Ethnic Minorities Change in Great Britain - Essay Example

Ethnic minorities change in Great Britain British society is one of he most diverse-multi-national societies in the world. The communities in Britainrepresent vast wealth of different inheritances, backgrounds, influences, perspectives, faiths and experiences. Since 1951, the rate of growth of so-called ethnic minorities has been extraordinary--from under 100,000 to over four million today and rising. Well established chains of connection, deregulated labour markets, cheap mass travel, English as a world language, a suddenly porous culture and, until recently, a universal welfare system--all these factors are shaping the British version of globalisation, an essentially American racket that sees all places and all polities as potentially a sort of low grade Los Angeles. In 2004, for the first time ever, the Census asked about people's ethnic group and so it is now possible to provide precise details of the degree of overlap between these two aspects of local, as well as national, populations. By the latest data the national picture it is known that the size of the minority population is 4,5 million in 2004 or 7,6 per cent of the total population of the United Kingdom. Indians are suggested to be the largest minority group, followed by Pakistanians, Black Caribbeans, Black Africans, and those of mixed ethnic backgrounds. The proportion of non-whites is 5.5%, while that of people born outside the UK is 6.9%. But the cross tabulations in the Census show that only 42.5% of British residents born outside the UK were in fact non-white and also that almost half (46.8%) of non-whites living in Britain in 2004 had been born in the UK. The latter group mainly comprises the children of immigrants and are almost all aged under 30 years old, as the graph shows. One result is that non-whites make up a significantly larger proportion of Britain's 0-15 year-olds than of the total population, 9.0% compared to the average of 5.5%. (Drew, 2004). Multicaltural society in the Great Britain is frustrating many people as it is affected by as not only ethnic minorities act, but because of how the political system treats them. One key phrase infuriates many people, 'positive discrimination'. This now exists throughout Great Britain in many key institutions, for example the media, politics and the police. The idea of quotas has become an obsession. This will and to some degree is leading Britain further down the path of no return. Tony Blair recently spoke of setting fixed quotas for the police force with 25 per cent for the ethnic minorities even though they are only five per cent of the population. Surely, this would mean that potentially higher calibre candidates would not be recruited because they were white; it is not good practice. This example could be followed by private businesses where ethnic minority candidates are recruited not because of their skills but because of their ethnicity. This discrimination against white people of British origin can already be seen. For example, some local councils give priority to ethnic minorities and asylum seekers in housing. Surely, these types of actions will further worsen ethnic tension and not benefit Britain as a whole. Already 'no white' zones are appearing especially in the Midlands and North. Positive discrimination can be seen in the way that crimes committed by ethnic minorities are covered up far more than if white people commit them. For example, if a 33-year-old black male commits a crime, newspapers will often say: '33-year-old male commits crime'. However, if a white male committed the same offence it would include their ethnic description. These types of actions lead to further ethnic tension, which is not good for Britain. It is often asked why the indigenous people of Britain should be forced to change their traditions, but every other culture is encouraged to be distinct and preserve their views and ideas. The UK is supposed to be a free and liberal country, so why should 'multiculturalism' be enforced. White Western and especially British culture is completely different from that of many ethnic minorities, especially Islamic ones. The government likes to promote local schemes, which are there to integrate and bring the community together. However, in praxis these schemes are often funded for just one side of the community. Many white indigenous people throughout the UK resent this. When their point of view is put forward, it is denounced as 'racist'. However, to them it is realistic. Multiculturalism has already had a negative impact on the UK and seems to be getting worse as seen in the Oldham riots in the summer of 2002. Multiculturalism leads to the increase of costs in terms of social services, education, and crime. Economically crime is a huge factor. Yes, it is not only ethnic minorities, which commit crime. This however, seems strange due to the amount that is actually spent on ethnic minorities. The statistics on crime are denounced by some multiculturalists as invalid because, they claim, the British police are targeting ethnic minorities and so catching more of them. Well surely, this is not a bad thing. If ethnic minorities are committing crimes and are being targeted, this seems a perfectly reasonable idea. It would be wrong for the police to target a group, which rarely commits crimes just to make the arrest and search figures look more valid. The geographical distribution of the non-white population is