nationalist commitment. Modernization, it would appear, has been ineffective, for the most part, as a force for assimilation, although there are differences of degree from republic to republic.

As we survey the three Baltic republics, it is Latvia which appears to have been most affected by Soviet Russian encroachment and to have manifested the least resistence to assimilation. However, the explanation for this lies not so much in modernization as in political factors. After the purges of 1959-62, the influence of the native Latvian leadership was largely emasculated, and the republic was placed under a regimen of very strict cultural controls. The result has been that a feeling of impotence has penetrated deeply into the Latvian intelligentsia. Moreover, the Latvian experience, when compared with that of the other Baltic republics, suggests a strong correlation between the percentage of Russian population in a given republic and the ability of the native population to protect its ethnic values.

The basic reason why industrialization and modernization have failed to produce real assimilation appears to be the fact that the Baltic people have continued to constitute majorities in their respective republics and to enjoy the status of union republics, which has allowed the local governments to function as systems capable of satisfying the regular human needs of their citizens. (It may be noted that Balts have been much less successful in preserving their ethnic identity when they have moved to the dominant Russian republic.) Moreover, the interwar experience of independent statehood has helped to sustain nationalist commitment. Finally, the Baltic nationalities all have non-Slavic linguistic backgrounds and traditional national cultures that have

never been dominated by or drawn their strength from the Russian heritage."

While the Baltic nationalities do not seem to be voluntarily assimilating to the extent observed in the Slavic republics" and among smaller nationalities and members of ethnic groups living away from their native territory (particularly in urban settings),” students of nationality affairs in the Soviet Union should not close their eyes to the high degree of Russification that has already occurred in the Baltic republics. Given the Kremlin's assimilationist goals, the crucial question for the Baltic region is whether Moscow will find it economically and politically possible to pursue its obvious course of managing economic and social processes in the Baltic republics to the point of reducing the local nationalities to urban minorities. Such a policy would doubtless lead to a further intensification of the ethnic conflict that already seems to characterize the current Baltic

scene.

69 On Baltic cultural peculiarities, see V. Stanley Vardys, "The Role of the Baltic Republics in the Soviet Union," originally prepared for a conference at the University of Michigan and shortly appearing in a volume on nationalism in the USSR, edited by Professor Roman Szporluk.

70 Yaroslav Bilinsky shows that in comparison to the Baltic area, assimilationist processes in the Ukraine are more advanced and resistance to assimilation lower. See his "The Background of Contemporary Politics in the Baltic Republics and the Ukraine: Comparisons and Contrasts," in Arvids Ziedonis, Jr., Rein Taagepera, and Mardi Valgemae, Eds., Problems of Mininations: Baltic Perspectives, San Jose, California, Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies, Inc., p. 112.

71 On the influence of the urban setting on assimilation, see, for example, Brian Silver, "Social Mobilization and Russification of Soviet Nationalities," The American Political Science Review, Vol. 68, No. 1, 1974, pp. 54 ff.

By June Teufel Dreyer

A

ccording to Karl Marx, the ethnic tensions which have rent or threatened to rend many states asunder should not occur in socialist states. National consciousness, as Marx saw it, was a manifestation of bourgeois society, and nationalism and ethnicity were tools which the bourgeoisie❘ utilized to mask the true cause of tension-class differences and thereby perpetuate its own rule. In a socialist state, on the other hand, ethnic antagonisms should not become a problem because the adoption of a tolerant, nonrepressive attitude toward all ethnic groups would lead the workers of different nationalities to identify their interests in class terms. The socialist state would encourage the unforced growing together of these groups, and a common proletarian culture would eventually emerge. In other words, ethnic differences, like the state itself, would simply wither out of existence.

Marx, however, was ambiguous as to both the length of time necessary for this attrition of ethnicity to take place and the degree of homogeneity required for the common proletarian culture to emerge. It is possible to imagine a spectrum of opinion ranging from the belief that the socialist state can eradicate all ethnic differences quickly and thoroughly to the view that the process of blunting the more severe of these differences will require a long period of time. The former point of view may be characterized as radical assimilationist; the latter

Ms. Dreyer is Associate Professor of Political Science at Miami University of Ohio and a specialist in Chinese political affairs, particularly in the area of minority policy. She is the author of a forthcoming book, China's Forty Millions: Minority Nationalities and National Integration in the People's Republic of China, and has written for such journals as The China Quarterly and Pacific Affairs.

as gradualist and pluralistic. Within these parameters are a wide variety of intermediate positions concerning the degree of accommodation that should be shown toward different minority groups on such issues as language, dress, work habits, allocation of resources, and life style in general. At least in theory, the proponents of these different positions all have an equal claim to Marxist orthodoxy.

As a socialist state, and one where the issue of Marxist orthodoxy is accorded a high degree of importance, the People's Republic of China has been at pains to "solve" its nationalities problem in an appropriately socialist manner. The concrete measures advocated by Chinese policymakers to achieve this goal have spanned the entire spectrum described above, and there has been considerable tension between proponents of differing views. The following article will outline the shifts that have taken place in the Chinese Communists' minorities policy over the past 25 years and attempt to assess the respective merits of the different approaches in achieving the classless, non-nationalistic society envisioned by Marx.

