China’s Solution to Its Ethno-national Issues by Shiyuan Hao

Author:Shiyuan Hao
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789813295193
Publisher: Springer Singapore

4.6 Regional Ethnic Autonomy: Legal Norms and Practices

In August 1952, the Program on Implementing Regional Ethnic Autonomy (hereinafter referred to as the program) was submitted to the State Council for consideration, which marked the preliminary legislative effort to carry out the system. Its promulgation provides a legal framework for the full implementation of regional autonomy in China. It defines the nature of autonomous regions in China: “Autonomous regions shall be subordinated to the unified state leadership; in addition, they shall be subjected to the governance of higher-level government”. The program embodies the basic requirements of autonomous regions as inseparable parts of China and the centralized and unified autonomous power. At the same time, this document stipulates the structure of the organs of self-government, the power of autonomy, ethnic relations within an autonomous area and leadership from state organs at higher levels. The promulgation and implementation of the program as China’s first administrative statute on regional ethnic autonomy represent an important step forward in its effort to promote the rule of law in ethnic minority affairs. At the same time, it provided a favorable reference for the legislation of the 1954 Constitution.

Adopted and enacted through the first National People’s Congress, the 1954 Constitution makes principled provisions on the self-government powers of the autonomous areas. It also guarantees a range of rights, including the requirement that the head of government of each autonomous area be of the ethnic group as specified by the autonomous area; self-regulation of finance, economic planning, science, and culture; the administering of their local public security forces in accordance with the military system of the state; drawing up statutes governing the exercise of autonomy or separate regulations suited to the political, economic, and cultural characteristic of the nationality or nationalities in a given area; employment of the spoken and written language by the organs of self-government. Among these provisions, the power of drafting autonomous statutes or separate regulations is the key to the specification of the power of autonomy.

Marxism–Leninism believes that the multi-ethnic socialist state, in addition to formulating state laws, should elaborate and develop the nationwide law by drafting special decrees applicable to a given area.54 In the discourse of China, it means that we should “act according to circumstances”. Zhou Enlai pointed out: “it is totally impossible to set uniform provisions on the right of autonomy for all the autonomous regions due to their divergent local conditions. The experiences and approaches applicable to the compact communities of the Han people shall not be mechanically copied to autonomous areas for ethnic minorities; likewise, those suitable to a certain autonomous area shall not be indiscriminately imitated in another”.55

In fact, it is easier to implement a uniform and nationwide policy than draft corresponding measures applicable to the specific conditions of a given area. Therefore, the promulgation of autonomous statutes or separate regulations must be based on grasping the local conditions in a realistic way while understanding the unifying principle of the nationwide policy. All these need to be explored step by step in the process of building the autonomous areas.

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