master it and that, in public spaces, Chinese characters must be more visible than minority scripts when both are present.
Another goal of the law is to foster greater social and territorial integration between ethnic groups. Local governments are encouraged to create interconnected communities where people of different ethnicities can live, study, and work together.
Policies are also envisaged to facilitate population mobility, educational exchanges, and cooperation between regions.
The law also addresses the economic development of ethnic and border regions, linking it to national strategic objectives such as border security, energy resources, and food supplies.
At the same time, in another section highly susceptible to abuse of power against minorities, it promotes the transformation of certain traditions considered “outdated” with the aim of fostering a "a new culture of civility”.
Regarding enforcement mechanisms, people are encouraged to report behaviour that threatens ethnic unity, while the authorities can intervene to stop the spread of online content deemed discriminatory or divisive.
However, the law does not introduce new specific penalties: any sanctions will be applied according to existing regulations.
Finally, in another extremely sensitive passage, the law also asserts Beijing's jurisdiction over foreign organisations or individuals who “commit acts targeting the PRC that undermine ethnic unity and progress or create ethnic division.”
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05/03/2025 14:51
