Managing Mongolia's Commons: Land Reforms, Social Contexts, and Institutional Change

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, postsocialist rural contexts have afforded commons scholars particularly fertile ground for examination of institutional change and evolution under new modes of governance. In Mongolia, as elsewhere, such transformations have been characterized by the erosion of state control and de facto or de jure devolution of land and resource rights. Particularly since 2000, policy and practice in Mongolia have reflected state and donor concerns with the formation of herders' groups and the implementation of group tenure solutions in pursuit of environmental sustainability. Drawing on data sets from the Gobi region, this article examines the nature, impact and limitations of recent state-, donor-, and community-led tenure reforms and social innovations with respect to land rights and practice, including with regard to mining-related land alienation. The article provides a critical analysis of recent, complex institutional innovations in Mongolia and their role in shaping contemporary commons management. Keywords: commonsgroupsinstitutionsland reformminingMongoliapastoralismsocial contexts Notes "Institutions" are defined herein following Leach et al. (Citation1999, 226) as the whole complex of factors and structures "which influence who has access to and control over what resources, and arbitrate contested resource claims" and thus include not only rules and norms, but groups/organizations. Institutional "success" is equated with long-enduring institutions, those that facilitate sustainable CPR use, through appropriate rules in use and resource users' compliance with rules, and with equity in access to resources/benefits (Ostrom Citation1990; Agrawal Citation2001). Sikor and Muller (2009) define state-led reforms as "programs conceived by national governments in a top down fashion and implemented … through bureaucratic modalities." Community-led reform does not deny the role of the state, but focuses on "actual land tenure arrangements and authority relations as well as 'bottom up' political initiatives around land." Space constraints preclude in-depth analysis of post-Soviet land reforms and debates over property rights. For further detail, see Hann (Citation2003) and Verdery (Citation1999). Study sites are based on bags, Mongolia's smallest administrative units. They form part of sums (districts) and aimags (provinces). Uniquely among the three sites, data from site 1 includes herders' pre- as well as postproject accounts of institutional landscapes. "Pre-project" does not mean that donor interventions were entirely absent in study areas, but rather that significant institutional transformations, through the emergence of donor-driven herders' groups, had yet to occur. KA are herding camps, usually kinship-based, of three to six herding households. The term is applied here where herders in study areas self-identified as KA. See Fernández-Giménez and Batbuyan (Citation2004) and Upton (Citation2009) for more detailed analysis of contemporary pastoral land rights. According to Cleaver (Citation2002), institutional bricolage is a process whereby stakeholders consciously or unconsciously draw on existing cultural and social arrangements, ways of thinking, and the legacy of historical institutional arrangements in shaping and justifying new institutions. Legally, this interpretation is debatable. An emerging consensus suggests that individual household/KA licences pertain only to the shelter and its immediate area (0.07 ha) (Fernandez-Gimenez and Batbuyan 2004). "Trespassing" was variously defined by herders, albeit typically in relation to out of season use of winter pastures. See Figure 2, note e; also Upton (Citation2005). Ostrom's 1990 "design principles" are still key to CPR debates, especially those reflecting economic rationality perspectives. Later work—e.g., Agrawal (Citation2001)—elaborates on these principles. SLP also produced maps that divided all herders into compulsory, geographically based groups. However, only where herders in study areas voluntarily formed smaller NGOs for pasture management were active groups evident. It is to these latter that "SLP herding groups" refers. Key provisions required local governors to "control use of common land" in addition to allocating campsites to herding households. Use rights/contracts do not confer rights of disposal and are less exclusive than possession rights (Fernández-Giménez and Batbuyan Citation2004). "Informal agreements" denotes pilot agreements between herders and local governors, without a clear legal basis; or informal agreements and practices among herders. Reforms to pastureland legislation were under consideration by the Mongolian government at the time of writing. It is expected that a new Pastureland Law may permit allocation of pasture possession rights. Herders' groups at study sites exhibited wide variations in kinship links. Some were dominated by close family members, although the majority included more distant and/or nonrelative households. Contracts required sum governors to make provision for those on otor from other group territories, in addition to more "exclusive" provisions. See Usukh et al. (Citation2010) for analysis of the ongoing Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation's Green Gold program and its attempts to develop such inclusive groups.