Minority Rights and Minority Identities-Sami in Finland and Sorbs in Germany

This paper deals with intemational minority rights and their meaning as an identity resource för ethnic minorities. It asks why small national groups, such as the Sami and the Sorbs, have not vanished, as was prophesied by modemisation theorists. In fact, the opposite has occurred. In Europe, small national minority groups are now clearly gaining more opportunities to invent their own "national" policies. After a short introduction that provides some general background, 1discuss some common definitions of minority rights and the specific meaning of 'minority identity' used in this paper. Then, 1 show how minority rights and minority identities are linked to each other, and why and how intemational minority protection treaties have become a part of the everyday vocabulary of Sami, Sorb and many other national movements. The examples 1 use originate mostly from my field studies with the Sorbs in Eastem Germany and the Sami in Northem Finland. 1 argue that not only the image of the group projected to its members is influenced by these treaties, but that the definition of the group itself is also changed.


Mimesis as Cultural SurvivaP
The project of nation-states is a never-ending repetition of itself, a compulsive mimesis of ideals that cannot be lived up to.The hegemonic nation-states include everybody in the process ofthe mimicry, since hegemonic ideals can neverreally be separated from what they exclude and what they limit.This inclusion implies that the hegemonic and non-hegemonic (the "outcast" of nation-state ideology) are always discursively dependent upon each other.The members ofhegemonic nation-states are, in this discourse, as important as those who are not allowed to become members.This implies, too, that minorities and majorities are equally important components of the system of the nationstate.The ideals and goals of a nation-state are constantly reinförced through a continual display of power symbols, which all members and non-members of a state understand as signs of decision power.In essence, the hegemonic ideals of the nation-state entail suppression and förcing-to-be-silent to make the creation of the nation-state possible.Take, för example, democracies that were established through non-democratic decisions or national cultures that could only emerge after multifarious local cultures were exterminated.
National cultures are based on an ideal of eliminating difference or transförming difference into a förm that is considered harmless to the construction of the state.Thus, those who represent difference (i.e.suppressed elements, outcasts, non-members) can use mimesis as an identity-building strategy.The mimetic "taking-off' can be seen as adaptation: a stranger seems to leam the way to become "one-of-us".If the "stranger" is seen as somebody trying to adapt, she is often seen as harmless and it becomes easier för the members of a hegemonic state to accept this person.The hegemonic environment in which the stranger is living decides what kind of adaption is reasonable (Adomo and Horkheimer 1947).The adaption to hegemonic ideals is, inevitably, always mimetic because everybody moves in the same discursive field -those who have power, as well as those who have not.The "have-nots" must use the same "dominant" means, and föllow the same "dominant" goals, if they are aiming to get out of their meek position and find a way to become visible in their societies.
Thus mimesis is a strategy of cultural survival.The strategy of cultural survival results in copying the hegemonic norm (Bell 1999).Through the mimetic process, minorities and migrants become a part of society.They start to adapt their cultural self-identification to the norm of the (dominant) state culture.This process always implies an imitation of the "anatomy" of the nation-state.Individuals not belonging to the dominant group can find a chance of survival in the mimesis of nation-building.For example, minorities imi tate the organisational structures of the state, take on the official understanding of political representation and simulate in their own organisations the institu-tional structures of a dominant nation.At the same time, also as a part of the process of mimesis, the ones not belonging to the dominant culture develop a canon of their own cultural symbols and resources that follow the same logic as the dominant symbols and resources.Like the representatives of a nation-state, spokespersons of the minority determine the value and hierarchy of ethnic and cultural features.The kind of mimesis I have described here does not have to be an active and conscious process.Do minority groups like the Sorbs and the Sami need to imitate the process of nationstate building in orderto be able to claim successfully to be a real national, cultural and/ or ethnic minority and eligible för minority protection?My analysis supports the assumption that this process of imitation is the strategy most readily accepted by states like Finland and Germany, and by other states and interstate organisations, such as the European Union.My study indicates that minority activists are forced to choose the kind of nationalist strategies that became very popular at the beginning of the 20th century, if they want to determine the contents of the definition of their minority identity successfully.The strategy of mobilising a minority with ethnic and national arguments is even supported by many European states, and the tendencies to homogenise a minority into "a nation" are implicitly enforced by many interstate organisations.