also significantly different from that of all immigrants. As a result, some parts of Britain have remarkably high proportions of non-whites in their 0-15 year-old population: fully a third of London's 0-15 year-olds, and one in six for the principal metropolitan cities (see table 1) Immigrants and non-whites, by type of district Table 1 District type % immigrant % non-white % non-white born in UK % 0-15 non-white Great Britain 6.9 5.5 46.8 9.0 Greater London Inner London 27.9 25.6 45.1 41.2 Outer London 18.0 16.9 41.2 25.0 Metropolitan Principal cities 7.5 9.5 53.6 16.8 Other districts 4.5 5.1 53.1 9.2 Non-metropolitan Large cities 6.2 6.0 47.8 10.2 Small cities 6.3 4.0 47.3 6.7 Industrial areas 3.4 2.6 50.4 4.6 New towns 4.4 2.7 46.7 4.3 Resort, port, and retirement 4.2 1.1 42.2 1.7 Urban and mixed urban-rural 5.7 2.3 43.4 3.7 Remoter mainly rural 3.2 0.6 43.7 1.1 Until the early 1970s it was assumed that the vast majority of nonwhites in Britain were immigrants from the former 'Third World' colonies which had become known as the New Commonwealth. (Stewart, 1983) Since then, however, the increasing proportion of the UK-born in the nonwhite population has undermined the value of this measure. This change was one of the key reasons for introducing the question on ethnicity in the 2004 Census. This point is demonstrated here at national, regional, and subregional levels. Over 3 million residents of Britain did not identify themselves as 'White' in answer to the 2004 Census question on ethnicity. This 'non-white' population covers a great variety of racial and ethnic groups, but the history of immigration to the UK ensures that certain groups are very much more prominent than others. There are also significant variations between groups in their characteristics and geographical distribution. Regional distribution As shown in the graph, the South East contains over half Britain's non-whites, though accounting for less than one-third of the country's total population. The West Midlands is the only other region to record a greater share of non-whites than of the total population, while the top five regions (these plus the North West, Yorkshire and Humberside, and the East Midlands) contain all but 8.3% of Britain's non-white population. The South East contains over half of the members of all but one of the broad categories shown in the graph. The exception--the Pakistani group, for which the South East accounts for just under 30%-is particularly prominent in Yorkshire and Humberside, and also forms a well-above-average share of the non-white populations of both the North West and Scotland. (Drew, 2004) Indians make up over half the non-white population of the East Midlands, while the contribution of the Black category to the nonwhite population is almost as high in East Anglia and the South West as it is in the South East. These variations are reflected in the maps opposite and are described in more detail in Black and white Britain. Ethnicity and the labour-market People play a variety of different roles in the household, the wider community and also in society at large. The aspect which is most thoroughly measured is position in the labour-market, notably whether people consider themselves as available for formal paid employment as opposed to being 'economically inactive'. The latter category includes people who have retired from work, children aged under 16 and older students who are not formally employed, those who are not available for work now or in the future because they are 'permanently sick', and a whole range of people for whom duties as carers in one form or another (for frail elderly, sick, children, or the household in general) deter them from seeking formal jobs. (Hagell, Shaw, 2001). Because children aged under 16 are not considered eligible for formal employment, 'economic activity rates' are normally calculated by reference to the population aged 16 and over. Even on this basis, there are considerable variations in labour-force participation between people and areas, not least between ethnic groups. These result notably from differences in age composition (mainly because those of retirement age are included), in numbers taking early retirement (by choice or through redundancy packages) and in the proportion of women not seeking work outside the home. (Hagell, Shaw, 2001). There are ten ethnic groups distinguished in the 2004 Census, the proportion of people aged 16 and over that is not economically active. The majority ethnic group of Whites, with its rate of 39%, provides a reference point for comparison with the various minority groups. Inactivity rates are significantly lower than this for Black Caribbeans, at barely a quarter, but are much higher for Pakistanis and Bangladeshis at around a half of all aged 16 and over. The direct reasons for these differences are evident from the breakdown in the bar graph and from the gender and age-based analyses in the table. In particular, the White population contains more retired people than the groups dominated by recent immigrants--a contrast which is only partially offset by the larger proportions of students for most of the minority groups. The levels of inactivity which are not attributable to students, sickness and retirement are particularly high for Bangladeshis and Pakistanis, who both have very low levels of labour-force participation amongst their working-age women arising from Islamic cultural tradition. At the other extreme, the 'other inactive' category