Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T05:43:47.255Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Age and the Cost of Being Uyghurs in Ürümchi

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 May 2012

Xiaowei Zang
Xiaowei Zang
Affiliation:
University of Sheffield. E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article asks: is the cost of being Uyghurs higher for young Uyghurs than for old Uyghurs in Ürümchi? I address this question with data from a survey of 2,947 people conducted in Ürümchi in 2005. The cost of being Uyghurs refers to the extent of economic inequality in the earnings of Han Chinese and Uyghurs. I develop three hypotheses on the effect of age on earnings differentials between Han Chinese and Uyghurs. Data analyses show that although young Uyghurs are better educated and earn more than old Uyghurs, they are more likely than old Uyghurs to suffer from being Uyghurs in Ürümchi. This finding has policy implications for the reduction of ethnic disparity in Xinjiang.

Keywords

ethnicityMuslimsinequalityUyghursinter-group relations
Type
Articles
Information
The China Quarterly , Volume 210 , June 2012 , pp. 419 - 434
Copyright
Copyright © The China Quarterly 2012

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Van Wie Davis, Elizabeth, “Uyghur Muslim ethnic separatism in Xinjiang, China,” Asian Affairs: An American Review, Vol. 35, No. 1 (2008), p. 15Google Scholar; Smith, Joanne, “Four generations of Uyghurs,” Inner Asia, Vol. 2, No. 2 (2000), p. 200CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Zhongqi, Pan and Xiaomen, Tan, “Ethnic conflict in China,” Issues & Studies, Vol. 35, No. 5 (1999), p. 153Google Scholar; Sautman, Barry, “Is Xinjiang an internal colony?” Inner Asia, Vol. 2, No. 2 (2000), p. 240CrossRefGoogle Scholar; also Jian Junbo, “Behind the riots in Xinjiang: China's changing economy fueling ethnic tensions,” http://www.skeeterbitesreport.com/2009/07/behind-riots-in-xinjiang-chinas.html; Roberts, Sean, “Negotiating locality, Islam, and national culture in a changing borderlands,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 17, No. 4 (1998), pp. 673–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rudelson, Justin and Jankowiak, William, “Acculturation and resistance,” in Starr, S. Frederick (ed.), Xinjiang: China's Muslim Frontier (Armonk: M.E. Sharpe 2004), pp. 299–319Google Scholar; Mackerras, Colin, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 20, No. 3 (2001), pp. 289–303CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Yee, Herbert, “Ethnic relations in Xinjiang,” Journal of Contemporary China, Vol. 12, No. 36 (2003), pp. 431–52CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 Wong, Morrison G., “The cost of being Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino in the United States 1960, 1970, 1976,” The Pacific Sociological Review, Vol. 25, No. 1 (1982), pp. 61CrossRefGoogle Scholar, 70.

3 Bellér-Hann, Ildikó, Cesàro, M. Cristina, Harris, Rachel and Finley, Joanne Smith (eds.), Situating the Uyghurs between China and Central Asia (Surrey: Ashgate, 2007), p. 38Google Scholar; Rudelson, Justin J., Oasis Identities: Uyghur Nationalism along China's Silk Road (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), p. 20Google Scholar

4 Millward, James, Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007)Google Scholar; James Millward and Nabijan Tursun, “Political history and strategies of control, 1884–1978,” in Starr, Xinjiang, pp. 63–100.

5 Benson, “Education and social mobility,” pp. 191,194–97, 209–12; Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance,” pp. 301, 307; Smith, “Four generations,” pp. 201, 205; also Rudelson, Oasis Identities.

6 Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance,” p. 307; also McMillen, Donald, Chinese Communist Power and Policy in Xinjiang, 1949–1977 (Boulder: Westview, 1979)Google Scholar; Millward, Eurasian Crossroads; Rudelson, Oasis Identities.

7 Davis, “Uyghur Muslim ethnic separatism,” p. 17; Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century.”

8 Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299; also Sautman, “Is Xinjiang an internal colony?”

9 Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299; also Sautman, Barry, “Preferential policies for ethnic minorities in China: the case of Xinjiang,” Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, Vol. 4, No. 1–2 (1998), pp. 86–118CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rebecca Clothey, “China's minorities and state preferential policies: expanding opportunities?” 2001, available at http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/contentdelivery/servlet/ERICServlet?accno=ED453139; Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, “Regional autonomy for ethnic minorities in China,” 2005, available at http://www.globaltimes.cn/www/english/truexinjiang/docs/2009-07/445453_5.html; Information Office of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, “China's ethnic policy and common prosperity and development of all ethnic groups,” 2009, available at http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-09/27/content_12117708_11.htm#. Readers should read official documents from the PRC with caution.