International Minority Rights
Legal conceptions and ways ofthinking form a structuring element forthe field ofthe political action of cultural minorities.International conventions and measures define political discourses, both directly and indirectly.Minority activists frequently refer to existing international minority rights treaties.Many practice-orientated guidebooks are published, aiming to help minority activists claim "theirrights" in a correct way.Indigenous Peoples, The United Nations and Human Rights, edited by Sarah Pritchard, was published in 1998.This work was explicitly addressed to the activists of indigenous movements.The back cover declares: "This important book is a guide to how indigenous peoples' groups can access the UN system".In this and many other guidebooks, minority activists can learn how to formulate their arguments and define their policies in order to join the international minority rights system.
International minority rights have a long and complex history.The first European "minority problems" were connected to religious differences (Kimminich 1985;Scherer-Leydecker 1997: 30).Nevertheless, confessional questions were strongly related to the political atmosphere of the day (Pernthaler 1980: 10).The exclusively confessional treaties were expanded first during the processes of nation building, which led to an interaction between national and international rights.The first protection treaty established in favour of a national minority is found in Article 1(2) of the Final Resolution of Vienna ( WienerSchluj3akte)from the year 1815.This treaty aimed to protect the Polish nation, its national representation and own institutions, under Prussian, Russian and Austrianrule (Oxenknecht 1988: 112;Stopp 1994: 16).
The term "national minority" was adopted into the vocabulary of intemational law immediately after the First World War with the new minority protection treaties in which the equation "state is nation, and nation is state" could not be accomplished (Oxenknecht 1988: 112).The "Wilson Doctrine" provided, in principle, rights för all groups considered to be 'nations'.The League ofNations, which was constituted in 1920, worked intensively on a design för group rights.These minority protection conventions have to be seen as compensation för the fact that after the war, new states with new leading "nations" came into existence (Galantai 1992).Helgesen (1988: 64) talks about the total failing of minority protection during the era of the League of Nations.However, the minority protection system of the inter-war period had positive effects.In general, it was very important that the parties to the agreement acknowledged the existence of minorities on their territories, at least in principle (Stopp 1994: 21).These group rights did not survive the Second World War.This time, there was almost no involvement för group rights.After all, group rights were seen as one part of the crisis constellation of the Second WorldWar and as one of the reasons förthe longlasting conflicts in the inter-war era in Eastem and Central Europe.In its new setting, intemational law was seen strictly as regulation of individual rights.The individual would enjoy equality with all peoples, and would be able to make use of fundamental freedoms and duties.The only article that included group rights was the right to selfdetermination as the hasis ofmodem intemational law.2Today, intemational minority treaties not only strive to combat the escalation of conflicts along ethnicborders,but also discriminationagainstminorities and -this important för my analysis -work to support the cultural survival of ethnic minorities (Priesnitz 1994).During recent years, many working groups and initiatives have worked to renew theminorityrights agenda and to förm new kinds of rights: In 1992,the UnitedNations adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, and the Council of Europe adopted the Charter för Regional or Minority Languages in 1992 and the Framework Convention on the Protection of National Minorities in 1995.Almost all European states side clearly with minority cultures.Different cultures and languages are seen as a part of the European heritage, a heritage which, för many years, was ignored.
International minority rights are important because they protect minority groupings from oppression on the part oftheir own govemments.At the same time, these rights offer important guidelines för states to adjust their national laws and policies.These rights aim to förce states to give their minorities the support they need to exist.As is generally the case with cultural matters, a great deal of state support is needed in order to keep a minority group in existence.It is important to understand that there is definitel y a need för minority protection.Without an intemational consensus on this, there is an enormous danger för people who cannot be satisfied with the one and only official national identity that many states embrace.
1 have analysed the contents of the definition of a minority in European treaties and conventions elsewhere in greater depth (Toivanen 2001).Implicitly, and sometimes even explicitly, minority rights treaties suppose minorities to share the same language, culture, traditions, belief system and history as other members of that group, and these attributes are supposed to distinguish the group from the majorpopulation of the state.To give some examples: a typical förmulation föund in the UNMinority Rights Declaration (1992) states in Article 1(1) that "[s}tates shall protect the existence and the national, cultural, religious and linguistic identity af minorities within their respective territories, and shall encourage conditions for the promotion af that identity."In Resolution 192/1988 of the European Council on Regional and Minority languages, minority languages are defined as föllows: "Languages belonging ta the European cultural heritage that are traditionally spoken within a territory by nations af state who form a group numerically smaller than the rest af the state s population and different language or languages spoken by the rest af the state spopulation."But how do the protection treaties influence the identity politics of minority activists?Maybe not only the image of the group projected to its members might be influenced, but also the definition of the group itself.
