A gendered uprising: political representation and minority ethnic communities

This article explores the interface between gender and ethnicity in a microlevel study of a conflict which involved members of a minority ethnic community. Focusing on gender reactions to the unfolding conflict, it explores arguments raised by women in its aftermath. These arguments concern who has the right to define and represent them in public spaces in the future. The specific conflict examined took place in Bradford, UK, in 1995, and involved male Pakistani Muslim youths and the police. In the aftermath, public debate on the issue has centred on community representation in general and the role of male youth in particular. It is argued that the conflict also accelerated a process whereby Pakistani Muslim women are (re)defining intra- and inter-community relationships in the public sphere. This article affirms that the gender analysis being employed by these women to understand the events of 1995 has wider implications for the future management of plural societies, and poses a challenge to the dominance of men in creating, maintaining and managing public spaces.     

Co-existence between the traditional societies and wildlife in western Serengeti, Tanzania: its relevancy in contemporary wildlife conservation efforts

This paper seeks to show how the traditional societies in western Serengeti have coexisted and continue to coexist with wildlife. It also recognizes the relevancy of this coexistence in furthering contemporary conservation efforts although there are practical constraints to putting this into practice. The following questions are examined: (1) How did/do traditional societies in Serengeti interact with their nature? (2) Which traditional management institutions governed/govern interaction between people and wildlife species, resources and ecosystems and, how do they operate? (3) Which factors were (or are) responsible for erosion of traditional management institutions? (4) What can the traditional practices offer to contemporary conservation efforts and what are the limitations? The paper identifies four ways in which traditional institutions and practices can contribute to current conservation efforts: regulating the overexploitation of resources; complementing the current incentives aiming at diffusing prevailing conflicts between conservation authorities and communities; minimising the costs of law enforcement and; complementing the modern scientific knowledge in monitoring and responding to ecosystem processes and functions. The practical constraints likely to limit adoption of these practices are presented as: methodological complications of acquiring indigenous knowledge; prevailing historical conflicts; human population growth; poverty and lack of appreciation among the conservation planners and managers. In conclusion the need to address the current constraints in order to achieve effective taping of the existing potentials is emphasized.     

From sojourners to citizens: managing the ethnic Chinese minority in Indonesia and Malaysia

The raison d'être of the management of the minority ethnic Chinese citizenry in Indonesia and Malaysia is not adequately examined in most studies. In this article, ethnic domination is put forth in explaining the dynamics of ethnic conflict management. New multi-ethnic states often opt for selective nation-building by creating institutionalized ethnic boundaries. Ethnic domination occurs when one ethnic group prevails over another through the systematic marginalization of the dominated group's political influence, cultural reproduction and way of life. Beneath the veneer of assimilation and consociation, the central identity encouraged is that of the indigenous bumi 'imagined community' from which the citizen-Chinese is excluded. Ethnic riots are symptomatic of the failure of incomplete ethnic domination, especially in the economic and cultural realms.     

Ethnic differences and predictors of colonoscopy,prostate-specific antigen,and mammography screening participation in the multiethnic cohort

PurposeGiven the relation between screening and improved cancer outcomes and the persistence of ethnic disparities in cancer mortality, we explored ethnic differences in colonoscopy, prostate-specific antigen (PSA), and mammography screening in the Multiethnic Cohort Study.MethodsLogistic regression was applied to examine the influence of ethnicity as well as demographics, lifestyle factors, comorbidities, family history of cancer, and previous screening history on self-reported screening participation collected in 1999–2002.ResultsThe analysis included 140,398 participants who identified as white, African American, Native Hawaiian, Japanese American, US born-Latino, or Mexican born-Latino. The screening prevalences overall were mammography: 88% of women, PSA: 45% of men, and colonoscopy: 35% of men and women. All minority groups reported 10–40% lower screening utilization than whites, but Mexican-born Latinos and Native Hawaiian were lowest. Men were nearly twice as likely to have a colonoscopy (OR = 1.94, 95% CI = 1.89–1.99) as women. A personal screening history, presence of comorbidities, and family history of cancer predicted higher screening utilization across modalities, but to different degrees across ethnic groups.ConclusionsThis study confirms previously reported sex differences in colorectal cancer screening and ethnic disparities in screening participation. The findings suggest it may be useful to include personal screening history and family history of cancer into counseling patients about screening participation.     

