Page 165 - DSOC202_SOCIAL_STRATIFICATION_ENGLISH

Social Stratification

Notes Ethnicity and Power

There are both broad and narrow implications of ethnicity. The examples of the broad ethnic
formations are: English, Japanese, Hindus, Muslims, etc. The narrow ethnic formations may be
Bodos, Santhals, Manipuris, or abstracted entities, which are not really ethnic categories, they are
more of ethnic misnomers. These are caste clusters like AJGAR (Ahir, Jat, Gurjar and Rajput),
Forwards, Backwards, Dalits and Minorities. It has also become a common practice to express
regional identities in ethnic idiom such as Oriya, Tamil, Telugu, Assamia, Marathi, Gujarati, etc.
What we need is to study sociology of ethnicity and politics of ethnicity. The two could be studied
independent of each other, and at the same time, the two seem to be inter-twined phenomena of
the same reality.

“Sons of the Soil” movement, the one presently seen in Maharashtra under the leadership
of Shiv Sena and its splinter group, conversion, migration, territoriality, dual labour
market, ethnic division of labour (for example, in Assam and Punjab) have all accelerated
ethnicization of economic and political interests and aspirations, cleavages and conflicts.

To the extent, ethnicity is expressed and appropriated as a means of social protest and social
criticism, providing reasoning to moral and political ideas, and contains a critical spirit, renaissance,
humanism, etc. When ethnicity acquires the character of a tool in the hands of new status-seekers,
the pyramid climbers, it takes the shape of resource in the hands of vested interests. The need is
to see the values and norms, leaders and followers, and the nature of interaction in any given
ethnicized activity/movement/protest. Forces behind ethnicism, and also its counter-protest could
reveal the real character of ethnicization of issues and goals involved therein.

Ethnicity in Specific Regions
China
The People’s Republic of China officially recognizes 56 ethnic groups, the largest of which is the
Han Chinese. Han predominate demographically and politically in most areas of China, although
less so in the autonomous regions of Tibet and Xinjiang (East Turkestan), where the Han are in the
minority. The one-child policy only applies to Han living in cities and who were not born overseas.
Europe
Europe has a large number of ethnic groups; Pan and Pfeil (2004) count 87 distinct “peoples of
Europe”, of which 33 form the majority population in at least one sovereign state, while the
remaining 54 constitute ethnic minorities within every state they inhabit (although they may form
local regional majorities within a sub-national entity). The total number of national minority
populations in Europe is estimated at 105 million people, or 14% of 770 million Europeans.
A number of European countries, including France, and Switzerland do not collect information on
the ethnicity of their resident population.
Russia has numerous recognized ethnic groups besides the 80% ethnic Russian majority. The
largest group are the Tatars 3.8%. Many of the smaller groups are found in the Asian part of
Russia.
India
In India, the population is categorized in terms of the 1,652 mother tongues spoken. Indian society
is traditionally divided into castes or clans, not ethnicities, and these categories have had no
official status since Independence in 1947, except for the scheduled castes and tribes which remain
registered for the purpose of positive discrimination.

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