The nations cannot -even quantitatively small nations like the Sorbian or the Sami -be studied by finding primordial continuities or collective feelings: the nation is a practical category of analysis (Brubaker 1996: 21 ).The Sorbian and the Sami nations were not bom out of themselves.Specific political circumstances are needed to give rise to a "revitalisation" process.1hesitate to use the concept of "revitalisation" as it connotes something old and förgotten that is made lively again, and would thereföre like to stress that in this "revitalisation" process, totally new phenomena emerge and are included in the "renewed" concept of national identifications.Even the old meanings of cultural practices are replaced and/or seen and used in new contexts (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983).This "comeback" of minority movements cannot be analysed as a result ofthe intemal ontogenesis of a group, even though sociologists and ethnologists sometimes try to make this connection (Esser 1988;O'Leary 1998: 58).1want to call attention to the extemal factors that cause minority groups to rise (and fall), such as economic resources, political circumstances or decisions made by intemational institutions.1have in my research concentrated on examining how intemational minority rights influence the images and contents of the "minority identity" itself and impact the identity struggle ofnational minorities.1have studied the intemational treaties in orderto find out why it is that so many national minorities in Europe use, in part, precisely the same terminol-ogy in representing themselves, för example, in their political programmes.1will now explore the concepts of 'minority', 'identity' and 'culture', and continue with a short presentation on Sorbs in Germany and Sami in Finland.

What Is a Minority Identity?
The concept of a minority has implications that are very often not conscious enough för us.Often, the nation of "minority" simply means a group of persons that shares one language, one religion, and a common ethnic past or culture, and that is smaller in size than another group living in the same state.This kind of definition corresponds to the denotations made in various intemational minority treaties (see above ).In some cases "minority" implies not the smaller size ofthe group, but its powerposition.This means that quantitative minorities can build qualitative majorities if they successfully control a larger group.Kraus (1997) states that "majority" and "minority" are always relational categories.It is very important to pay attention to the fact that the concept of minority mediates political values which should not be adopted without recognising the dynamic relationship between dominant and subordinated groupings or without being aware that the power circumstances between or inside the groups vary all the time.Khleif (1993) uses the concept of"minoritized" to föcus on the real life circumstances of the so-called minorities.Khleif emphasises that the fact that minoritized groups do not voluntarily assume the position that implies less power and more economic disadvantages.He remarks that most of them are trying hard to get out of the subordinated status.Berry (1992) uses the nation of"acculturating group" för similarreasons: to show the processual nature of belonging to groups defined as minorities.To conclude, the fundamental difference between maj ority and minority groups is in their unequal access to economic, social and their so-called "own" cultural resources.The people who have access to these resources only when they are mediated through one or more other groups can be called minorities.
Identity is another difficult and confusing concept.Studies conceming national minorities allude to the nation of identity all the time, because every definition of group or individual always contains identity prescriptions.According to Calhoun (1994: 27), the tension between identity ("putatively singular, unitary and integral") and identities ("plural, crosscutting and divided") is unavoidable.Whenever we talk about groups, like the Sami or the Sorbs, we strive för one construct.We try to talk about the Sami as though it were a simple and easy task to set the borders of this identity definition.But even though it might often seem to us that the minority groups are stable and their identity characteristics almost timeless, such an opinion does not stand up to critical inspection.It would of course be tempting to conclude that it is allin the eye of the beholder, that it is all 'situational', a matter of time and context, shifting, fleeting, illusory (Smith 1986: 2).However, identity is certainly an ongoing process rather than containing fixed characteristics.
Belonging seems to be one ofthe most important terms in this debate.Belonging to a social group establishes the hasis för self-definition.This is how social context has a massive influence on how, and with what values, an individual identifies herself (Deux et al. 1995;Edwards 1985, 132).We know that identity is constructed and reconstructed through endless self-definitions and self-evaluation (Hogg and Abrams 1988;Liebkind 1992).These definitions are influenced and changed through definitions and evaluations made by other people and groups.Deux et al. ( 1995: 289) say in conclusion that identities are developed and adopted within a common cultural context and as such represent a culturally shared förm of social representation.Many authors recognise that it is an impossible task to define a homogeneous social identity (Brown & Williams 1984).Above all, the individual will try to maintain the feeling that she is controlling all the changes in her identification process herself (Mol 1982).
