National minorities: problems, protection and rights

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:43

The issue of nationality has always been very sharp. This is due not only to artificial factors, but also to the historical development of mankind. In primitive society, a stranger was always perceived negatively, as a threat or an "annoying" element that one wants to get rid of. In the modern world, this issue has acquired more civilized forms, but still remains a key one. It makes no sense to condemn or give any assessments, since the behavior of people is mainly controlled by the herd instinct when it comes to "strangers".

What is a national minority?

National minorities are groups of people who live in a certain country, being its citizens. However, they do not belong to the indigenous or settled population of the territory and are considered a separate national community. Minorities may have the same rights and obligations as the general population, but they are often not treated well for a variety of reasons.

Vladimir Chaplinsky, a Polish scientist who has carefully studied this topic, believes that national minorities are consolidated groups of people who most oftenlive in separate regions of the country, strive for autonomy, while not wanting to lose their ethnic features - culture, language, religion, traditions, etc. Their numerical expression is much less than the average population of the country. It is also important that national minorities never occupy a dominant or priority value in the state, their interests are rather relegated to the background. Any recognized minority must reside in the territory of a given country for quite a long time. It is also noteworthy that they need special protection from the state, as the population and individual citizens may be too aggressive towards another national group. This behavior is very common in all countries of the world where certain ethnic groups of people live.

Protection of the rights of national minorities is a key issue in a number of countries, because the global acceptance of minorities does not lead to change everywhere. Many countries are just passing the first legislative acts that will be aimed at protecting minorities.

Rise of this issue

The rights of national minorities have become a hot topic due to the fact that this issue is quite closely related to state policy. Of course, the concept arose and was put into use due to discrimination of the population on a national basis. Since interest in this issue only increased, the state could not stand aside.

But what caused the interest in minorities? It all started in the 19th century, when many empires began to fall apart. This resulted in whatthe population was "out of work". The collapse of the Napoleonic Empire, the Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman Empire, the Second World War - all this led to the liberation of many people, even nations. Many states gained independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The concept of "representative of a national minority" began to be used only in the XVII century in international law. At first it concerned only small regional minorities. A clearly formulated and correctly formulated question of minorities was raised only in 1899 at one of the congresses of the Social Democratic Party.

There is no precise and unified definition of the term. But the first attempts to form the essence of minorities belonged to the Austrian socialist O. Bauer.

Criteria

The criteria for national minorities were established in 1975. A group of sociologists from the University of Helsinki decided to conduct an extensive study on the topic of ethnic groups in each country. Based on the results of the study, the following criteria for national minorities were identified:

• common origin of an ethnic group;
• high self-identification;
• strong cultural differences (especially their own language);
• the presence of a certain social organization that ensures productive interaction within the minority itself and outside it.

It is important to note that scientists from the University of Helsinki did not focus on the size of the groups, but on certain aspects of social and behavioral observations.

Another criterion can be considered positive discrimination, in which minorities are given many rights in different areas of society. Such a situation is possible only with the right policy of the state.

It is worth noting that countries whose national minority are a very small number of people tend to treat them more tolerantly. This is explained by a psychological phenomenon - society does not see a threat in small groups and considers them completely controlled. Despite the quantitative component, the culture of national minorities is their main we alth.

Legal regulation

The issue of minorities was raised as early as 1935. Then the Permanent Court of International Justice said that the presence of minorities is a matter of fact, but not of law. An unclear legal definition of a national minority is present in paragraph 32 of the 1990 Copenhagen Document of the SCCC. It says that a person can consciously belong to any minority, that is, of his own free will.

UN Declaration

Legal regulation of minorities exists in almost every country in the world. In each of them there is a certain community of people with their own ethnic group, culture, language, etc. All this only enriches the indigenous population of the territory. In many countries of the world there are legislative acts that control the development of minorities in national, cultural and socio-economic terms. After the UN General Assemblyadopted the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic Minorities, this issue has become an international level. The Declaration enshrines the rights of minorities to national identity, the opportunity to enjoy their culture, speak their native language and have free religion. Also, minorities can create associations, establish contacts with their ethnic group living in another country, and participate in decision-making that directly affects them. The Declaration establishes the obligations of the state to protect and protect national minorities, take into account their interests in foreign and domestic policy, provide conditions for the development of minority culture, etc.

Framework Convention

The creation of the UN Declaration served to the fact that in a number of European countries began to create legislative acts that disclosed the rights and obligations of national minorities living in a particular territory. It is worth noting that this issue became really serious only after the intervention of the UN. Now the issue of minorities was to be regulated not independently by the state, but based on world practice.

Since the 80s, the creation, development and improvement of a multilateral treaty has been actively going on. This lengthy process ended with the adoption of the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. She pointed out that the protection of minorities and the provision of adequate rights for them had become a full part of the project for the international protection of the rights of the individual. To date, the Framework Convention has been signed by 36countries of the world. The Convention on National Minorities showed that the world is not indifferent to the fate of certain ethnic groups.

At the same time, the CIS countries decided to adopt their universal law on the protection of minorities. The widespread creation of international documents on national minorities suggests that the issue has ceased to be a state issue and has become an international one.

Problems

We must not forget that countries that sign international treaties are getting new problems. The provisions of the Convention require a significant change in legislation. Thus, the country needs either to change its legislative system, or to adopt many separate international acts. It should also be noted that it is impossible to find a definition of the term "national minorities" in any international document. This leads to a number of difficulties, since each state separately has to create and find signs that are recognized as common to all minorities. It all takes a long time, so the process is very slow. Despite international activity in this regard, in practice things are somewhat worse. In addition, even the established criteria are often very incomplete and inaccurate, which gives rise to a lot of problems and misunderstandings. Do not forget about the negative elements of each society, which only want to cash in on this or that law. Thus, we understand that there are a lot of problems in this area of regulation of international law. They are solved gradually and individually, independing on the policy and own preferences of each state.

