How Autonomous are the National Autonomous Areas of the PRC? An Analysis of Documents and Cases

Abstract

This paper examines the concept of national autonomous areas (NAAs) within the Chinese legal-political context. The first part surveys the Chinese conception of autonomy from Imperial times to the Republican period. From this survey, we understand that the notion of national autonomy is not a creation of the twentieth century, but rather a concept rooted in the Chinese past. Of course, this is not to say that modern forces have not influenced the nationality question. Indeed, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was highly influenced by Soviet nationality policy. Part three therefore examines the CCP’s nationality policy from the days of the Jiangxi Soviet to the end of the Cultural Revolution. The corpus of legislation studied here includes the Chinese Soviet Republic’s Basic Law (1934), the Common Program (1949), the General Program (1952), and the 1954, 1975, 1978, and 1982 constitutions. Part four is devoted entirely to the analysis of the Law on Regional National Autonomy (1984), which represents Deng Xiaoping’s view on the nationality debate. A common theme found in all these legislations is that they are extremely limited in their autonomy provisions; this has been borne out in practice, as cited by the cases in section five. The author concludes that given the experiences of the NAAs, the same fate (if in a different degree) may befall the soon-to-be created Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.