The concept of culture is unavoidable in this debate.Kymlicka (1995: 18) works with a nation of culture synonymous with concepts of "nation" and "a people".By these terms he means an inter-generational community that is more or less institutionalised, that lives in a specific territory, communicates in a certain language, and shares a history.One should be careful with Kymlicka's definition, because one has to keep in mind that cultural groups are not primordial social entities that rest on biological, cultural, linguistic orreligious facts (Gurr 1993, 4).Neither are they simply rational associations created to gain access to specific material or political resources.The shared historical experience ofbeing a victim of discrimination and racist action certainly strengthens group identity (Rex 1994) and the awareness ofhaving suffered unfaimess collectively clearly nourishes a feeling ofbelonging together (Bott-Bodenhausen 1996;1997). 1 agree that the minority elites can "manipulate" these resentments in their political work on group identity (Horowitz 1985, 66-69), but 1do want to stress that they cannot invent these feelings.Kukathas (1995, 233) emphasises that extemal factors and, especially, various political institutions play a majorrole in the förmation of modem groups.Culture is, in his view, not that decisive för group identity; culture can be "added" to the identity later on.This is an interesting nation because it proposes that beföre culture there has to be an elite.The moment this elite has obtained a secure status in society, it may begin to reförm, or even to create, a group identity.1do not believe that even Kukathas means that the elite could invent a culture, but they can certainly influence what is represented as "the minority culture" för the wider society.An identity conflict between a minority and the rest of the population is always somewhat artificial in its outset.People who feel that their cultural and social needs are not sufficiently acknowledged or who are oppressed by the state they are living in, have to find a "point" that makes the differentiation on an ethnic hasis reasonable and allows them to mobilise "their" people.Once there are people who have enough power to start recreating "a" people, it is possible to förm a democratic elite and to find democratic representatives (Kukathas 1995, 235;Offe 1996).Very often this creation of an elite or activist group is supported by intemational minority rights which presuppose the existence of a more or less förmal representation för each minority (Toivanen 2001 ).Like Kukathas, Giddens (1991) emphasises the importance of the dominant institutions in the process of determining and strengthening one's identity.The concept of institutional identity emphasises the meaning ofvarious institutions, relevant för all members, as a hasis för an identity project.To my understanding, only this concept of identity is useful when looking at people who are struggling för a distinctive and officially recognised identity to find equality.Various relevant institutions set guidelines and borders för the identity förmation of a person ora group.The agents construct a specific meaning för institutional establishments and accept these as relevant resources för their identity.In this process of construction, history, biology, productive and reproductive institutions, collective memory and personal fantasies, power constellations, and religious revelations flow together (Castells 1997, 7-12).
In order to he able to act together, ethno-cultural movements have to create and maintain a feeling of belonging amongst their members, and establishing institutions is an effective means of achieving this sentiment.Both the Sorbian and the Sami organisations are working hard on the democratisation of their representative organs.Only democratically elected delegates have a chance to change the circumstances oftheirminority, in terms of finding ways to help the group out of a suppressed position.Only if the minority organisations fulfil at least the minimum standards of a democratic organisation, they will he taken seriously in the field of politics, as well as in the eyes oftheirpotential members, the state, and interstate representatives.
To summarise, identity should he seen, in my view, as an ongoing process in which belonging to social groups plays a major role.When a person evaluates the meaning of one specific identification för herself, the different institutions she feels she belongs to or accepts as an important source of self-definition provide her with an orientation on how and with which terms to define her belonging, Even an "inter-generational community" (Kymlicka) does not remain in existence without specific circumstances keeping it existing or helping its "revival".Amongst other resources, various intemational institutions create specific circumstances för identity support or identity loss.Institutions like UNO, ILO, EU, OSCE or the Council of Europe set and define minority existence and identities through setting and defining minority protection treaties.The political institutions -and 1consider minority rights as one kind of political institutionand intemational organisations, among other extemal factors, are decisive för minority activists working on identity politics and politics of recognition.
In the next part, 1will argue that these minority rights function as guides för minority identities in two ways: directly, as the well known contents of minority protection treaties which, then, are adopted into the minority's own "national programmes", organisational structures, and förms of representation.And, on the other hand, indirectly, through state and communal minority policies that define the space minorities can occupy in the societies and what kind of minorities are accepted as recipients of diverse support programs.My point is to say that these rights create an important resource för the identity politics of minority activists.They are relevant both för what minorities are like and how they have to act.

Who are the Sorbs and the Sami?
When looking at the identity strategies used by the Sami movement in Finland and by the Sorbian movement in Germany, it seems quite clear that both identity projects have long and different preceding histories.The differences between the groups are enormous and inevitably meaningful för my study.Even so, my analysis here concentrates on the similarities between these two groups.It is surprising that two different movements use very similar resources and are able to use very similar identity strategies.Now, 1will briefly introduce the Sorbian and the Sami movements.
