Comparison of United States incarceration rate with other countries
The incarceration rate of the People's Republic of China varies depending on sources and measures. According to the World Prison Brief, the rate for only sentenced prisoners is 118 per 100,000 (as of 2015). The rate for prisoners including estimations for the number of pre-trial detainees and those in administrative detention is 164 per 100,000 (as of 2015). In a 2010 interview Harry Wu, a U.S.-based human rights activist and ex-Chinese labor camp prisoner, estimates that "in the last 60 years, more than 40–50 million people" were in Chinese labor camps, but that period includes the mass incarcerations of the 1950s or the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) and is not representative of modern China.
Internalized racism
The case of China is of interest because some have argued that racism, and race itself doesn't exist in China. However, Dutch Historian Frank Dikötter argues that everything from the practice of using cranium weight between races as a measure of white and Chinese superiority to the physical attacks and demonstrations of Chinese university students against African students make it clear that race is indeed recognized in China. Indeed the context of race and racism in China is heavily affected by the fact that the large majority of the county is identified as Han Chinese (90.56% of the reported population in 2005). 55 minority ethnic groups are recognized by the government, giving the government the power to dictate different groups as legitimate (and therefore eligible for less taxes, more subsidies and less restrictions) or illegitimate. This creates an environments in which groups attempt to gain their validation and sense of worth from the dominant Han Chinese and the state, internalizing a subordinate position. Because this system involves policing of social groups, it also involves discriminatory practices which are then internalized by both recognized and unrecognized minority groups.