China’s Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress was submitted to the National People’s Congress on September 8, 2025, passed by a vote of 2,756 to 3 with three abstentions, signed by Xi Jinping on March 12, 2026, and takes effect July 1, 2026. The 62-article law codifies Xi’s sinicization policies and extends their reach into every sector of Chinese society, and beyond China’s borders.
The law also applies to foreign nationals living in or visiting China, who could now be punished or possibly jailed for advocating freedom for Tibet or independence for Taiwan. The law’s preamble frames China as a civilization with more than 5,000 years of history that has forged “a unified multi-ethnic nation” under the CCP. This is despite the fact that China has 56 recognized ethnic groups and five ethnic autonomous regions: Xinjiang, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Guangxi, and Ningxia. Several of these regions have movements seeking independence or greater autonomy.
China also includes Hong Kong, a Special Administrative Region whose residents have mounted sustained resistance to Beijing’s encroachment on political freedoms. Taiwan, meanwhile, already functions as an independent democratic country despite lacking official international recognition.
Its Chapter II mandates fostering identification with the “great motherland, the Chinese nation, Chinese culture, the Communist Party of China, and socialism with Chinese characteristics” through patriotic education, official historical narratives, and promotion of Chinese cultural symbols. Article 14 directs authorities to “establish and highlight … Chinese cultural symbols” in public facilities, architecture, and tourist sites, including in the naming of places.
The law imposes ideological obligations on a sweeping range of actors, including public employees, mass organizations, enterprises, public-service institutions, industry groups, religious institutions, neighborhood committees, and the military. Under Article 20(2), parents and guardians are required to “educate and guide minors to love the Chinese Communist Party” and are forbidden from teaching minors “concepts detrimental to ethnic unity and progress.”
The provision reinforces existing law. The CCP’s 1982 Document 19 banned religious education among minors, a prohibition the U.S. State Department confirms remains in force: children younger than 18 are prohibited from participating in religious activities and receiving religious education, even in schools run by religious organizations, and the law mandates the teaching of atheism in schools.
The Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) has documented enforcement of these prohibitions against minority communities specifically, with Uyghur and Tibetan children, among whom religion and ethnic identity are inseparable, subject to the strictest application.
Language policy is a central mechanism that builds on previous restrictive legislation. In December 2025, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee revised the Law on the Standard Spoken and Written Chinese Language, originally adopted in 2000. The revision removed a provision that had allowed minority languages to be used as the medium of instruction in schools, declaring such education “no longer necessary.” The changes took effect on January 1, 2026.
A years-long trend of replacing Mongolian-, Tibetan-, and Uyghur-medium instruction with Mandarin was thereby codified into law. Students in those communities are now permitted to study their mother tongue only as a standalone class, while all other subjects are taught in Chinese.
The March 2026 ethnic unity law reinforced and expanded that framework. It codifies the predominance of Standard Chinese (Putonghua) in public life, sets a goal of preschool-level Mandarin proficiency, and requires Chinese characters to be displayed more prominently than minority scripts wherever both appear.
The CECC found that the law promotes Mandarin-language instruction for ethnic minority children beginning in preschool. It also embeds ideological education prescribing a single “correct” understanding of history, ethnicity, culture, and religion as defined by the CCP.
Hellbound and Down 