Institutes of National Minorities

In carrying out this policy the Institutes of National Minorities which I visited at Peking, Lang-chow and Chengtu are playing a major role. The staff of these Institutes is carrying out fundamental research into the social organisation, the economic problems and the history of China's minority peoples. They have created new scripts for those who had no written language.

Above all, they are training carefully selected students, drawn from some dozens of minority groups, not only in the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism but also to become doctors, teachers and administrators who will return to work among their own people

The layout of these institutes is impressive, the staffing generous, the library and other facilities are excellent. The students are young and enthusiastic; they will return to their remote villages, professionally skilled and ardent supporters of a regime whose resources are marshalled to wipe out the poverty and exploitation from which their parents suffered, which has given them opportunities undreamed of by their parents.

In assessing the significance of the frequent reports of unrest or revolt among the minority peoples of China we would do well to bear in mind the increasing effect of China's minority policy. It is creating—for perhaps the first time in history—a real and living unity between the many peoples of China.