Preferential policies for ethnic minorities in China: The case of Xinjiang

Preferential policies for ethnic minorities in China are implemented in family planning, school admissions, the hiring and promotion, the financing and taxation of businesses, and regional infrastructural support. Affirmative action has created greater social equity, while not impairing and likely promoting positive Han‐minority relations. This is so even in Xinjiang, a fast growing, but unstable PRC minority region. China's preferential policies represent a case that does not conform to the hypothesis of Thomas Sowell and other scholars that affirmative action everywhere fails to produce substantial equity, inhibits economic efficiency and creates inter‐ethnic tensions.