The aim here is threefold. First, to understand the nature of China’s policy towards the minorities. Second, to understand the Hanization of the ethnic regions and finally to take a closer look at the recent unrest in Xinjiang. Finally, a summary analysis is done of Chinese state policy in quelling such unrest.

According to the census of 2000, the population of minorities in China amounted to 8.41 % of the total population, more than 100 million. These minorities are however, scattered over 60% of China’s total territory, and constitute a majority in many sensitive border areas.

The Chinese Communist Party follows the Stalinist line which states that “nationality is a stabilised community…which has a common language, a common territory, a common economic life and a common psychological make-up that finds expression in a common culture.” This is how the minority ethnic groups have been identified in China.

The second aspect of note is that the CCP insists that conditions in that country are not suitable for national self-determination or a Soviet-style federal union, but a national or ethnic autonomous system.

A third aspect of note is that while officially, the CCP policy towards religion is to “provide freedom to believe in religion and also the freedom not to believe in religion” – in reality the CCP prefers the latter. Therefore while many ethnic minorities would prefer to follow their religion, the communist state prefers it to low-key. This is one of the hallmarks of the Uighur problem in Central China, where a Muslim minority has begun to assert its religious identity in response to state oppression.

Regional Autonomy for Ethnic Minorities [RAEM] was inspired by the Soviet ethnic policy, imperial China’s practice towards ethnic groups and the CCP’s competition with the Nationalists in winning over ethnic minorities in the 1930s and 1940s. It was installed in the 1950s with the aim of introducing a balance between integration and co-existence of ethnic minorities with the Han. However, from the late 1950s to the late 1970s the RAEM was undermined by Mao’s radicalism and policies of forced integration.

In the early 1990s the CCP announced a three-no’s policy towards the minorities. First, no more ethnic identification work to recognise and confirm a new nationality. Second, no more creation of a new written language and third, no more new founding of a new national or ethnic autonomous area for the minorities.

While officially there are 55 minority groups, in the 2000 census one finds that there are still more than seven lakh people who remain unidentified. The state will not do any new ethnic identification; these peoples are free to join the existing minorities. Second, there are 15 languages for the non-literate minorities, but all have failed in practice. Therefore, the second ‘no’ comes into play.

Finally, the Chinese state is wary of changing the already existing autonomous areas. With growing populations and demands for greater autonomy, it becomes difficult to make a change in the system that is already working.

In this context, it is relevant to note that ethnic autonomous areas in China are divided into three levels, namely, autonomous regions, autonomous prefectures and autonomous counties. In 1947, before the People’s Republic of China was founded, under the leadership of the CPC, the first provincial-level autonomous region in China – the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region – was established in the liberated areas inhabited by Mongolians in compact communities.

After 1949, the Chinese government began to introduce the system of ethnic regional autonomy to all areas where ethnic minorities lived in compact communities. In October 1955, the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region was established; in March 1958, the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region was established; in October 1958, the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region was established; and in September 1965, the Tibet Autonomous Region was established. Today, China has established 155 ethnic autonomous areas, including five autonomous regions, 30 autonomous prefectures and 120 autonomous counties (banners). Of the 55 ethnic minorities, 44 have their own autonomous areas.

From 1949 onwards, the People’s Republic of China organized migration into peripheral areas. In the Xinjiang region in the northwest, the Han Chinese population rose from under ten percent in the 1950s to over forty percent today. Han migration ensured their numerical domination into most of Central, southern and eastern China, but their dominance never took hold in the north and northwest because the land could not support agriculture using traditional techniques. Since 1949, the government has undertaken an aggressive sponsorship and encouragement of Han migration has shifted political power in the minority areas to Han. The interprovincial migration of ethnic groups to the remote and border regions, are as in the past, almost of all han ethnic groups. In some places, the Hans outnumber the local ethnic population. But in other places, where the Hans are in a minority they make their presence felt with the backing of the political and military power of the national state. The Hans in these areas also placed in positions of political and economic power by the Chinese state.

Since the beginning of the 1960s, Beijing has been encouraging Han Chinese to settle in the region. As a result, the Han population of Xinjiang rose from 10% in 1955 to an estimated 40-50%  in 1994, out of a total population of 16 million. The numbers of ethnic Han settlers in Xinjiang has risen from less than half a million in 1953 to 7.5 million by 2000.

