Collecting ethnic and racial data in censuses and surveys

The historical comparability of data from different censuses requires that we take into account all changes that may have arisen during the period under study. The way in which we answer the census of population questionnaire or to any other surveys may in fact be influenced by various factors, including those related to the methodology. The examination of the responses to the language questions of the 2001, 2006 and 2011 censuses allows us to note that observed changes in the patterns of response to the questions on mother tongue and language spoken at home in 2011 arise in large part from the changes made to the position and context of the language questions in this census questionnaire relative to previous censuses.

Latin America has tried to cope with ethnicity and race issues since the beginning of the colonization process till current days, therefore, how to collect this information is also a sensible point on census matter. Additionally, different countries build their racial and ethnical identity based on different criteria. From that we built an analysis of the criteria used by the last two Censuses round of Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Ecuador in South America. For that, initially, census criteria used to represent ethnic and racial categories in those four countries were assembled into a comparative table. Following it were assessed the constitutional and law changes concerning ethnical and racial issue, alongside the social movements/civil society demands for the same period. It made possible seeking the changes on census criteria for ethnic and racial data collection within and among those countries, highlighting the differences on how each country officially deal with their population diversity, as much as the legal disposition and census criteria intertwining changes. The results lead us to the main argument of the text: racial and ethnical data are a product of constitutional disposition reviews motivated by social demands and political relations in a very controversial environment.

This paper is borne out of the need to resolve the ever-growing dilemma of census counts in Nigeria. Ever since its independence in 1960, the country has employed and switched between two major methods of census enumeration namely - de jure and de facto, for its census exercises to minimize errors and obtain more dependable data planning and development. The aftermath of each exercise has been marked by allegations based on manipulations by the various sectors. Purposive sampling technique was adopted for the study which targeted societal members knowledgeable about census issues in Nigeria. They include census officials, researchers, academicians and policy makers. What do stakeholders put forward? What measures should be put in place by government to have its citizens become committed to ensuring reliable census results? These and similar issues are what the paper explores and then proposes a more satisfactory approach - which includes consultations at the grassroots among others - that will be agreeable to all and sundry if Nigeria must have accurate population count.

This paper aims to analyze the experience of four Latin-American countries with different traditions and methodological perspectives on the gathering of ethnic and racial statistics of black and indigenous populations, but also of white, mestizo and Asian populations, in particular after the significant appearance in the four societies of the multicultural ideology since the mid-eighties in the 20th century until today. The choosing of these four national societies to present the Latin American experience has to do with the particular interest in the different types of ethnic-racial statistics between the four societies, which allows to have a relevant view of these type of statistics in the region, this is without saying that this is giving an account of all the countries in the region. Anyhow, we take the three societies with the major population volume in the region (Brazil, Mexico and Colombia) and with differentiated ethnic-racial patterns: Brazil has a tradition of statistics by skin color and according to the 2010 census it shows that more than half of its population self-recognized as black under two historical categories (preta and parda). On the contrary, the other three countries have built their statistics under the ethnic paradigm of the indigenous groups.

On November 21, 2012, a new census will be fielded in Bolivia, the first since 2001. All residents will be required to stay in their homes in order to be available to census enumerators. Since the amount of resources that each rural and urban municipality receives from the state is based on the number of inhabitants recorded in the census, maximizing that number recorded locally has become a crucial goal for municipal and community leaders. They have been demanding that every person be present in their real or de jure “home”. In some cases, they have threatened sanctions against migrants who do not return to that home. Given the high rates of internal migration in El Alto —estimates from the 2001 census show that for every migrant that leaves El Alto, five arrive— these threats suggest that the forthcoming census will trigger considerable pre- and post-census population flows. In turn, this suggests that census data on population distributions across high in- and out-migrant districts will be flawed

