There are two vastly different types of minority situations, those who have recently migrated to a region from somewhere else, and those who were displaced by incoming migrants from remaining the majority of the population, linguistically, culturally, or ethnically. Since all humans going back far enough at one time were immigrants who migrated to other regions of the world, from outside of Africa most likely, we count those who were the first to reach a new region, sustain large numbers there, and form a distinct language or culture which survived for a long enough period to still be remembered or continues to survive to this day, as being the native people of that region. This is what many in the majorities in some nations today fear, becoming a minority in their own lands. Some may think it to be an unwarranted fear depending on their numbers or particular situations, but it does happen, as has happened in the Americas, Australia, and other regions of the world. When the numbers of new people coming in reaches a certain point, they can begin to have an affect on the present culture and can either replace that culture with their own which developed outside that region, or a new culture can develop which is neither wholly one nor the other, but a mixture of both. It can even seem as something completely new.

          These fears, warranted or not, shape the politics in many regions of the world today. In many nations around the world today, nationalism is rebounding and anti-immigrant sentiments are on the rise, especially in Eastern European countries searching for a sense of identity of their own after having it repressed under Communism. Sometimes this is seen as racist as well as nationalist when some immigrants are more unwelcome than others due to their physical appearances or cultural differences. The degree of perceived differences is important as it can help or hinder integration between these groups, or  two or more separate nations within a nation. When integration, inter-marriage, and general cross-cultural development can take place, tensions can remain low, and people can begin to form a new common identity not based on appearances or previous nationalities. When the perceived differences are great, such as pronounced differences in skin color or have different religions, languages, or cultural values, full integration may never occur and ethic tensions might subside, but may never disappear completely, and always can remain a factor quietly beneath the surface.

          In discussing this topic I intend to focus mainly upon the American experience, and relate it to Europe, both for its perceived success in integration and its context within what many nations fear most, having a new culture come in and completely displace the existing culture and people. Much of this background may seem to some irrelevant and unfair because these events took place prior to and during the development of recent ideas of majority versus minority relationships and human rights. I do not wish to suggest that anyone living today should bear any blame for these events, but that does not mean such lessons are not relevant to what is going on in the world today. This is hardly ancient history. The institutions which had governed during such times continue to exist in much the same form, the displaced peoples still exist, and if we are to applaud the successes of American integration, which are substantial and almost unprecedented, we must see them in the context of who was included and benefited in this new culture, and who was excluded and suffered by it.

          There are many reasons that the Native Americans get left out when talking about the American Melting Pot. Their numbers were declining sharply during the great waves of immigration after the United States began as a new nation, becoming quickly a fraction of the population around 1900. Their culture was much different and considered inferior when considered a culture at all. Religious differences made even the most barbaric treatment by today's standards, acceptable and even considered kind, and intended for the benefit of the Native peoples. Replacing their culture with the new American culture forming, Christianizing them, replacing their native languages with English, all were seen as helping them even when done forcibly, as was often the case. Forced resettlement to other areas with other groups whom they had little in common other than also being native to North America was common and sometimes led to conflicts with each other, starvation as some of the areas they were relocated to did not have adequate food, freezing to death because of lack of anything to there burn, and other political decisions which lead to a great losses of life bordering on genocide. Children were taken forcibly from their parents to be raised in boarding schools, forbidden from speaking their native languages, and forced to become Christians regardless of their or their parents opinions on the matter. 

          When contemplating how to solve or deal with the problems and tensions of minority groups in regions of Europe today, it might be tempting for some if they could, to be able just tell all the people of such an ethnicity or language, you must all move to this town or region. Furthermore to make things even easier you must stop speaking your previous languages from this point forever onward, and while you are at it, change yours and your  children's religion to the predominant one of the area. Wouldn't that make things so much easier? If they are incoming immigrants you can say, "If you find this unacceptable, then don't come here at all", and not feel like you are behaving harshly. And if they are recent immigrants of a generation or less ago, you might also be tempted to tell them to go home, and give them free tickets or offer to resettle them elsewhere as long is it outside of your borders. Obviously this is not applicable in relation to modern concepts of human rights and the accepted civilized practice of the world today, but then when the world is not watching, such things still can happen. Even in liberal Western European countries where considerable attention is paid to such issues, people can still be attacked or harassed by locals when they move into the "wrong" neighborhoods, feel social pressure to change their dress or not overtly show religious identity which could target them for harassment, and gradually feel pressured to switch themselves and their children to mainly using the dominant language of the area. While these problems are far less severe than what happened to the Native Americans since minorities in Europe now have excellent legal protection, freedom of religion, and are allowed to continue to speak their native languages in their homes and often in public, they are of the same nature. The more people can look and seem like everyone else, speak the same language without identifiable accents, the easier it seems to be for everyone to get along.

