Ethnic mainstreaming policy is based on the fact that government planning and national laws all need to take ethnic differences into account. Before policy is decided, analysis should be carried out into potential effects on different groups, to ensure the allocation of government resources is equally accessible for different ethnic groups, and so that genuine ethnic equality can finally be achieved in terms of opportunities for taking part in society and public affairs and in access to resources.

Ethnic mainstreaming is a core value of a multicultural constitutional democracy, whose goal lies in creating public space across ethnic groups and seeing different groups establish a social mainstream in an environment of intersubjectivity, breaking the power relationship between the center and the periphery. Intersubjectivity reverses the thinking of “I am the subject, you are the object;” it means that both are the subject and each side has to learn from the other’s subjectivity.

In the past, the values of a country’s majority ethnic group have been at the center and the disadvantaged groups at the margins. But in national mainstream culture, why are disadvantaged groups always at the margins? In the United States, for example, without African-American culture there would be no jazz music, no blues, no NBA superstar Michael Jordan, no King of Pop Michael Jackson; American culture would have lost an important part. So whether minority or majority ethnicities, all should serve together to create society’s mainstream culture.

The first step in ethnic group policy is cross-departmentalization. In the past, policy regarding ethnic groups was all down to the department: the Hakka Affairs Council handled Hakka affairs; the Council of Indigenous Peoples handled indigenous affairs. Each looked to its own matters and did not pay attention to the needs and interests of other groups. For instance, what if someone does not understand Mandarin and misses the stop, when the language is the only one to be broadcasted in public transport in Hakka settlements? It seems that government policies have nothing to do with Hakka affairs, but the fact might be opposite.

In addition to the ordinary administration of government, a cross-ethnic public domain should also be established so that all ethnic groups can have a space to express themselves and have dialogue with each other, encouraging the formation of a cross-ethnic, cross-cultural national literacy. To give an example: in Taiwan, indigenous issues are not their own issues alone, but are issues concerning indigenous peoples’ relationships with ethnic Han people. In the past few centuries, Han people took over the lands originally belonging to indigenous peoples, directly or indirectly causing indigenous people groups to become disadvantaged. If people lack mutual understanding between different ethnic groups, the minorities, including members of indigenous and Hakka communities, will be taken care of by the country, eventually becoming the object of sympathy.

Once such literacy has been established, the next step is to think about whether, within the national polity, festivals and ceremonies may be established according to the memories of each ethnic group, to show that the sacred memorials shared by the nation should also be across ethnic lines, so people of all ethnic groups may feel that they are owners of their nation.

The places where ethnic minorities live should also be locally mainstreamed. For example, most of the population in Miaoli County is Hakka, and Hsinchu County also has a high percentage of Hakka population. Since the nation has the national language, the county should also have its own language. One shouldn’t be the minority when staying in his/her own hometown. This is also a very important goal in moving towards "ethnic mainstreaming," and the ultimate goal is to reach the constitutional level.

From a legal perspective, ethnic mainstreaming requires a policy program and division of labor rules, combined with high-level plans, medium- and long-term plans, and annual plans of various departments to implement them together. In order to plan ethnic policies, we should first collect basic data on ethnic statistics, as well as supporting measures such as internal evaluation, service evaluation, ethnic budget, ethnic mainstreaming budget, and ethnic relationship empowerment, so as to drive the society as a whole to care about and recognize the consciousness of ethnic groups.

Ethnic mainstreaming is actually the pursuit of positive equality, so that every ethnic group has the opportunity to participate in social and public affairs and acquire resources, and finally achieve the mainstreaming of ethnic entities and become part of the mainstream of society.