According to the Sorbian historiographic the Sorbian minority has always lived as they still do today, in the area of Lausitz (Lusatia) in the förmer DDR, in the East of contemporary Germany.Sorbian historical sources show that they already inhabited the Lusatia area beföre the Germans arrived (Kunze 1995: 9;Kasper 1990Kasper , 1991)).The Sorbian sources emphasise that the Sorbs are the first inhabitants of what they consider their homelands, and should be seen as aborigines of this area (Mahling 1991: 7; Sorben -Ein kleines Lexikon 1989: 10).Some Sorbian activists would say that their lands have been occupied by the Germans since the 6th century (see also Neustupny 1951).A people called the "Sorbs" did not exist at that time, but there were certainly Sorbian ancestors, Slavic people, living in what is the Eastem part of Germany today.The national minority known as the Sorbs (in German, the "Wenden") was actually created as a by-product ofthe constitution ofthe German nation.
The Lausitz is considered a Sorbian homeland, even though the group isin the minority there (Oschlies 1990).The "Historical Dictionary of Contemporary National Movements" (Minahan 1996, 334) tells that Sorbs declared theirindependence on 1 January 1919, and their territory is settled today by 45 % Sorbs and 55 % Germans as the two "major national groups".According to Sorbian estimates, there are about 60,000 Sorbian people.About 15,000 people have an active knowledge of at least one of the two Sorbian languages (Kriiger-Potratz 1991: 87).The greatest number of Sorbs live in two Bundesländer -Brandenburg and Saxony.They speak two different Sorbian languages.
The language spoken in Brandenburg is more closely related to Polish, and is called Lower Sorbian.The other language, spoken in Saxony, is related to the Czech language and called Upper Sorbian.All Sorbs speak German (Elle 1995a(Elle , 1995b;;SpieJ3 1995).The Sorbian minority movement is strongest in the Catholic areas in Saxony (Walde 1994).The Sorbs enjoy extensive legal protection (Domowina Information 2/1994).Sometimes it is even said that there are more laws to promote Sorbian language and culture than people can make use of: the elite is very small and Sorbian people difficult to find (Interviews DS5).The most important Sorbian organisation is called 'Domowina'.The goal of this organisation is to establish a cultural hasis för Sorbian existence that can be used to fight against assimilation on a linguistic and cultural level (Elle l 995a, 475).There is also a variety of smaller Sorbian local organisations and clubs that are mainly subordinate to the Domowina (Stiftung för das sorbische Volk 1994).The minority identity is experienced primarily through these diverse associations.Even though co-operation between the Lower and Upper Sorbian organisations is not without conflicts, to split the minority would mean ending state money and assistance, as Sorbs are, by law, considered to be one national minority.Lower Sorbian activists argue that eventually there may be no speakers ofthe mother tongue and they worry about preserving their identity should the language be lost (SpieJ3 1995).In the Catholic areas where Upper Sorbian is spoken, it is still possible to find young people who use Sorbian as their first language.In recent years there have been many attempts in schools and kindergartens to re-activate the Sorbian languages (FAZ 10.8.2000).Altogether, it is hard to differentiate between the Sorbian and German lifestyle, since socio-economically Sorbs do not differ from the rest of the population living in the same area.
The Sami people enjoy the status ofthe aborigines of Scandinavia and Finland.Sami mythology relates that the Sami have always lived in harmony with nature in Lapland (Aikio, Aikio-Puoskari and Helander 1994).Relatively recent research shows that the ancestors ofthe Sami have even been legal landowners in Lapland (Korpijaakko-Labba 1994).However, Sami history emphasises that the Sami used to be nomads, following the course of wild reindeer, until space decreased as new inhabitants moved north and settled down.These newcomers are considered to be the ancestors ofthe Finns, who, as DNA studies seem to indicate, are genetically "of a different population" than the Sami (Carpelan 1996: 10-14;Savontaus 1995).For some Sami activists this information is very important: "We are not Finns, Swedes or N orwegians, even the genetic studies prove this", they say (Interviews FS24).Today, Sami people live in four different states: Norway, Sweden, Russia and Finland.Altogether, there are estimated to be about 70,000 Sami.About 6,500 Sami live in Finland (Pentikäinen 1995a;Kitti 1995).There are nine to eleven different Sami languages and even more dialects.Three of the languages, Northem, Inari and Skolt Sami, are spoken in Finland.There are difficulties in maintaining all the Sami languages, and there is a concem that only the largest of the Sami languages, Northem Sami, spoken in Norway, Sweden and Finland, might survive (Pentikäinen 1995b ).Because it is the most widely spoken, it has the best chance ofbecoming the Sami linguafranca.