A basic but fundamental question to arise from the dramatic changes in immigration flows is whether countries have moved towards greater recognition of ethnic diversity in the official statistical sources that provide the basis for evidence-based policy. Numerous case studies have examined how and why governments in particular times and places count their populations by ethnicity but studies that are both cross-national and longitudinal are rare. In this paper we present preliminary findings from the Ethnicity Counts? database of ethnicity questions drawn from national censuses and population registers of more than 200 countries spanning 1985 to 2014. We find a clear shift towards the recognition of ethnic difference in national censuses, although this has occurred unevenly across time and place. In any given round, questions on language dominate, followed by ethnicity, mother tongue and ethnic nationality. The language of race remains, for the most part, confined to the former slaveholding societies in the Americas including the Caribbean and some of US territories in Oceania. Interestingly, the shift towards ethnic enumeration has been accompanied by an increase in state inquiries into citizenship and parental birthplace, suggesting that ethnic and civic enumeration operate as dual strategies of state surveillance.

Indigenous and afro-descendants peoples in Latin America have become active political actors, who have succeeded in placing their historical claims in the public agendas. Consequently, the region as a whole is experiencing a growing demand for information on these populations, given the fact that this is a basic tool for political design and the promotion of human rights. The identification of these populations in national statistical data sources, therefore crucial, being the census the main one. The information obtained from the censuses 2000 contributed to a greater understanding of the conceptual and methodological aspects of the inclusion of the ethnic perspective in data sources. It yielded consensus and standards to be applied to the 2010 censuses. So, it was observed an intense effort to improve the quality of the information, taking into account different conceptual, methological and operational aspects, including the specific wording of the self identification question in each country, all of which will be analysed in this document. However, not all the countries have improved equally and it can be seen that minimum standards still have to be reached. That is why it is necessary to double the efforts made, specially, in pre-census activities and in the institutionalization of ethnic participation.

Buddhism is the dominant religion in a number of Asian countries and the most common religion in some of the countries with the lowest fertility levels in the world. The relationship between Buddhism and childbearing has received comparatively limited scholarly attention so far. Studies of of childbearing in other religions tend to find that religiosity is positively related to fertility.
After considering Buddhist teachings regarding contraception, family formation, and childbearing ideals, we do not find evidence that Buddhism is inherently pronatalist. Our hypothesis is the Buddhist affiliation and commitment level is not associated with higher fertility.
We analyze patterns of childbearing among Buddhists in several Asian countries: India, Cambodia, Nepal, Indonesia, Mongolia, Thailand, Japan and South Korea. We investigate how Buddhist affiliation (and religiosity when available) related to the number of children ever born, controlling for education, urbanization, union status and age. Our preliminary empirical results suggest that in many countries, Buddhist affiliation is not associated with significantly higher fertility. For instance in Thailand, Buddhism is negatively associated with fertility (among women aged 25-49), also when education and region is controlled for.

Discrimination is one of the few subjects for which it is possible to compare the subjective assessment of its extent with an objective measure of the racial or gender penalty the individual faces. In this paper we balance standard measures of discrimination on the labor market to the subjective feelings expressed by individuals about the discrimination they have experienced. We use a large French survey done in 2008 on migrants, second generations and natives. .We found a strong and positive correlation between these two measures. This tends to prove that questions on the way people feel treated can be considered as reliable information on the actual level of discrimination.

Unlike countries with a long history of census taking (e.g. the United States and most European countries), China had only six censuses and the latest one was finished in year 2010. In the censuses, China always collects ethnic group information by one question, “Ethnicity (民族)”, and the answer is in a blank space ending with “ethnic group (族)”. However, the meaning of the question was quite different in year 2010 from the one taken in 1953, the first census in China. That is because since 1982, Chinese answered the census ethnicity question within a framework of 56 ethnic groups. This change in meaning or content of the question is closely related to the purpose of ethnic data collection in the census, the characteristics of ethnic groups in Chinese society as well as a concern of an equal chance for development of all Chinese in China. This paper starts with the ethnicity question in the latest census, the answers and the meanings of the question to individuals. We will examine the short history and reasons for the change and the special meaning of the question over the years. The analysis will remind the academic community and public the complexity of the ethnicity issues of the census in China, including formulation and interpretation of the question as well as their results.