China's work concerning ethnic groups has been the most successful compared with that of other countries; therefore, China should not belittle itself in this area.
Chinese President Xi Jinping made the above remarks during an important speech given at the Central Ethnic Work Conference held in 2014.This is a scientific conclusion based on a comprehensive look at the ethnic relations at all times and in all countries.
There are roughly 2,500 ethnic groups in the world today, distributing over more than 200 countries and regions. Whether large or small, developed or currently developing, the vast majority of countries around the world are multi-ethnic, and they are all faced with the issues and responsibilities of managing ethnic relations.
For an ethnic group, language is the basis of inheriting its culture and identifying itself. However, when taking this as an example, we found that the policies adopted by different countries towards ethnic minority languages differ greatly.
In the U.K., Gaelic, the traditional language of Highland Scottish people was once excluded from the Scottish education system and public life for more than a century.
Since the founding of the United States of America, a strategy focusing on "assimilation" has been adopted towards the language education of aboriginal Indians, with "English-only education" greatly promoted and bilingual education opposed.
In contrast, since the founding of New China, China has continuously implemented a policy of equality towards ethnic languages, and been vigorously promoting bilingual education.
The great difference between ethnic language policies highlights the real gap between different countries' work related to ethnic groups.
For Western countries, they have undergone periods of colonialism, racism, assimilationism, multiculturalism, and civic protectionism to try and solve ethnic problems. However, neither of them proved to be successful.
Historically, they have divided ethnic groups into different grades and ranks, resulted in genocide, apartheid, forced assimilation, and caused extreme suffering for some ethnic groups.
Even today, issues of race and ethnic minorities remain very sensitive in Western society, and controversies, protests, and riots caused by racial tensions and immigration issues never stop, such as Scotland's special referendum for independence and African Americans' protests against violence towards black Americans in the United States.
Ethnic issues are also widespread amongst developing countries. From failed democracy in Africa to the Arab Spring, to the division and turmoil in Ukraine, ethnic issues have played important role as triggering factors.
During the 1990s, due to the tide of worldwide nationalism, the Soviet Union disintegrated into fifteen separate countries, Yugoslavia into six, and Czechoslovakia was divided into two. It cannot be ignored that an important internal cause was mistakes in ethnic policies adopted by these countries. After the death of Vladimir Lenin, the Soviet Union failed to unswervingly follow the Marxism in dealing with ethnic issues. As a result, the country estimated the process of constructing a socialist society with blind extremism and prematurely believed that domestic ethnic issues had been permanently resolved, which ultimately caused the outbreak of ethnic conflicts, thus leading to the collapse of itself.
In contrast, China has continued to adhere to its own national conditions and its own reality in dealing with ethnic issues, independently exploring a path with which to solve ethnic problems with Chinese characteristics.
By establishing ethnic equality as one of the fundamental principles, China believes all ethnic groups are equal and should act as their own masters. The country adopts the system of regional autonomy for ethnic minorities, opposes any sort of ethnic oppression and discrimination. By doing these, China has established and consolidated the new socialist ethnic relations, which is a great change in the country's history in thousands of years.
Through genuinely offering assistance to its ethnic minorities and guiding all ethnic groups to embark on the socialist path, China is helping its ethnic groups get out from poverty to prosperity, from closure to an open society, from backwardness to civilization.
