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| Community, collective action and common grazing: The case of post-socialist Mongolia |
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Reference |
| Mearns, Robin(1996)'Community, collective action and common grazing: The case of post-socialist Mongolia',Journal of Development Studies, 32:3, 297 — 339 Link: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~db=all?content=10.1080/00220389608422418 |
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Introduction to the Institution |
| This case study describes the institutional dynamics of the management of common grazing in Mongolia through two major historical transitions: the collectivization of the rural economy from the 1950s or so, and its decollectivization since 1990. Of Mongolia's total land area of 1.6 million sq. km., 79 per cent is under pasture. The institutions relevant to the management of common grazing are not so much the formal organisations of the state, as the informal, kinship- and residence-based community groups that serve a wide range of socially valued purposes, including a minimal role in natural resource management |
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Rules for Management
of the Institution |
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(a) Boundary Rules |
| Spacial Boundaries: Pasture land of Mangolia. Of Mongolia's total land area of 1.6 million sq. km., 79 per cent is under pasture.Social Boundaries: The khot ail, or nomadic herding camp, is traditionally the basic, independent social and economic unit of livestock production. It comprises a group of households who are often but not necessarily consanguineal or affinal relatives, and who assist each other in activities such as day-to-day herding, cutting wool and hair of animals, making felt, nomadic moves, and hay-making. Membership of khot ails is not fixed, and individual households may come and go, but more often than not they form around a relatively stable, core group of households who customarily reside together for at least part of each year. |
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(b) Governance
rules |
| Most khot ails have an acknowledged leader who is usually the most experienced male herder. |
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(c) Resource Allocation |
| Mongolian herders invariably espouse a ideal of free and open access to pasture by all-comers. However there are regulations for access to seasonal grazing commons, such as tacitly agreeing the approximate date on which a seasonal pasture is 'opened'. There are evolved set of rules and cultural norms surrounding the use of pasture land. There are activities that take place at the level of the neighborhood such as search parties to look for lost animal, firewood collection in forested areas, clearing pastures following heavy snowfall. Each family would normally keep several; perhaps even all, of the five species of animals (camels, horses, cattle (including yak in mountain areas), sheep and goats). Within the khot ail, each family's animals are combined into separate herds of each species and turns are taken to provide family members to take them to pasture. Among sheep herders neighboring camps form a sakhaltiin ail and swap over their suckling lambs in the daytime during the milking season (around April to July), so that the ewes' available milk supply does not become depleted. |
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Conflict Resolution Mechanism |
| Neighbourhood groups have an acknowledged leader, who would play an important role in the settlement of local disputes (for example, over land or water resources). According to the Constitution of Mongolia, which came into effect in February 1992, the pasture land will remain in state hands as 'common' land under the jurisdiction of the relevant local authorities at provincial and district levels. In practice, it falls under the effective control of local herding groups as de facto common property. Such controversy surrounds the new land legislation, the wording of which leaves considerable room for ambiguity in interpretation, that conflicts over access to and control over these commons appear likely to increase in the near future. |
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Changes in the Institution over time |
| During the twentieth century, Mongolian society has experienced two major transformations. The first followed the Bolshevik-inspired revolution of 1921, which by 1924 made the Mongolian People's Republic the world's second communist state after the Soviet Union. Mongolia undertook the collectivization of its rural economy along Soviet lines. There was a gradual increase in the direct involvement of the state in the productive activities of ordinary herders During the period 1929-32 attempts at forced collectivisation also led to an estimated loss of between six and seven million head of livestock. Herders chose to slaughter their animals rather than see them be collectivised while decollectivization has largely taken place in the period since 1991. Due to the disastrous social and economic consequences of this period gradual steps were taken towards the development of a co-operative movement from 1932 onwards. Co-operation between herding households was encouraged by pooling funds.The period since 1991 the decollectivization activities started in Mangolia. Decollectivisation has had profound consequences for pastoral institutions at local level. At the level of the herding camp, the khot ail has re-emerged as an important form of social and economic organisation in post-socialist MongoliaDecollectivisation has had profound consequences for pastoral institutions at local level. At the level of the herding camp, the khot ail has re-emerged as an important form of social and economic organisation in post-socialist Mongolia. |
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Purpose |
| Management of common grazing |
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Country |
| Mongolia |
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Region |
| The pasture lands of Mangolia which is probably the largest remaining area of common grazing in the world. |
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Date Of Publication |
| RS-1996 |
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