The Early Period

The circumstances in which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) came to power in 1949 counseled a gradual, pluralistic approach to the problem of dealing with China's ethnic minorities. Victory had come much more quickly than anticipated, and the party consequently had available only a relatively small group of cadres equipped to serve in minority areas. Moreover, certain ethnic groups bitterly opposed some aspects of the party's program: the Hui, or Chinese Muslims, for example, were militantly against its atheism and quite prepared to die

All these factors were conducive to an initial policy of tolerance toward what were termed the "special characteristics" of minorities. The approach, however, differed from group to group. Where a minority had indigenous Communist leaders and a level of social and technological development approaching that of the dominant Han Chinese (94 percent of the population), there was relatively less compromise with minority traditions and culture and greater emphasis on early social reform. On the other hand, where these conditions were not present or where special considerations dictated caution and moderation, there was a greater degree of tolerance.

The most conspicuous examples of "advanced" minorities were the Mongols, the Koreans, and the Chuang. All had produced native Communist leaders: Ulanfu in Inner Mongolia, Chu Te-hai in Kirin Province, and Wei Kuo-ch'ing in Kwangsi Province had proven themselves politically astute and talented organizers. The agricultural (though not the pastoral) Mongols, the Koreans, and the Chuang, moreover, had had more sustained contacts with the Han Chinese over a longer period of time than most other minorities, and they had attained a standard of living roughly comparable to that of the Han. In

China (formerly Japanese-occupied Manchuria) may even have had a higher standard of living than their Han compatriots. In these areas, land reform was carried out at approximately the same time as in the Han areas, and there were relatively few concessions to the traditional local elite.

In the other minority areas, the early Communist approach was generally characterized by compromise. The Hui, for example, not only were allowed to continue the practice of their Muslim religion, but a number of ahron, or prayer leaders, were absorbed into governing bodies at various levels. Many minority groups were promised that no social reforms would be undertaken except at the behest of the masses, and at least one slave-owning nobleman of a minority group in Southwest China was elected to the National People's Congress.' A similarly relaxed policy was evident in the Western frontier province of Sinkiang, where the only prominent indigenous Communist, Saifudin, was a product of the province's earlier connections with the Soviet Union, and where the Communists were anxious to avoid giving cause for a possible separatist movement among the Uighur minority. Policy toward minorities in the Southwest, as well as in Tibet following the Chinese military takeover in 1950, was still more tolerant. In Yunnan, the former warlord of the province, a Yi, was named to the Central People's Government Council, the forerunner of the State Council, and also served in the National People's Congress. In Tibet, an agreement was signed in May

1 Before the CCP's accession to power, Hui rebellions were frequent and fierce. Renowned for their martial skills, the Hui were especially formidable when engaged in holy war against non-Muslims-which most of their grievances seem to have escalated into. Outnumbered and armed only with swords, they were known to charge head-on into machine-gun barrages and emerge victorious. (On these matters, see Robert Ekvall, Cultural Relations on the Kansu-Tibetan Border, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1939, p. 17, and Harrison Forman, "China's Moslems," Canadian Geographic Journal [Ottawa] Vol. 27, No. 9, p. 140.) A Chinese Communist administrator, writing shortly after the Communists' advent to power, recalled the Han proverb "every ten years a small rebellion, every thirty years a large one" in urging a tolerant attitude toward the Hui (Sun Tso-pin, "Some Opinions on Minority Nationalities Work," Hsin-hua yüeh-pao [Peking], Vol. 1, No. 4, p. 876).

2 Two examples were Ma Sung-t'ing and Ma Chen-wu. However, they and a number of other Hui religious leaders were subsequently removed from office during the anti-rightist campaign of 1958 on the ground that they had been using religion as a "cloak" to disguise their anti-socialist activities (see Chen Kuang, "Oppose the Reactionary Religious Elements, Help the Shantung Hui into a New World," Min-tsu t'uan-chieh [henceforth, MTTC-Peking], No. 7, 1957, p. 16). 3 Alan Winnington, The Slaves of the Cool Mountains, London, Lawrence and Wishart, 1959, p. 85. During the Cultural Revolution,

the head of the CCP's Southwest China Bureau was accused of having named more than 80 percent of the upper-class members of Szechwan Province's minorities to governing bodies of some sort. All 11 Szechwan minority delegates to the First National People's Congress were said to have been from the upper classes, without a single member from the working class. On these accusations, see T'ien Pao, "The Counterrevolutionary Revisionist Li Ching-ch'uan's Towering Crimes in Nationality Work in Szechwan," speech broadcast by Kweiyang Radio, Oct. 7, 1967.

* Because Sheng Shih-ts'ai, the warlord and nominal Kuomintang governor of Sinkiang, had established close ties with the Soviet Union during the 1930's, Sinkiang's Communist movement was Soviet- rather than Chinese-influenced. Certain activities of the Sinkiang Communists led both the Kuomintang and the CCP to suspect that the Communists might be planning to separate the province from China and join with their fellow ethnics living across the Soviet border. These suspicions were reinforced after the CCP's assumption of power by Soviet propaganda aimed at Sinkiang's minorities— a subject of frequent criticism by the Chinese media since the public acknowledgement of the Sino-Soviet rift. See Alan Whiting and Sheng Shih-ts'ai, Sinkiang: Pawn or Pivot? East Lansing, Michigan State University Press, 1958, passim; and Wang En-mao, "The Great Victory of Mao Tse-tung's Thought in Sinkiang," Peking Radio, Oct. 7, 1965.