Threatened and vulnerable minorities

Minorities are threatened with extinction, whether by ethnocide, by voluntary assimilation into a dominant culture, or by gradual suppression of the minority culture.

Threatened minorities include tribes, religious sects, ideological groups or movements and powerless small nations, which latter may be threatened with economic or political domination from outside and may even be absorbed by a powerful neighbour. Ideological groups are mainly threatened by police activity or internment, while religious sects and tribes may be as much threatened by the influence of the dominant culture as by any of its actions. In organizations, dissenters (collectively or individually) may be removed, relegated to marginal functions, downgraded, harassed, or made the subject of brain-washing, peer-pressure or other techniques. The organization may attempt to silence conscience in the case of those members with cultural and moral values differing from those accepted as the norm.