There has been a steady erosion of Beijing’s traditional control over the lives of the Chinese population in recent years as the country’s rapid economic growth has triggered greater labour mobility and heightened expectations of greater financial opportunities. At the same time, the death of Deng Xiao Ping marked the end of an era of leadership whose roots
lay firmly in the Chinese revolution and presented the prospect of a period of political instability and uncertain regime durability. If seen in this context, the uprisings in Xinjiang, as well as the continuing resistance to Chinese rule in Tibet and Inner Mongolia, are not atypical responses to the traditional ebb and flow of centre-periphery power relations in China. The history of China is replete with cyclical struggles manifested by the pursuit of independence in peripheral regions as central authority is perceived to weaken.

The revival of Islamic identity throughout Central Asia has certainly contributed directly to the growth of anti-régime hostility in Xinjiang and raised concern in Beijing that religious nationalism poses the greatest threat to the stability of China. Official statements repeatedly refer to the danger of "splittism" along religious lines and it is clear that the government is not prepared to countenance greater ethno-religious autonomy at the risk of jeopardizing the control of the Communist Party. Beijing’s efforts to quell "splittism" in Xinjiang have been couched within the framework of country-wide "strike hard" campaign against crime and corruption, introduced in April 1996. In Xinjiang and Tibet, however, "strike hard" has always been targeted against separatists and thousands of people have been detained or imprisoned without due process.

Beijing’s quandary is how to maintain its authority in Xinjiang whilst avoiding exacerbating the separatist crisis through measures that, inevitably, must accommodate the basic demands of the extremists for greater autonomy. Beijing appears to be in a no-win situation in Xinjiang. If it chooses to pursue more harmonious Chinese-Uighur relations through greater tolerance of cultural and religious freedom in Xinjiang, it risks increasing the separatists’ exposure to the more fervent kinds of religious-nationalist sentiments sweeping Afghanistan and parts of Central Asia. However, if Beijing maintains, or increases, its repressive policies against the separatists, it will fuel the flames of unrest and, perhaps, alienate the regional Islamic states with whom it needs to cooperate in pursuit of its broader economic, political and security objectives.

In the past year, however, incidents have escalated and become bolder, in part because radical groups, once on the fringe, appear to be growing in influence and voice. Among them are the Tibetan Youth Congress, which advocates full independence for the Himalayan region, and the militant East Turkestan Islamic Movement, which China has accused of leading a violent separatist movement in Xinjiang.

In March 2008, Tibet saw its most sustained anti-government uprising in decades in its capital of Lhasa after police moved in to quell a peaceful commemoration by Tibetan monks of a failed 1959 uprising against Chinese rule. The demonstrations exploded into violence, which spread to Tibetan communities in neighboring provinces.

Less than six months later, Uighur separatists were blamed for a series of high-profile bombings and stabbings around the Aug. 8-24, 2008, Beijing Olympics, although no one claimed responsibility. In one instance, militants tossed homemade bombs at government buildings and officials said 12 people were killed, including 10 assailants.

The authorities have responded to the ethnic tensions in Xinjiang the same way they did in Tibetan communities — flooding them with troops and keeping most foreigners out. More Army reinforcements have been moved into Urumqi and other areas of the province from Sichuan. They have undertaken a vigorous patrolling of the areas in order to help the police maintain law and order. Helicopter patrols have also been pressed into service.  In an unusual move, the People’s Daily of China, owned by the Chinese Communist Party, asked its readers in advance to look out for an editorial on July 9 in which it would call for the strict application of the laws against those found guilty and for strict measures to restore social order.

The way the Chinese have handled the aftermath has been refreshingly different from the way they reacted after the Lhasa uprising of March 2008. After the Lhasa uprising, they ordered all foreign journalists and tourists in Tibet to leave and stopped permitting foreign journalists to visit Tibet for nearly three months. Now, the Chinese foreign and information offices in Beijing have been taking the initiative in contacting foreign journalists and requesting them to go to Urumqi to report on the situation. It has been reported that many journalists are already in Urumqi.

The only common factor in the way the Chinese handled the aftermath of the Lhasa uprising and are now handling the Urumqi uprising is the virulent demonisation of His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Youth Congress last year and a similar demonisation of the World Uighur Congress (WUC) and its leaders. The immediate priority for the Chinese, as seen by them, is to address the Han Chinese anger over the alleged failure of the police to protect them on July 5 and 6, 2009. The next priority is to arrest and prosecute all those involved in acts of violence.