What’s a dominant minority?

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A dominant minority usually refers to a group of people who wield enormous social, political, economic, or cultural power in a country or area even if they make up a small part of the population. This term is most commonly used for racial divisions or groups within countries. A dominant minority, however, can apply to any situation that adheres to its definition. For example, the ruling minority might be restricted to only political power or crucial decision-making much larger than its numbers, a concept known as minorityism.

A well-known example of a dominant minority are white South Africans. This group represents only about 9% of the population in the Republic of South Africa, with Afrikaners – descendants of mostly Dutch, German and French settlers who began arriving in southern Africa in the mid-17th century – comprising around four-fifths of it. On the other hand, Black Africans make up about 17% of the South African population. White South Africans, however, are the dominant minority due to vestiges of an informal social system.

When South Africa was under British influence and sovereignty, first as a union, then as an autonomous dominion from 1910, blacks were prohibited from participating in the country’s affairs on an equal footing with whites. In 1948, during the parliamentary elections, racial segregation became legal in the country due to white fears about black political aspirations. The system was called apartheid, and for more than 50 years blacks would suffer the indignities of second-class citizenship characterized by separate but unequal public services and violent intimidation whenever they presented resistance. After decades of domestic turmoil and trade embargoes against South Africa, apartheid ended in 1994 when multi-racial democratic elections were held. White South Africans as a group, however, still wield considerable economic power.

Tutsis in Rwanda and Burundi, based in Central and East Africa, are an example of a dominant minority within groups of people who share the same continental connection. They are numerically five times more numerous than the Hutu, which is the largest ethnic group in the region. Tutsis, however, particularly in the Republic of Rwanda, were generally wealthier, had higher graduation rates, and possessed considerable political influence. Some theorized that this status could be traced to the Belgian colonizers, who favored the Tutsi because they believed they were racially superior to the Hutu. This is said to be one source of the resentment that would erupt between the Tutsi and Hutus in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, which claimed the lives of nearly a million people.

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