State-controlled religious organizations and foreign propaganda are mobilized to implement and defend the widely criticized statute.
by Hu Zimo
When the United Front Work Department released its guidelines on April 27 for implementing the new Ethnic Unity and Progress Promotion Law, it showed, once again, how the Chinese Communist Party views “law” as a tool for promoting the Party’s political agenda. The UFWD, which exists to co-opt, discipline, and oversee all social forces outside the Party, now positions itself as the main interpreter of a law it helped create and will enforce. In doing this, it confirms that the new law is aimed at reshaping identities, “Sinicizing” the non-Han groups, silencing dissent, and extending the Party’s influence beyond China.
The UFWD’s guidelines repeat familiar slogans: the law is a “milestone,” a “major political task,” and a “strategic deployment” of the Party Central Committee, with Xi Jinping at its center. However, beneath this formal language lies a practical message. The law does not aim to protect ethnic diversity; it aims to dissolve it into a single, state-built “Chinese national community.” The guidelines assert that the law’s purpose is to turn the Party’s theories on ethnic work into state will, converting ideological concepts into enforceable legal duties. This language emphasizes a political agenda that seeks to govern identity itself.
The UFWD is uniquely positioned to execute this agenda. For decades, it has been the Party’s main tool for managing religion, controlling ethnic minorities, and coordinating propaganda overseas. It has complete control over the state-managed religious associations. These organizations, which are presented to the world as “representatives” of Chinese believers, function as administrative branches of the UFWD. The new guidelines clearly state that all “civil society” groups are expected to actively promote the law’s main demand: the forging of a unified national identity that overcomes religious, cultural, and ethnic differences. In practice, this means that religious beliefs, practices, education, and leadership must all be adjusted to support the Party’s vision of a singular, unified, Han-centered Chinese nation.
The guidelines also highlight the UFWD’s role in “international communication capacity,” a term that refers to the global propaganda system that includes Chinese diaspora organizations, Confucius Institutes, state-aligned media, and an expanding network of “friendly” scholars and influencers abroad. These groups are now directed to include the new law in their messaging, portraying it as a progressive, inclusive framework while hiding its coercive aspects. The UFWD’s overseas operations have long been assigned to counter criticism of China’s ethnic and religious policies, especially regarding Tibet, Xinjiang (East Turkestan), and Inner (Southern) Mongolia. The new guidelines broaden this objective: they require all overseas propaganda outlets to defend the law as a valid expression of China’s sovereignty and to label any external criticism as smearing, interference, or attempts to undermine national unity.
The insistence on strengthening propaganda and interpretation in the guidelines is particularly telling. They call for the law to reach all areas of society, including government offices, schools, communities, businesses, social organizations, and, notably, religious sites. The aim is to ensure the law becomes a constant presence in public life, a moral and political guide that defines acceptable thoughts and actions. The UFWD demands that research institutes and think tanks ramp up their theoretical work to produce academic justifications for the law’s ideological claims. This follows a familiar pattern: the Party creates a political doctrine, elevates it to law, and then enlists scholars and Party-friendly religionists to support its historical necessity and moral superiority.
The guidelines also stress the law’s coercive nature. While the law’s text appears “promotional,” the UFWD reminds all parties that it contains binding obligations and penalties. Any organization or person accused of “undermining ethnic unity” could face legal consequences, including criminal charges. The guidelines explicitly link these provisions to national security, broadening their scope to include actions outside China. This extraterritorial ambition is not new; China has often used legal measures to pursue dissidents overseas. However, the UFWD’s interpretation suggests that expressions of ethnic identity, religious belief, or political opinion beyond China might now be evaluated under the concept of “ethnic unity.” For diaspora communities, this suggests that cultural or religious practices that diverge from the Party’s narrative could be seen as threats to national unity.
The April document from the UFWD outlines a comprehensive strategy: rewrite the understanding of ethnicity, redefine religious life, reshape cultural memory, and mobilize both domestic and international groups to enforce a single, state-sanctioned identity. The law becomes the legal façade for a political campaign, while the UFWD acts as its designer, supervisor, and global spokesperson. For those who have monitored the shift in China’s ethnic and religious policies, none of this is unexpected.
The new law and the UFWD’s interpretation of it signify a further move toward uniformity. They indicate a future in which minority ethnic and religious communities can exist only as ornamental parts of a national story dictated by the Party, and in which any display of difference may be classified as a legal breach. The UFWD’s guidelines celebrate the law as a significant achievement. For those who care about freedom of belief, cultural preservation, and minority rights, the reality is that the space for independence is shrinking, and the machinery of ideological assimilation is speeding up.
Uses a pseudonym for security reasons.