The Sami organisations are the heart of the minority's existence.As the lecturer of Sami studies at the University ofHelsinki, Irja Seerujärvi-Kari said, "!believe that the Sami are the best-organized people in the world.They have found [sic] many kinds af local, national and international organisations, ideological associations and hobby clubs."(Quoted after Korhonen 1997, 5-6).Association and organisation life has always been critical to the modem Sami existence.In the beginning of the twentieth century, many Finnish and föreign academics became interested in "helping Lappish people" to create their own organisations.In the l 930s, an important support organisation ofthe Sami, "Lapin Sivistysseura", was föunded.Samuli Aikio, a researcher of Sami origins, noted that in the 30s, many of these Sami societies and organisations were föunded in a global context of nationalistic and fascist ideas, which represented a very real threat to national minorities in many parts of Europe.This atmosphere was also tangible in Finland and lead to the development of many organisations to protect Sami heritage (Aikio 1984, 28).Another important Sami organisation in Finland and the most important political actor until the Sami Parliament was föunded in 1973, Samii Litto, mainly had members who identified themselves as Sami.The Sami Parliament continued the political work of Samii Litto and was able to establish a democratic hasis för Sami politics in Finland.In Norway, Sweden and soon also in Russia, similar kinds of parliaments have developed.In every country, the Sami elite have slightly different goals, but their main programme goals are developed by the N ordic co-operation of the Sami Council (beföre 1992, the Nordic Sami Council), föunded in 1956.With the "law on cultural autonomy" in 1996, the Sami Parliament in Finland was replaced with the Såmeting (Saamelaiskäräjät) (Govemment Act 974/95).
It is true för Finnish Lapland and för the German Lausitz that many educated minority members have föund regular employment in the minority institutions.There are some professions that are traditionally seen as Sami occupations, like reindeer farming.However, even though the Sami (as opposed to the Sorbs) still have a "traditional" lifestyle, it is today shared by many Finns and has become highly modemised.All people in Lapland live in similar kinds of houses and share many aspects oflife, irrespective of their ethnic affiliation.
There are some major changes in the political situation of Europe in the l 990's that have an enormous influence on all European minority movements.Sorbian history and the many advantages that came with the GDR era have a remarkable influence on the current situation of the Sorbs.However, the unification of Germany did not only make the old options vanish, but at the same time opened new doors: In 1990, för example, the Domowina became a member of the European Bureau för Lesser U sed Languages.Domowina has launched many significant cultural exchange programmes, supported partly by the EU and intemational organisations, with the Czech Republic and Poland.For the Sorbian minority, the European Union and European minority politics play an important role -not only because of financial support but even more because of moral guidelines of the European Parliament and European Council.This applies to Sami organisations, too.Finland became a member ofthe European Economic Area (EEA) in 1994, andjoined the EU in 1995.Evenmore important förthe development of Sami politics in Finland has been the collapse of the Sovi et Union, which opened the door för Finland to become a full member ofthe European Council.

Some field notes on how minorities define themselves as nations
1 did my field work in 1995-1997, travelling by car around Såpmi and Lusatia, interviewing 45 activists and politicians of the Sami and Sorbian minority movements.Some of them were working för minority organisations, others devoting their leisure time to them.The interviews lasted 1-3 hours, and included personal questions and open discussion about the legal, social, economic and educational situation of the Sorbs and Sami. 1 was interested in hearing how the minority members define themselves and their minority movement without asking direct questions about it.At the same time, 1 met many people who did not like to be seen as minority members and talked with them about the reasons för identifying or not identifying themsel ves as minority members.All interviews are coded because anonymity was important för most people 1 talked with.As another method of gaining införmation on how the group defines itself and even more to establish the arguments through which it claims a need för specific treatment, 1analysed minority publications, leaflets and diverse organisation materials representing the minority, its culture, traditions and language, and local newspapers in both Lapland and Lausitz.
In the föllowing, 1am going to give some examples of the self-definitions made by the people 1interviewed, modifying a schema proposed by Xose Nufiez Seixas (1993). 1 want to make a short excursion into my field notes in order to show how the essentialistic identity concept is used by the minority activists and politicians to create and recreate their groups as "a" people eligible för the protection and support promised in the international minority protection treaties för national minorities.My aim is to show that the activists are förced to operate with this kind of nationalist self-definition ifthey want their groups to enjoy the status of a national minority.According to my research, the föllowing factors seem to be important förthe self-definition of Såmi and Sorb activists.In the discourse of affirmative elements, the activists stress that because they have their own culture, their own language, a history different from that of the majority and because they still have their own homeland, they do förm their own nations.For instance, one officer of the Sorbian movement says: "You really should drive out ta the villages.There you find the old, beautiful lifestyle which we have lost [here in the city].The Germans have lost their traditions, but we haven t" (DS16).The activists like to stress that their mentality differs from that of the majority population, that they have their own specific world view.In the words of one Sorbian interviewee: "Our culture is certainly a different culture, as you can see in the costumes, as you can hear in the music, maybe [you see it} a bit less in the painting, but it is a different colour.We come out af a different culture -we are a different culture" (DS12).With these affirmative elements, the activists give the impression both to their colleagues and to the wider population that there is a specific emotional bond linking the minority members of the same blood, fate and culture.As one Sami activist pointed out: "The Finns do not have a mental landscape like us, a bond with this area.For us [Sami people} this is home" (FS4).
