Second-class citizen

Encyclopedia : S : SE : SEC : Second-class citizen

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Second-class citizen is an informal term used to describe a person who is legally (and often socially) discriminated against or generally treated unequally within a state or other political jurisdiction, despite being native-born or a legal resident. While not necessarily slaves, outlaws or criminals, second-class citizens have limited legal rights, civil rights and economic opportunities, and are often subject to mistreatment or neglect at the hands of their putative superiors.

Second-class citizenry may be de jure or de facto, and is generally regarded as a violation of human rights. Typical impediments facing second-class citizens include disenfranchisement (a lack or loss of voting rights), limitations on civil or military service (not including conscription in every case), as well as restrictions on language, religion, caste and education.

Examples include:

• Non-slave native Americans and black people in many African and North- and South American nations up to approximately the mid-20th Century.
• The native black population of the former apartheid society of South Africa.
• Whites in Robert Mugabe's Zimbabwe.
• Native Indians under British India, and also outcastes in India.
• Burakumin in Japan.
• Jews, Roma (also called Gypsies), homosexuals and other "undesirables" in Nazi Germany.
• Women and non-Muslims in certain Islamic or Muslim-majority countries.
• Political dissidents and "class enemies" in communist nations.
• Iraq's Kurdish and Shia population under the rule of Saddam Hussein.

The term is generally used as a pejorative or in the context of civil society activism and governments will typically deny the existence of a second class within the polity, except in the cases of segregation in the United States, apartheid in South Africa, and the German Nazi rulers.

By contrast, a resident alien or foreign national may have limited rights within a jurisdiction (such as not being able to vote, and having to register with the government), but is also given the law's protection, and is usually accepted by the local population. A naturalized citizen carries the same rights (and responsibilities) as a born citizen, and is also legally protected.

See also

• American Civil Rights Movement (1955-1968)
• Civil Rights Act of 1964

 

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