10 Dwyer, Arienne, The Xinjiang Conflict: Uyghur Identity, Language Policy, and Political Discourse (Washington, DC: The East-West Center, 2005)Google Scholar; Schluessel, Eric, “‘Bilingual’ education and discontent in Xinjiang,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 26, No. 2 (2007), pp. 251–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Anaytulla, Guljennet, “Present state and prospects of bilingual education in Xinjiang,” Chinese Education and Society, Vol. 41, No. 6 (2008), pp. 37–49CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance,” p. 306; also Becquelin, Nicolas, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” China Journal, Vol. 44 (2000), p. 85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Stanley W. Toops, “The demography of Xinjiang,” in Starr, Xinjiang, p. 262.

12 Hopper, Ben and Webber, Michael, “Ethnicity, nationalism and the state: migration, modernisation and ethnic estrangement,” Inner Asia, Vol. 11, No. 2 (2009), pp. 169–203Google Scholar; Moneyhon, Matthew, “China's Great Western Development Project in Xinjiang: economic palliative, or political Trojan horse?” Denver Journal of International Law and Policy, Vol. 31, No. 3 (2003), pp. 491–523Google Scholar; also the special issue of The China Quarterly, No. 178: “China's campaign to open up the West: national, provincial and local perspectives.”

13 Benson, “Education and social mobility,” pp. 198, 214; Becquelin, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” pp. 85–86; Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance,” p. 316; Sautman, “Is Xinjiang an internal colony?” p. 247.

14 Toops, “The demography of Xinjiang,” p. 262.

15 Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299.

16 Smith, “Four generations,” p. 201; also Smith, Joanne, “Making culture matter,” Asian Ethnicity, Vol. 3, No. 2 (2002), pp. 153–74CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Roberts, “Negotiating locality”; Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance”; Yee, “Ethnic relations in Xinjiang.”

17 Bauder, Harald and Sharpe, Bob, “Labor market marginalization of youth in San Antonio, Texas,” The Professional Geographer, Vol. 52, No. 3, (2000), p. 531CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Handler, Joel, Social Citizenship and Workfare in the United States and Western Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), pp. 113–15CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Martin, Gary, “A portrait of the youth labor market in 13 countries, 1980–2007,” Monthly Labor Review, Vol. 132, No. 7 (2009), p. 3Google Scholar.

18 Becquelin, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” p. 85; Bovingdon, Gardner, “The not-so-silent majority: Uyghur resistance to Han rule in Xinjiang,” Modern China, Vol. 28, No. 1 (2002), pp. 39–78CrossRefGoogle Scholar at p. 45; Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299; Smith, “Making culture matter,” p. 157; Yee, “Ethnic relations in Xinjiang,” p. 449.

19 Amnesty International, “China: gross violations of human rights in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” 1999, p. 9, available at http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/ASA17/018/1999.

20 Graham E. Fuller and Johnathan N. Lipman, “Islam in Xinjiang,” in Starr, Xinjiang, p. 325; Smith, “Four generations,” p. 201.

21 Becquelin, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” p. 85; Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299; Yee, “Ethnic relations in Xinjiang,” p. 449.

22 Becquelin, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” p. 85; Mackerras, “Xinjiang at the turn of the century,” p. 299; Maurer-Fazio, Margaret, Hughes, James and Zhang, Dandan, “An ocean formed from one hundred rivers,” Feminist Economics, Vol. 13, No. 3–4 (2007), p. 181CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Yee, “Ethnic relations in Xinjiang,” p. 449.

23 Benson, “Education and social mobility,” pp. 198, 214; Becquelin, “Xinjiang in the nineties,” pp. 85–86; Rudelson and Jankowiak, “Acculturation and resistance,” p. 316; Sautman, “Is Xinjiang an internal colony?” p. 247.

24 Toops, “The demography of Xinjiang,” p. 257.

25 Also see Smith, “Four generations,” pp. 195, 204–09; Pimentel, Ellen Efron, “Gender ideology, household behavior, and backlash in urban China,” Journal of Family Issues, Vol. 27, No. 3 (2006), p. 342CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

26 Elliott, Robert and Lindley, Joanne, “Immigrant wage differentials, ethnicity and occupational segregation,” Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Vol. 171, No. 3 (2008), pp. 645–71CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Reid, Lesley Williams, Adelman, Robert M. and Jaret, Charles, “Women, race, and ethnicity,” City & Community, Vol. 6, No. 2 (2007), pp. 137–52CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 Bian, Yanjie, Work and Inequality in Urban China (Albany: SUNY Press, 1994), pp. 154Google Scholar, 156, 168–69.

28 Bian, Work and Inequality, pp. 168–69.

29 Smith, “Four generations,” p. 195.