Today, one of the most serious threats to Tibet is the Chinese demographic influx. The influx is a combination of the direct transfer of Chinese residents by the government, government induced relocation, and spontaneous migration with indirect government support. This influx, which has its roots in early Communist directives, assimilates Tibet and Tibetans into China at a rate unseen in previous decades. The rate has now reached a point where the distinct identity of the Tibetan people and their ancient civilization are being overwhelmed, and Tibet's separate existence is in jeopardy.
Background
In October 1950, when the People's Liberation Army (PLA) marched into Tibet, only a handful of Chinese resided in what is today the Tibet Autonomous Region (T.A.R.). Eastern Tibet, now under the jurisdiction of Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, was home to a small population of Chinese traders. Northeastern Tibet, which is now under the jurisdiction of Qinghai and Gansu Provinces, contained a sizable Chinese population confined to the northwest corner of the province.
By 1956, Beijing introduced demographic management policies aimed at integrating the Tibetan minority into the Chinese majority. The policies projected that the steady flow of Chinese into Tibet would enable rapid economic development and in turn raise the standard of living in the region. A strong economy would facilitate the future settlement of Chinese and provide greater political control. The first wave of immigrants was the PLA, thousands of whom stayed and raised families. And in the 1960s and 1970s, over one million Chinese prisoners were sent to Tibetan prefectures in Qinghai Province.
After Hu Yaobang, former Chinese Communist Party General Secretary, visited Tibet in 1980, Chinese authorities relaxed the flow of settlers, but by 1987, official policy renewed the influx of large numbers of Chinese into the TAR. Population transfers have since been intensified in order to assimilate Tibet into the Chinese economic system and to stabilize and develop Tibetan areas resisting communist authorities.
Recent Trends
In the early 1990s, Beijing implemented significant administrative, infrastructure, and development projects to facilitate large scale Chinese migration to Tibet. Economic construction continues to relocate scientists, teachers, and students from Chinese technical schools into Tibet. In eastern Tibet, the process of the Chinese influx has been marked by the appropriation of Tibetan land for agriculture. Current strategies for economic growth and development rely on and significantly benefit the Chinese settlers. Lay-offs of Tibetans in favor of Chinese workers contribute to the growing unemployment and increased levels of poverty among Tibetans. Mineral extraction and hydroelectric, and irrigation projects also involve the influx of large numbers of Chinese workers.
Travel restrictions within the People's Republic of China and checkpoints on interprovince highways have been lifted. In lieu of softening regulations in China proper, Tibetans face identification checks and other harassment while moving within Tibet. In addition, regulations on private enterprises in Tibet are being eased and loans are made readily available to Chinese settlers. Tens of thousands of Chinese petty entrepreneurs and traders flock to Tibet from interior provinces in order to pursue private economic opportunities. Chinese migrants, who dominate commerce in urban centers such as Lhasa, are establishing markets, clothes shops, hotels, and restaurants as well as discos, karaoke bars, and brothels. The opening of rail links to Tibet from China would invariably speed the process of Chinese migration into Tibet.
Chinese Government Policy
The influx of Chinese to Tibet involves the active participation of the Chinese government. Authorities in Beijing offer an array of benefits, which encourage and facilitate Chinese migration and settlement in Tibet. These incentives are largely financial ones: higher wages, improved pensions, low taxes and land rates, assured employment for family members, quicker promotions, and hardship allowances for people living in remote areas. Annual wages are 87% higher in Tibet than in Chinese provinces. Other social benefits include better housing and longer periods of vacation. Benefits available to Tibetan employees are not as extensive as the benefits offered to Chinese employees. As a result, Tibetans are marginalized in the economic, political, and social spheres of contemporary Tibetan society.
The Party regularly recruits Chinese to skilled jobs as cadres, technicians, and scientists while assigning unskilled Chinese to work on construction sites, in factories, and as road workers. Tibetans have expressed anxiety about the government's active role in taking job opportunities away from Tibetans. They feel that the government prefers to employ Chinese immigrants and does not invest in educating and training Tibetans to compete with the Chinese.
The Chinese government repeatedly denies allegations that it practices a policy of population transfer into Tibet. Meanwhile, Tibetans are currently a minority in five of ten autonomous prefectures. Qinghai Province, 98.5% of which is designated as Tibetan autonomous areas, is now ethnically only 20% Tibetan.
Official sources understate Chinese presence in Tibet. Authorities have claimed that the total number of Chinese in the TAR is 80,837 (3.7% of the total population), compared to a Tibetan population of 2.196 million. Authorities recorded the total Tibetan population of all the areas with Tibetan autonomous status as 4.34 million. The non-Tibetan population in the same area was officially given as 1.5 million. Well researched and credible estimates put the actual Chinese population at no less than 250,000-300,000 in the TAR; and the total number of Chinese in all Tibetan autonomous areas as 2.5 to 3 million.
Official figures fail to record the non-registered floating Chinese population in Tibet. The floating population includes those who have maintained their household registration in a Chinese province and those who have not been in Tibet for more than one year. This population also includes the large number of settlers who have migrated to Tibet on their own volition and without legal registration. These settlers are often given preferential treatment for jobs and establish private shops and restaurants. Official Chinese population figures do not account for military presence in Tibet. A 1990 Party document estimated the number of military personnel in the TAR as 50,000, however other sources estimate the figure at between 100,000-200,000.
Recommendations
- Revoke or amend regulations which establish economic incentives for Chinese in Tibet.
- Provide education and training opportunities to Tibetans that will allow them to compete for and gain skilled jobs.
- Enact and implement Chinese law that requires Tibetan to be the official language in the region.
- Re-establish checkpoints on the roads in Tibet to determine whether people have authorization to live and work in Tibet.
- Enforce residency as a requirement to reduce the floating population
- Limit the hiring of Chinese workers and experts and the period of time they can spend on projects in Tibet. Such regulations have already been enacted by Qinghai provincial authorities, but are not being implemented.
Further Reading
Wang Xiaoqiang and Bai Nanfeng, Poverty of Plenty. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991.
The International Commission of Jurists, "Tibet: Human Rights and the Rule of Law," 1997.
National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, "Tibet: Issues for Americans," 1992.
The Alliance for Research in Tibet, Tibet Outside the TAR, 1996 (CD ROM).
DIIR, Dharamsala, "China's Railway Project, Where Will it Take Tibet?," 2001.