Industrialization and ethnic change in the modern world

Despite the large recent attention given to ethnicity within the social sciences, the sources of modern ethnic change have remained opaque. Drawing upon social theory from Marx and Gellner, I argue here that industrialization incentivizes ethnic homogenization by lowering the relative value of land. Using carbon emissions per capita as a proxy for industrialization, I show that cross-country changes in ethno-linguistic fractionalization between 1961 and 1985 are negatively correlated with industrialization, and that this result is robust to the use of a variety of control variables, sub-samples and alternative measures of industrialization such as cement production, urbanization and agriculture as a percentage of GDP. In particular, I find no evidence for the direct role of the state in promoting ethnic homogenization, which adds to other recent evidence on how economic incentives may trump political ones as regards identity change, at least in the short- to medium term.     

Revising the ethnodevelopment model: addressing Karen self-determination within the context of the failed ethnocratic state of military-ruled Burma

My paper examines the Karen ethnic nationality and their fifty-eight-year self-determination struggle against ethnic cleansing resulting from the ethnocratic and military governments of Burma. I frame Karen self-determination as a development issue by employing Rodolfo Stavenhagen's ethnodevelopment model. Ethnodevelopment argues that, if asymmetrical development occurs within a multi-ethnic state, state-oriented ethnic minority development strategies are needed to neutralize the asymmetry. However, Stavenhagen's ethnodevelopment does not question the premise of an authoritarian state or the systemic crisis experienced by ethnic minorities under authoritarian rule. Thus, I revise ethnodevelopment from its top-to-bottom trajectory where ethnic minority development is dependent upon the centralized state, to a bottom-to-top trajectory I designate as liberation ethnodevelopment. I argue that Karen liberation ethnodevelopment is also a development process, but one that develops and shields the Karen from ethnic cleansing.     

Boundaries of ethnic identity in Central Asia: titular and Russian perceptions of ethnic commonalities in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan

Using data from nationally representative public opinion surveys done in 2005 in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, the authors focus on the titular groups as well as the Russians in both countries and provide assessments of their perceived ethnic commonalities with one another and with various other ethnic groups, including Uzbeks and Jews in each country. The results indicate that there are hierarchies of intergroup differentiations that help to delineate the boundaries of ethnic identities in both countries. Multivariate analyses show the systematic effects of regional variables in shaping these ethnic boundaries. The basic topographies of the boundaries are consistent with the effects of social identification processes and the relative power and social standings of the different target ethnic groups across the regions. Our results lend clear support to the ethnic boundaries paradigm by underscoring that ethnic boundaries can be independent of objective commonalities and can vary according to contexts.     

Immigrant and ethnic enterprise in North America*

Many claim that national economic success depends upon cultural homogeneity. We collect new time-series data and develop new measures of ethnic, linguistic and religious fractionalization for the OECD countries. We show that cultural diversity may vary by type across countries and over short periods of time. We also show that our measure of ethnic fractionalization is a significant predictor of economic performance in OECD countries despite the fact that they constitute a particularly homogeneous and economically advantaged group.     

Measuring ethnicity: challenges and opportunities for survey research

Measuring ethnic identity in social surveys has traditionally been problematic, often using a single question and allowing the respondent to choose one category from a pre-defined list. In this paper we discuss the rationale for and limitations of measuring a complex and multi-dimensional concept with a simple, uni-dimensional question. We propose that operationalizing ethnicity as multi-dimensional requires multiple questions to capture the complexity of the concept. Giving researchers a number of different measures enables them to focus on the dimensions of interest to them, and has the potential to open up the rich resources of theoretically robust survey research to researchers from a range of disciplines concerned with questions of ethnic identification.