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China’s National Identity and the Root Causes of China’s Ethnic Tensions

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Abstract

This paper seeks to examine the People’s Republic of China’s (China) self-defined national identity and the consequences on China’s ethnic relations with its ethnic minorities. This paper argues that China’s identity is equated with the identity and culture of its ethnic Han Chinese majority—a narrative originally constructed by the Chinese state which its ethnic Han Chinese majority since indulges in. However, this hegemonic narrative is at the root of interethnic issues and tensions in China today, as further ethnic tensions stem from the resistance of ethnic minorities against Sinicization and the imposition of this “Chinese” identity against them. These phenomena thus both indicate what I term a weak “internal soft power appeal” of Han Chinese Confucian culture for ethnic minorities living in the PRC, and imply that China must adopt a different, more inclusive national identity if it were to maintain ethnic stability in the long term.

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Notes

  1. An ambiguous political and sociological term used in the People’s Republic of China, translated before the 2000s as “nationality” and currently as “ethnicity,” to be discussed in this paper.

  2. A historic term for the Chinese civilization.

  3. Literally "The Chinese People”

  4. Literally “The Chinese Ethnicity”

  5. Often spelled as “Genghis Khan” in English language literature, due to earlier mistranslations of his name

  6. Minkaomin refers to non-Han ethnic students receiving primary and secondary education, and taking the university examinations in their own respective ethnic languages instead of in the Chinese (Putonghua) language.

  7. The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps, AKA “Bingtuan,” is a unique economic and paramilitary organization in Xinjiang. Dominated by the Han Chinese and answering directly to the CCP, they wield exceptional power in Xinjiang and is perceived as an apparatus for maintaining CCP control in the region.

  8. Yining city, also known as Ghulja, saw a major ethnic conflict in 1997 which, by some sources, ended with dozens of ethnic Uyghurs killed.

  9. Putonghua, or ‘Standard Speech’, otherwise known as Mandarin Chinese, is the official term for the standard dialect of the Han Chinese language in the PRC, and, by extension, the sole official language of China nationwide in practice.

  10. The Gaokao is the University Entrance Examination in China, which is treated with great importance in the Chinese education system.

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  1. MA Political Science, Brock University, 2506-761 Bay Street, Toronto, ON, Canada

    John Irgengioro

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Irgengioro, J. China’s National Identity and the Root Causes of China’s Ethnic Tensions. East Asia 35, 317–346 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12140-018-9297-2

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