is especially low for Black Caribbeans, for whom working-age participation rates are very high for both women and men. Geographical variations in economic activity rates are sizeable, as shown in the maps for men aged 16 and over. (Hagell, Shaw, 2001) For Whites and Blacks, the highest rates occur in central southern England as a result of a traditionally tight labour-market and relatively youthful age structure. For South Asians and Others, the highest rates are found in some of the more remote, mainly rural counties, often areas with relatively small numbers of these groups and where only those who are strongly placed in the labour-market have been able to move in. Labour-force participation rates for men and women of working age, by ethnic group, Great Britain, 2004 (%) Table 5 Ethnic group Men aged 16-64 Women aged 16-59 All groups 86.6 67.6 White 87.0 68.3 Non-white 79.6 56.6 Black 81.9 69.2 Caribbean 86.4 73.3 African 70.4 61.4 Other 83.7 64.8 South Asian 79.6 47.6 Indian 82.3 60.4 Pakistani 75.7 28.3 Bangladeshi 74.3 22.2 Chinese and Others 76.7 57.0 Chinese 72.4 56.7 Other Asian 78.0 56.2 Other 78.5 58.2 Ethnicity and unemployment The extent of joblessness varies considerably between ethnic groups. This is clear from the maps opposite, notably in terms of the number of areas with unemployment rates in the top categories. Thus, while no area had a rate of 20% or more for White males, twenty-four areas did for Black males, ten areas did for South Asian males, and three areas did for the Chinese and Others category. The same descending order of ethnic minority rates is found for the highest-unemployment county for each group: for Black males, it is 36.3% in Merseyside; for South Asians, 30.5% in South Yorkshire; and for Chinese and Others, 22.3% in West Midlands. (Blackaby et al, 2005) Unemployment rates for men and women by ethnic group, Great Britain, 2004 (%) Table 6 Ethnic group Men Women All groups 12.6 7.9 White 12.0 7.4 Non-white 22.6 18.4 Black 28.2 19.5 Caribbean 26.6 15.9 African 33.2 29.0 Other 29.5 22.1 South Asian 21.1 19.3 Indian 15.1 14.7 Pakistani 31.1 34.5 Bangladeshi 32.7 42.4 Chinese and Others 17.9 14.6 Chinese 11.9 10.0 Other Asian 17.0 15.5 Other Other 22.3 17.5 The table gives a breakdown for the nine ethnicminority groups, and for women as well as men. Clearly, even within the three broad minority groupings, there are considerable variations. For instance, the rate for Chinese men is barely half that for the Other Other category. Even more strikingly, the rates for Pakistani and Bangladeshi men are over twice that for Indian men, and the rate for Bangladeshi women Is almost three times that of Indian women. Not only, as seen previously, do remarkably few Bangladeshi women want to work, but among those that do a substantial number are unable to find a job. The bar graph shows the employment position of the whole labour-force, men and women combined, with the ten ethnic groups ranked on the basis of overall unemployment rate. First, this reinforces the fact that the rate of unemployment for Whites is only about a third of those for Bangladeshis, Pakistanis and Black Africans. It also shows that the Chinese level is not much above that for Whites, and those for Indians and Other Asians are also comparatively low. Also evident from the bar graph are significant differences between groups in the pattern of employment amongst those with work. Self-employment is very much more important amongst the Chinese than any other single group, with the level for Indians and Pakistanis being about two-thirds of this, and that for Bangladeshis also being above average. Less than half the Pakistanis and Bangladeshis in the labourforce are full-time employees, and the only groups which exceed the white rate for this category are the Black Caribbeans and Other Asians. (Blackaby et al, 2005) Part-time employment is less important for all nine ethnic-minority groups than it is for Whites. Given that part-time work in Britain is predominantly female work, this is partly due to the below-average labour-force participation of women of most ethnicminority groups (see the table in Ethnicity and the labour-market), but not entirely because of this. The Census also shows that, amongst those women who are in the labour-force, fewer non-whites are engaged in part-time work than Whites (17.7%, as opposed to 34.4%) and more are in full-time employment (57%, compared to 52% of economically active White women). (Blackaby et al, 2005) In the end, the great proportion of non-white population that make up ethnic minorities in Great Britain causes unequal distribution of benefits and opportunities between indigenous inhabitants and constantly migrating people from all over the world. Bibliography: 1. Blackaby, D., Drinkwater, S., Leslie, D. and Murphy, P. (2005) A picture of male and female unemployment among Britain's ethnic minorities', Scottish Journal of Political Economy Vol. 44: 182-97 2. Drew, D. (2004) Race', Education and Work: The Statistics of Inequality, Aldershot: Avebury Press 3. Hagell, A. and Shaw, C. (2001) Opportunity and Disadvantage at 16, London: Policy Studies Institute 4. Modood, T. et al. (2005) Ethnic Minorities in Britain: Diversity and Disadvantage, London: Policy Studies Institute 5. Stewart, M.B. (1983) Racial discrimination and occupational attainment in Britain', Economic Journal Vol. 93:521-41 6. Whitmarsh, A. and Harris, T. (2003) Social Focus on Ethnic Minorities, London: HMSO Read More