          The main problem for the Native Americans was of a different nature. They could not be told to go back home or stay home. They were home. They were there first. Their religions did not have any legal protection in a land which so greatly claimed to covet freedom of religion, because they were not accepted as religions. Also there was not the attention paid to what was happening to them in the media at the time nor access to outside media as could happen today with global foreign media, where many now must turn when denied coverage of abuses to them in the media of their own states. They had no newspapers of their own to distribute widely as there was no common spoken language for all the indigenous peoples, nor a common written one, nor were they allowed to politically organize themselves. There was no satellite television to cover massacres live, no United Nations to send in observers to look for signs of mass graves.

          Though the Native Americans did have autonomous rule in various regions (termed "reservations") throughout the history of the United States, even today, it was always limited in a number of important ways. They were not allowed to declare themselves or be recognized as equal and separate countries within the world's family of nations, nor were they allowed to negotiate treaties with other countries as legal states. Earlier revisions and revocations of treaties between native peoples and the government of the United States without both parties consent, and other tensions led to wars. However, due to the great disparity of power in numbers and in weapons, they lost all of them and have long been relegated to this in-between legal status as autonomous regions within another nation without hope of ever being recognized as full states and remain regions with limited legal international rights. Hawaii is an exception in many ways as it was once recognized as being an independent country or a nation in its own right internationally, and its people were not as severely restricted in the use of their language, though they were required to learn English and did lose their independence and majority status due to foreign immigration as well as legal manipulations.

          There were similar problems shared by other groups of minorities in America which are applicable in some ways to the problems faced by the Native Americans to one degree or another. Freedom of religion is a grand idea but in the beginning and for most of American history in practice it meant freedom of which Christian church you wished to belong to as well as protection for Atheists, who were not uncommon among the elite and wealthy, as well as protection for multiple smaller groups which were not large established denominations of Christianity as they are today, such as Baptists. Jews as well as Moslems faced significant religious persecution and social exclusions up until the middle of the 20th century, though they had legal protection to turn to in many instances when they could afford to because they had the added benefit of belonging to organized Western or world religions, which Native Americans did not have.

          African-Americans also have had many similar hardships based on their own unique place in the American tapestry. Their skin color is often much more markedly different from the majority group of Americans (generic European) than Native American skin colors. Skin color is something which cannot be changed to blend in with the rest of the population even if one chose to wish to assimilate with the dominant culture. Also being the descendents of slaves, they often had no memories of which specific part of Africa as being their particular "homeland" and after generations, not always had one particular region of Africa as their sole ancestral cradle. With no wealth to relocate, no existing nation to identify with, when released from absolute slavery, found themselves like the Native Americans, with nowhere else to go. For different reasons, this was now their only home by circumstance, and there was nowhere else practically speaking for them to be able to go. Liberia is an exception as a nation state which was created to resettle American slaves back into Africa, but was not practical, financially realistic, or preferential for everyone, and led to problems in Liberia which still persist today due to injecting larger numbers of foreigners into that region.