Another definition of "the other" helps the activists to define how their group differs from these "others".To be a Sami ora Sorb is also to be defined through implicit and explicit comparison with "others", with Finns and Germans respectively.In the interviews, the statement of "what we are like" was always the opposite ofthe comments about "what the others are like".The majority society is hardly a strange place för the Sorbs or the Sami, as many are fully integrated into the majority populations.The strangeness is represented in a purely idealised form.In this discourse, defining the majority institutions as strange and as a threat to the minority, activists legitimate their will to create their own institutions equivalent to the institutions of the majority.The negative and positive strangers were used to describe the kind of "othemess" that was threatening to minority identification and the kind that was supportive.In Finnish Lapland, the Sami experience is: "Many inhabitants here are annoyed that there are other nationalities -like us Sami -living here.They just say 'we are in Finland and here everyone should speak Finnish:" (FS 13).In the schools, one teacher said: "The interesting point is that the more distance the pupils family has from their Sami roots the more open-minded they generally are towards the Sami language" (FS4).This is a experience shared by Sorbian activists who say that the West Germans are often much more open-minded towards Sorbian culture than the local Germans.Those who live among or next to the Sorbs or the Sami develop a resentment, and some have questioned: "Why do they have separate treatment-they are exactly like us" (DS16).As one interviewee summarised: "A threatfrom outside(..) has lead ta closer ties among us.The negative publicity has given an inner boost ta [our minority] movement" (FS3).
In my study, 1 called one group of "others" "the strangers among us".They are potential members needed by the minority organisation.Their membership could make it possible forthe minority group to gain both power and numbers.They sometimes give a new direction to the minority movement.While the elite try to keep dissidents quiet, they simultaneously try to encourage new people to join the movement.The activists try to encourage people to "ta declare their roots" (FS 1).As one Sorb politician said: "The overwhelming part af our people have scarcely had anything ta do with politics and therefore they could never understand the backgrounds af diverse things (...) it is our task ta show them the correct way ta go" (DS 14).
The third element of the discourse of self-definition is about re-integration as a selective process.Minority activists try to look för people who could be seen as potential members, and motivate those persons to come and join the movement.This is a difficult task, as the group of "potential members" is not very large, according to one activist: "We have ane weak point (...) public relations.It [a positive picture af the group} is not very attractive" (DS 17).It is a difficult task to lure families back to the movement that, just one generation ago, got rid of the stigma of being a minority member.As one Sami activist pointed out: "Many af the people living here have not been a Sami for generations and want ta be neither Sami or Finnish" (FS8).A Sorb said: "There are some [Sorbs J (...) who tell they are Sorbs, but do not speak the Sorbian language anymore and do not care about the minority identity (...).I guess most af the Sorbs just don 't have the necessary national consciousness" (DS 10).The problem of "reintegrating" these potential members is that so many ofthem do notfeel like a national minority.
The last element used by the interviewees is called an "analogy discourse" here.This is when activists use the stories of another minority group as a positive model to help convince people that they are also able to challenge state politics and policies in a way that helps the activists.One of the persons interviewed said: "Four days ago I visited the Frisian minority and we exchanged information on how they preserve and revitalize their language in practice and so on (...) it is a great help, this 'know-how' exchange among minorities.Often you get affirmation that other minorities have similar problems ta us and (...) you can learn so much, because some succeed while others do not.This experience af exchange isfor me the cheapest invention existingit cannot be measured with money" (DS16).The analogies are used as examples to help demand rights from the govemment, and are also used to convince potential minority members, as when one activist said: "If the Inuit can get this through, we shall also make it" (FS3).
The four main elements of the discourse of self-representation or "making of a national minority" analysed above -affirmative elements, definition of others, re-integration, and the analogy discourse -are used by activists of the minorities to shape and reshape the official picture of the movement and reach out to their members (actual and potential) in wider society orin other countries.
International minority rights, as well as most of the European treaties and recommendations, operate with old-fashioned and essentialist minority and identity concepts.This agenda radiates through national policy which, in tum, affects the self-image and identity strategies of the minority activists.The common-sense image of a homogenous minority is used in this discourse to help organisations define themselves as a real minority, a people, with a collective identity.

