Any situation involving racism or prejudice is probably going to have shades of the struggle between majority and minority. Generally, the majority wants to protect what they have, while the minority would like a piece of the pie, please and thank you.
With the Chinese Exclusion Act, the majority were the white workers, while the minority was the Chinese immigrant labor force.
Questions About Majority vs. Minority
- Do majorities actually hate and fear minorities, or are they a convenient proxy for something else? Are the pressures primarily social, economic, or cultural? If so, what?
- Sometimes, as with Apartheid-era South Africa, it's the minorities with all the power. Does this change the nature of the struggle between the groups? Why or why not?
- The Chinese Exclusion Act was a struggle between the majority of white laborers, and two minorities, the wealthy labor-owners, and the Chinese laborers. Why were the Chinese the only minority victimized?
- Majorities become minorities over time and vice versa. How does this change the nature of the struggle between the groups? How has it in the past?
Chew on This
Check out some potential thesis statements about Chinese Exclusion Act.
Though the Chinese immigrants ended up the scapegoats of the white labor force, it was a masterful ploy by the moneyed interests to distract hostility from them.
Though by today's standards the Chinese Exclusion Act is unconscionably racist, it did address a reality of the economics of labor by removing a significant minority in the labor force.