          However, in many ways African-Americans have had an easier time in some respects integrating into American culture and society than Native Americans despite their more apparent skin tone differences. The majority of them had been forced long previously to lose their native languages under even more extreme conditions than the Native Americans were pressured, and were almost exclusively English speaking. They also had adopted Christianity. Being regarded and treated on many levels as even more sub-human than Native Americans were viewed and treated, for them learning to read and write English and adopt the same religion was a way to gain respect and to be treated more like a human being. Not seen by most as a loss of identity, adaptation however possible from the lowest possible position in society they were in was seen as a victory, creating a place for oneself at the table of "civilized" folk whether they were welcome there or not. Their common identity was not in danger of being stripped away any more than it already had, and what was left, their common experience as a people was not based upon any specific previous African locale or nationhood but of a new American Black identity which was could not be taken away anymore even if they wanted it to be. Unlike the Jews during the Holocaust, they needed no badge on their arms to visually be seen by all and each other as separate from the majority, nor could they ever hope to hide the differences which grouped them together as a distinct minority. They could assimilate more in a sense because they did not have to be afraid of losing their identities of seeing themselves as a separate new people (coming from many diverse regions and nations themselves) into it, nor of being completely swallowed by it.

          Common language was in their favor, common religion was in their favor, but the overwhelming advantage African-Americans had toward eventual acceptance and integration over the Native Americans' chances was that of possessing greater numbers. In many regions of the United States they have often made up 30% or more of the population. Native Americans by comparison often now make up less than 10% (with the exception of Hawaii and Alaska) in most every state and less than 1% in total. Though numbers alone do not mean acceptance, it can mean having to deal with people on a daily basis, accepting that you cannot deny their existence, and can provide the means to organize and become a force in a society politically, and potentially becoming an integral part of that society eventually whether it welcomes you there at first or not. In large enough numbers, one group cannot help but be considered as a part of that society and a part of its legacy and identity, especially to those who come later or when looked at by those outside of it, even when others within it choose to deny it at the time.

          So the so-called Great American Melting Pot of cultures, though now including African-Americans, Native-Americans, and genuine acceptance of other religions besides Christianity, was at first practically speaking mostly a melting pot of European cultures (switching to speaking English) and of different Christian denominations, with an included toleration of Atheism. Even this first stage was no small achievement. Given the continuing schism between Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants in Northern Ireland, recurring "racism" of some white people against other white people in Germany and other European states, and civil wars between people who on both sides claim the common name and cultural identities, America forming a new common identity out of a mixture of previous nationalities and beginning true religious tolerance was a marked step forward, however hypocritical the proclaimed words were against its reality then, and possibly in many ways, can be interpreted as such even now. What made it possible, ironically, was the price that was paid by the Native Americans. It was a new identity made possible by a new land. 

          Not atypical in forgetting the Native Americans, it is a common expression and notion that in America, everyone is a descendent immigrants who came there from somewhere else in search of a better life. This embracing of a new identity based not upon previous senses of national identity was made possible as it was a new game being played on someone else's turf. All the major players were the visiting teams, and the home field belonged to a people too dissimilar from each other as well as the outsiders, too disorganized, and too militarily behind to be a force to need to reckon with or to need to integrate and blend in with, pretty much from the start onward. For what America has given the world as model of integration, this was a happy accident. For Native Americans, it was not a happy accident. In Europe every region is well claimed and long claimed. People trace their ancestry back thousands of years on the same land, and everybody well remembers and will never forget seeing some as outsiders even if their families have been living in those regions for many hundreds of years. They can still be seen as outsiders and interlopers.

          The situation of the minorities in the Baltics, especially in Estonia and Latvia, has some similarities which can be related to both the African-American and Native American experiences. As with African-Americans, the Russia speaking people there often did not have any choice about where to live given the nature of the Soviet system which they lived under, and gave itself the power to tell people where they must live or move to. Additionally, these three now separate internationally recognized Baltic states were considered by Russia at the time to be lands within its own national borders, though those borders were not universally accepted by other nations. Many of the people who might have voluntarily moved there from other regions of the USSR, were they to have had influence and luck enough to be able to decide for themselves where to live, would have done so under the assumption it was not moving to a foreign country, just another region of their own country. When independence came, many of these other now separate ethnic nationalities who were put or moved into the Baltics were in the same situation as African-Americans as having it not economically feasible for all of them to return, not motivated financially to return, as for some, they had no ties to another area to the degree that they could assume they would be accepted or better off returning, and now had ties to their new homeland which was pushed on them by circumstances. 

