China is amending its laws to weaken ethnic identities, including Tibetan language and culture.
– By Jianli Yang for The Diplomat, 12 March 2026
In recent years, the Chinese government has intensified policies in Tibetan areas that aim to reshape Tibetan identity through language, education, and cultural control. These measures are not isolated administrative actions but part of a broader national strategy centered on what Beijing calls “forging a strong sense of the Chinese nation community.” Under this framework, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) seeks to strengthen a unified national identity by weakening ethnic identities that might compete with the political narrative of the “Chinese nation.” Increasingly, these assimilationist policies are not merely administrative practices; they are being codified into law.
For decades, the Chinese state maintained tight political control over Tibet, particularly over Tibetan Buddhism and religious institutions. Yet in the realm of language and education, earlier policies were comparatively more accommodating than those of today. In 1994, the “Measures for Implementing the Compulsory Education Law of the People’s Republic of China in the Tibet Autonomous Region” stipulated that schools should “use Tibetan as the principal medium of instruction while gradually improving a bilingual Tibetan-Chinese education system.” Within this framework, Tibetan language education held a central place in the school system, while Mandarin functioned largely as a supplementary language.
At that time, Tibetan students also had institutional options in China’s university entrance examination system. Two separate examination tracks existed. One, known as “min kao Han,” required students to take exams in Chinese. The other, called “min kao min,” allowed ethnic minority students to take their exams in their own languages. While imperfect, this system acknowledged linguistic diversity and allowed Tibetan language education to retain meaningful institutional space.
This situation began to change dramatically after Xi Jinping came to power. Under the banner of achieving the “great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” Beijing increasingly began to view minority languages – including Tibetan – as potential threats to national unity. The policy shift reflects a deeper transformation in China’s ethnic governance doctrine.
Chinese policymakers and scholars now frequently refer to a transition from the “first-generation ethnic policy” to the “second-generation ethnic policy.” The earlier framework, developed during the Mao and Deng eras, formally emphasized ethnic regional autonomy and the protection of minority languages and cultures. Although implementation was uneven, the official policy at least recognized the legitimacy of cultural pluralism within the Chinese state.
The second-generation ethnic policy represents a significant departure from this approach. Rather than preserving ethnic diversity, it seeks to minimize the political and social significance of ethnic distinctions. Its central objective is the creation of a unified national identity centered on the concept of the “Chinese nation” (中华民族). In practice, this shift encourages linguistic assimilation, cultural homogenization, and tighter political integration of minority regions.
Language policy in Tibet provides one of the clearest examples of this transformation. Officially, the Chinese government continues to describe its education policy as “bilingual education.” In reality, Mandarin Chinese has increasingly become the dominant language of instruction, while Tibetan has been relegated to a secondary or optional subject. Core academic subjects such as mathematics, science, and history are now overwhelmingly taught in Mandarin.
This trend was reinforced by legislative developments at the National People’s Congress (NPC). In December 2025, the NPC Standing Committeerevised the National Common Language Law, removing earlier provisions that allowed minority languages to serve as primary mediums of instruction in schools. The revised law explicitly requires that Mandarin be used as the fundamental teaching language and mandates the use of standardized national textbooks throughout the education system.
These changes have had profound consequences for ethnic minority students. The “min kao min” examination track has largely disappeared, leaving only the Chinese-language examination system. Tibetan language proficiency, for example, is no longer central to university admissions except for students applying specifically to Tibetan-language academic programs.
Perhaps the most controversial element of the new policy has been the rapid expansion of the boarding school system in Tibetan areas. Research by human rights organizations suggests that roughly one million Tibetan children have been placed in state-run boarding schools. These institutions operate primarily in Mandarin and reportedly restrict the use of Tibetan language in daily life. Because students live on campus for extended periods, they are separated from their families and communities during crucial stages of cultural and linguistic development.
At the same time, private Tibetan language schools have been systematically closed. In several cases, teachers associated with independent Tibetan-language education initiatives have been detained or disappeared. Today, Tibetan language instruction within public schools has been drastically reduced, and private efforts to establish Tibetan language schools are rarely permitted.
The contrast is striking. Chinese immigrants around the world are free to establish Chinese-language schools. Tibetan immigrants abroad can organize Tibetan-language education in diaspora communities. Yet Tibetans living in Tibet itself increasingly lack the freedom to establish Tibetan-language schools in their own homeland.
The situations in other ethnic minority areas in China, such as Xinjiang and the Inner Mongolia, are similar.
The Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law, which was passed during the NPC’s annual session this week, further strengthens this assimilationist framework. Based on a draft version, the legislation requires that preschool children begin learning Mandarin and mandates that students “basically master the national common language by the end of compulsory education.” At the same time, it weakens provisions in the Regional Ethnic Autonomy Law that previously protected minority language rights.
The law also introduces provisions that allow authorities to pursue legal responsibility for individuals overseas accused of “undermining ethnic unity.” Such clauses extend the reach of China’s ethnic policy beyond its borders and further integrate identity issues into the country’s national security framework.
International concern about these developments has grown. In a 2026 report, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on minority issues warned that systematic restrictions on minority language education could lead to “linguistic erasure” and create a serious risk of cultural destruction. The report noted that policies designed to eliminate a language from public life may approach what international law describes as cultural genocide.
Viewed in this broader context, China’s current policies in Tibet represent more than a shift in language education. They reflect a structural transformation in the Chinese state’s approach to ethnic governance. The combination of administrative campaigns and legislative codification suggests that Beijing is moving to institutionalize the “second-generation” ethnic policy.
Through both political campaigns and legal reforms, China is steadily narrowing the space for minority autonomy in education, language, and religion. The legal codification of assimilation policies marks a new phase in Beijing’s frontier governance strategy – one that seeks not merely to manage ethnic diversity but to fundamentally reshape it.
Read the original report on The Diplomat here.
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