Legal regulation around the world

The rights of national minorities in different countries of the world vary considerably. Despite the general and international acceptance of minorities as a separate group of people who should have their own rights, the attitude of individual political leaders can still be subjective. The lack of clear, detailed selection criteria for the minority only contributes to this influence. Consider the situation and problems of national minorities in different parts of the world.

There is no specific definition of the term in the documents of the Russian Federation. However, it is often used not only in international documents of the Russian Federation, but also in the Constitution of Russia. It is worth noting that the protection of minorities is considered in the context of the federation and in the context of the joint jurisdiction of the federation and its subjects. National minorities in Russia have enough rights, so it cannot be said that the Russian Federation is too conservative a country.

Ukrainian legislation tried to explain the term "national minority", saying that this is a certain group of people who are not Ukrainians on a national basis, have their own ethnic identity and communities within themselves.

The Estonian law “On Cultural Autonomy” states that a national minority is Estonian citizens who are historically and ethnically connected with it, have long lived in the country, but differ from Estonians in a special culture,religion, language, traditions, etc. This is what serves as a sign of minority self-identification.

Latvia has adopted the Framework Convention. Latvian law defines minorities as citizens of a country who differ in culture, language and religion, but have been attached to the territory for centuries. It is also indicated that they belong to the Latvian society, preserve and develop their own culture.

In the Slavic countries, the attitude towards persons of national minorities is more loyal than in other countries of the world. For example, national minorities in Russia exist on practically the same terms as native Russians, while in a number of countries minorities are not even recognized as existing.

Other approaches to the issue

There are countries in the world that are distinguished by their special approach to the issue of national minorities. There can be many reasons for this. One of the most frequent is a long, centuries-old feud with a minority that for a long time slowed down the development of the country, oppressed the indigenous people and sought to occupy the most advantageous position in society. Countries that take a different view of the issue of minorities include France and North Korea.

France is the only EU country that refused to sign the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities. Also before that, the French Constitutional Council rejected the ratification of the European Charter for Regional Languages.

The country's official documents state that there are no minorities in France, and also that constitutional considerations do not allowFrance to sign international acts on the protection and accession of national minorities. UN bodies believe that the state should resolutely reconsider its views on this issue, since officially there are many linguistic, ethnic and religious minorities in the country, which should have their legal rights. However, for now, the issue is up in the air as France is unwilling to revise its decision.

North Korea is a country that differs from other countries in many ways. Not surprisingly, she did not agree with the majority opinion on this issue. Official documents say that the DPRK is a state of one nation, which is why the question of the existence of minorities cannot exist in principle. However, it is obvious that this is not the case. Minorities are present almost everywhere, it is an ordinary fact that stems from historical and territorial aspects. Well, if silent minorities are raised to the level of the indigenous population, this is only for the better. However, it is possible that minorities are severely infringed on their rights not only by the state, but also by individual citizens who treat minorities with hatred and aggression.

Society attitude

The law on national minorities is observed differently in each country. Despite the official recognition of minorities, minority discrimination, racism and social exclusion are common in every society. There can be many reasons for this: different viewson religion, rejection and rejection of another nationality as such, etc. Needless to say, discrimination by society is a serious problem that can lead to many serious and complex conflicts at the state level. In the UN, the issue of minorities has been relevant for about 60 years. Despite this, many states remain indifferent to the fate of any group within the country.

The attitude of society towards national minorities largely depends on the policy of the state, its intensity and persuasiveness. A lot of people just like to hate because they don't get punished for it anyway. However, hatred never ends just like that. People unite in groups, and then mass psychology begins to manifest itself. What one person would never do out of fear or morality comes out when he is in a crowd. Similar situations really took place in many countries of the world. In each case, this resulted in terrible consequences, deaths and maimed lives.

The issue of national minorities in every society should be raised from an early age so that children learn to respect a person of a different nationality and understand that they have equal rights. There is no homogeneous development of this issue in the world: some countries are actively succeeding in education, some are still captured by primitive hatred and stupidity.

Negative moments

Ethnic national minorities have many problems even in today's sane world. Most often, minority discrimination is not based on racism or hatred, but on the usual factorsdictated by the socio-economic aspect. This largely depends on the state, which, most likely, does not pay enough attention to the social security of its citizens.

Most often problems arise in the field of employment, education and housing. Studies and interviews with many leading experts indicate that the practice of discrimination against national minorities does indeed take place. Many employers may refuse to hire for various reasons. Especially such discrimination concerns those who arrived from Asia and people of Caucasian nationality. If at a low level, when you just need cheap labor, this question is less obvious, but when applying for a high-paying position, this trend is very bright.

In terms of education, employers often distrust diplomas from minorities for many reasons. Indeed, there is a perception that international students come simply to get a plastic certificate of education.

The issue of housing also remains very relevant. Ordinary citizens do not want to take risks and rent their native walls to suspicious persons. They prefer to give up profits than to get involved with people of a different nationality. However, every question has its price. That is why it is most difficult for foreign students who do not have too much money at their disposal. Those who can afford a good existence, most often get what they want.

Protection of national minorities is an important issuefor the entire world community, because each person, as a result of historical events, may become a member of a minority. Unfortunately, not all countries are ready to understand and accept ethnic groups with which there has been enmity in the past. However, the protection of national minorities is reaching a new level every year. This is shown by global statistics as the rules become more and more loyal.