          Similar to Native-Americans, ever becoming autonomous and equal states for these ethnic minorities is also not in the cards. Semi-autonomous local rule is all they can realistically hope to achieve and most are satisfied with that. There are a number of factors which are unique to their situations in why this is the case. In regards to Native Americans being outnumbered and out-gunned militarily speaking by outsiders, the Russian minorities within these states belong ethnically to a people in a neighboring state which is the dominating one in the region both in numbers and in military power. Before the tables were turned, it was that "now outside" power which had threatened to swallow these "now new" state's cultures into itself. Given the political instability and nationalism in Russia, moves toward greater autonomy for Russians within these states beyond limited local self-rule would be seen as attempts for or spark calls for renegotiating borders or the incorporation of those areas back into Russia. Thankfully given that instability in Russia, few Russians on the outside of it in the Baltics would seriously wish to have their towns become a part of Russia, though that threat of such local instability is always potentially there, especially in border regions. Though Russian media within Russia can and does try to stir things up by constantly viscerally portraying the Baltic treatment of minority Russians extremely negatively, the economic advantages of being outside of Russia means even most ethnic Russians see themselves as better off belonging to a state of the European Union than in becoming a province of Russia.

          Linguistically the similarities to Native Americans goes both ways. The recent now native immigrant Russians in these states are required to learn the official state language of their new countries to become full citizens even if they were born there, and an official status for Russian as a second state language is unlikely, even though their numbers are around 1/3 the population in Estonia and Latvia. However, numbers-wise, it is the majority and the official state languages which feel the pressure of needing to act to preserve their language, while the minority language is not in danger of being lost. While already maintaining large minorities of roughly a third (Estonian and Latvia) of their total populations speaking what they see as a foreign language within their own borders, and no one outside of their own countries speaking their titular languages, combined with declining populations and a presumed probable need for future immigration, they feel without requiring more to learn to speak the titular languages of these small states, if they did not, their languages would eventually be replaced or once again relegated to a second-class status in the future. 

          As I began, the threat of losing one's majority status, culture, and language via immigration as well as more overtly by war and political manipulations are not unwarranted fears for many peoples. Seen in context with the United States' development, the European Union is growing in influence as well as area, though it does so by promising to maintain respect for local languages and cultures through a balance of internal diversity, a "we are all minorities here together" outlook. However, when smaller states become attached to or loosely bound to larger states, they can perceive their culture as slowly being stripped away even when they are allowed to retain their own languages. And languages themselves are taught according to their usefulness and grow in numbers according to what people see as the most beneficial for their children to be taught and for themselves to know as well. Once reaching a critical mass, one language becomes dominant and eventually, if the other languages are not spoken outside of that region, can cause them to disappear completely except in history books and tapes. 

          One could say in such instances, so goes the language, so goes the culture. And what defines cultures as being separate from each other is often ambiguous. Distinctly different cultures can and do merge and overlap in too many ways to count, and deciding at what point they are lost or in danger of being lost is difficult. New more inclusive cultures are always being formed as well, and are equally hard to define where they start in what respects, and where they end, as language is just one indicator of a culture. 

          Belonging to a larger more inclusive culture has many benefits. Having a smaller say in a larger arena where more can hear is better in many ways than having full say where no one can hear, none will listen, or where it will not matter. To control ones own life, their families futures, their ethnic groups futures, they now must become a part of larger groups for it is the larger groups of states now making the important decisions, and not just individual states by themselves. 

          Cultures can mix and ethnic divisions can blur over time, but not without new cultures and new senses of ethnic identity forming when not wholly at the expense of one over another, but language is often seen as an indicator of who is winning and losing that battle to retain influence over the common culture as well as just physical survival. The ability to read the records (historical media archives, old newspapers, television, films, etc.) of your physical nation's past which were kept in the same native language you read and write in makes you tend to see yourself and your present culture as extensions of them, even if you are genetically an extension of a different ethnicity. While people do not see themselves as just people but as "a people",  or as separate nations within a nation without promoting the development of new more common inclusive identities they will tend to see language as the key to whom is culturally winning or losing and whose sense of still being one separate identity, which or whose people will still exist later as "a people" or even "the people", or have the greatest influence of perceived identity over most others within their present land's borders in their children's and their children's children's greater futures. 
 
 

 For more on similar issues, see the On Liberty Introduction