Self-representation and ethnic minority rights in China

Abstract

Proposals to reform along liberal lines China’s system of discrete minority rights, such as ethnic regional autonomy and preferential policies, seek to ‘depoliticize’ minorities by treating them as cultural groups whose members have individual, but not collective, rights. Beyond the binary of only individual rights or no change, a third option is to expand minority rights, including through their self-representation. Not self-determination, which is inapplicable to minorities, self-representation can be based on structures that allow minority people to take up their histories and cultures, ethnic disparities, and their position in China’s political leadership. Organizations of self-representation need not be counterposed to the state and can address non-elite concerns in ways that promote minority participation in China’s governance and minority integration, not assimilation.