Most modern nation states have been formed through their central governments' delimitation of national boundaries in frontier areas, which were often inhabited by ethnic minority groups. To relax possible ethnic tensions, the central governments have presented ethnic policies. Because the minority policy in a nation is one of the most important factors affecting the process of national integration, it is crucial to explore the development of the policy in detail.
The ethnic minority people in China account for only 6.7% of the country's whole population However, since the area of their resident districts accounts for more than fifty percent of the nation, and are located at strategically important points, national integration of ethnic minorities has been an essential problem for the Chinese government. Whereas it is said that the government accomplished political equality, it admits the existence of ‘inequality as a matter of fact’: inter-ethnic differentials in both economic and cultural terms. To ameliorate this problem, the government has attempted to implement policies of economic development and ethnic education in the minority districts. To date, their specific circumstances have been rather unclear, however. In particular, with regard to Yunnan Province, Japanese scholars, including geographers, have thus far paid attention to cultural aspects almost exclusively. The purpose of this paper, keeping Yunnan's historical and geographical factors in mind, is to elucidate the development of ethnic minority policy by the Chinese goverment in the province.
In the second section, the current situation of the minority ethnic groups is discussed briefly. The twenty-four groups with more than ten million people account for 31.7% of the province's whole population, and these compose eight autonomous prefectures and twenty-nine autonomous counties. Furthermore, the twenty-four groups can be divided into sub-groups. These imply the variety and complexty of the province's ethnic composition. Generally, the percentage of minority population is higher in the frontier districts than in the central districts of Yunnan, and particular minorities tend to concentrate partly according to altitude.
The third section is devoted to an explanation of ethnic policy during the period between 1949 and 1958, when an essential aim of the Chinese government's policy was to integrate minority groups into the new system of the communist nation. Even at the time immediately after the foundation of the nation, the central Yunnan districts were under long-standing control of the Han Chinese in terms of socio-economic activities, suggesting a relatively easy integration of them by the Chinese Communist Party. However, the influence of the party in the frontier districts was negligible, because the districts formed a buffer zone, where the powers of Britain, France, the Kuomintang Government and native nationalist headmen were complicated. The Yunnan government sent there a minority maneuvering party in order to establish a better relationship with the minorities, support their lives and investigate their circumstances. In particular, integration policy in terms of economy and distribution was taken seriously at the beginning of this period. With regard to political matters, autonomous districts were established through the assumption of minority leaders to important posts in the Chinese Communist Party, and, as a result, a great part of the frontier districts came under the rule of the party. Minority groups were divided into four different types from the historical stage standpoint of social development. The Yunnan Government presented four land reform methods, correspondent to this minority grouping. Although the land reform based on this method and establishment of collective farms began in 1955, they have made less progress in the frontier districts than in the central parts of the province.
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