ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the effect of socieconomic achievement on social strutrual assimilation between two ethnic groups as the consequence of frontier migration in a multi-ethnic region of China. It describes the interrelations between a migrant majority—the Han people—and an indigeneous minority group—the Uygur people in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China. Xinjiang is a traditional ethnic minority peoples’ resident area in Northwest China bordering with the Soviet Union, the Republic of Mongolia, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. One of the major goals of Chinese government policy in ethnic interrelationship is to promote “equality in fact”, which was primarily based on a belief that inequality blocks social structural assimilation and may bring conflicts between groups. The government sponsored migrants are obviously more active in political organizations than are spontaneous migrants. The factors affecting political organization participation are, besides the background variables and control variables- educational attainment, the experience of inter-ethnic schooling, and the ability to use the other language.