Summary: Mimesis and Minority Rights
This is the final part of this paper.Here 1 want to bring together the previously discussed subjects: on the one hand, intemational rights and the case studies, and on the other hand, the concept of mimesis and minority identity.
The member states of the European Union view themselves as liberal democracies, as states that guarantee individual freedom and human rights (McGrew 1997).They have signed a vast number ofbills conceming cultural matters in order to guarantee cultural exchange and democracy.Cultural democracy means that all people and groups should actively participate in the process of cultural production, consumption and legitimisation.Moreover, minorities -according to the principles of cultural democracy -have the same right to participate in the cultural flourishing of the states they inhabit.Behind these recommendations, we still find the assumption that it is only natural that every human being belongs to only one nation and feels at home in only one culture.Furthermore, this nation implies that all nations and all peoples do have one culture -one pure culture -to defend (Eriksen 1993), to protect from hybridity3, and to maintain för subsequent generations.Zygmunt Bauman (1992, 155-160) has called this whole phenomenon "Kampf gegen Ambivalenz".Already, at its starting-point, the mixture or creolization of cultures is defined as a problem, as if it would be enough för the mental stability of one human being to handle only one culture (Eriksen 1993, 53).Along these same paths of argument, national minorities ask för rights för their specific culture, which needs to be protected against other cultures; against mixture and impurity.In order to enjoy protection and rights, the one culture has to be defined and demarcated from other, maybe even quite similar cultures.In this process the culture has to be politicised and instrumentalised as a national culture, the culture of one distinctive nation.Potentially, this kind of understanding of the concept of national culture can be used as an identity resource.But how can a culture be constructed to have the qualities needed to serve as an effective political resource -a political resource that would allow people to demand not only distinctiveness, but more especially, equal status?
For it to serve appropriately as a modem resource för a minority, the minority activists need to work on their concept of culture.One effective strategy to modify it is to historicise the minority experience.In studying the way Sorbian and Sami activists represent their culture as a national culture, the organisations' materials, interviews and observations in minority associations and institutions indicated how minority history föllows and imitates the history of the dominant nation, the official state history.It offers an altemative to the dominant histographical models and explains how the minority ended up as a minority.The legends or stories about the Sorbian and Sami minorities have, in this sense, a lot in common.They describe how a little nation, suffering under a lack of an educated elite and other resources, föught its way through troubles, and even wars, and managed to maintain and preserve its ancient identity to this day.In this canon ofhistory there is alwaysjust one nation and one history in singular.Sources förthis "collective" identity and its preservation are föund in distinctive incidents and events, which are pushed to the föreground as a kind of hasis för the minority existence.
All groups förmed by people are, without question, heterogeneous.This heterogeneity is, för most of the minority activists, much less of a problem.Amongst the Sami and Sorbianmovements, heterogeneity is generally considered to be absolutely natural, but för "the public" there must be a monolithic canon to represent.In the same way, activists have to agree on the contents of some "plausible" moments of identification.Even though the Sorbian and Sami history, and even other identity resources, differ from each other in many respects, a considerable number of similar guidelines and parallel discourses can be recognised in the mobilisation processes or in the identity politics of the minority activists.The key förthe identitypolitics ofboth organisationsis to represent the minority as "a people", "a nation" belonging together biologically, historically and culturally, sharing a common past and a common future.
It can be deduced that the common language ofnation-building at the beginning of the last century has re-surfaced in the language of minority activists.The common-sense image of a homogenous minority used in the intemational minority protection treaties must be used in the discourseto help the minority organisations establish themselves as a protected national minority.The intemational minority laws codified, för example, in the UN, ILO, Council of Europe and OSCE, are often used as an argument to show that the minority organisation may regulate membership within their minority.The minority protection treaties and recommendations define minorities as groups with one unified mind.According to these treaties, minorities speak one language, share one culture and live in their ancient territories.The treaties help to maintain the myth that these minorities have preserved their identity throughout history.Thereföre, if the minority elites want to claim their rights, there are few altematives för them but to attempt to nationalise and homogenise the minority.To be taken seriously, the non-dominant cultures in Europe, and maybe elsewhere too, have to imitate the hegemonic model of the nation-state used and cultivated in transnational organs.States clearly tend to support specific kinds of groups: those that are able to convince others that they do constitute a "real minority", "bearing" distinctive cultural and national features, get support and protection för their identity politics.Cultural and ethnicminorities use mimesis as a strategy of cultural survival, and it is difficult to imagine any other options för most minority movements in Europe.