Mongolia: The rise and travails of a deviant democracy

Democratization

Volumn 15, Issue 4, 2008, Pages 766-788

  Fritz, Verena A ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

Crony capitalism; Democratization; Mongolia; Transition

Indexed keywords

EID: 48349123641     PISSN: 13510347     EISSN: 1743890X     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/13510340802191060     Document Type: Article

References (63)

1. Samuel Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991)
2. Seymour M. Lipset, 'The Social Requisites of Democracy Revisited', American Sociological Review, Vol. 59, No. 1 (1994), pp. 1-22.
3. Claus Offe, Der Tunnel am Ende des Lichts. Erkundungen der politischen Transformation im Neuen Osten (Frankfurt a.M.: Campus, 1994)
4. Jon Elster, 'The Necessity and Impossibility of Simultaneous Economic and Political Reform', in Douglas Greenberg, Stanley N. Katz, Steven C. Wheatley and Melanie Beth Oliviero (eds), Constitutionalism and Democracy. Transitions in the Contemporary World (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), pp. 267-74.
5. Jeffrey Kopstein and David Reilly, 'GeographicDiffusion and the Transformation of the Post-Communist World', World Politics, Vol. 53, No. 1 (2000), pp. 1-37.
6. Herbert Kitschelt, 'Post-Communist Economic Reform. Causal Mechanisms and Concomitant Properties', Paper presented at the APSA Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 29 August 2001.
7. See, http://www.freedomhouse.org/ratings/index.htm.
8. Peter Boone, 'Grassroots Macroeconomic Reform in Mongolia', Journal of Comparative Economics, Vol. 18, No. 3 (1994), pp. 329-56.
9. Robert L. Worden and Andrea Matles Savada (eds), Mongolia: A Country Study (Washington: PO for the Library of Congress, 1989).
10. Kitschelt (note 4).
11. Kopstein and Reilly (note 3)
12. Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way, 'International Linkage and Democratisation', Journal of Democracy, Vol. 16, No. 3 (2005), pp. 20-34
13. see also the introduction of this special issue for more information on the 'diffusion approach'.
14. This assistance took different forms (provision of physical infrastructure, personnel seconded by Russia, favourable terms of trade, assistance to Mongolia's five year plans, etc.) and hence its precise levels are difficult to specify.
15. Renske Doorenspleet and Petr Kopecký, 'Against the Odds: Deviant Cases of Democratization', Democratization, Vol. 15, No. 4 (2008), pp. 697-713.
16. Tsedenbal took over from Mongolia's 'Stalinist' leader Choibalsan in 1952.
17. In a sense, pacting was not necessary, as there was no need to reserve special powers for the military or protect authoritarian elites from prosecution, because the bloody transition to a communist-authoritarian regime took place in the 1920s and 1930s
18. this was so long ago that few if any participants were still alive. On the concept of 'pacted transitions', see: Guillermo O'Donnell and Philippe Schmitter, Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Tentative Conclusions about Uncertain Democracies (Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986).
19. Kazakhs are the largest minority with around five per cent of the total population.
20. Inner Mongolia, to the South of Mongolia, is an autonomous province of China. Han Chinese today far outnumber ethnic Mongolians in the region (ca. 4m Mongolians and 18.5m Han Chinese).
21. USAID, Mongolia Corruption Assessment (Washington DC: USAID, 2005).
22. Robert Worden, Mongolia: A Country Study (Washington DC: Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress, 1991), pp. 202-3.
23. G. Bayantur, Democratic Transition and Electoral Process in Mongolia MA thesis, University of Saskatchewan, 2005, p. 20, quoting from Democratic Party Archives.
24. Morris Rossabi, Modern Mongolia: From Khans to Commissars to Capitalists (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2005).
25. Interview in Ulaanbaator with Udo Barkmann, German Mongolist, National University of Mongolia, June 2006.
26. Alan Sanders, 'Mongolia', Far Eastern Economic Review, Vol. 147, No. 12 (March 1990), p. 11.
27. Rossabi (note 19), pp. 18-24.
28. A. Sanders, 'Foreign Relations and Foreign Policy', in Ole Bruun and Ole Odgaard (eds), Mongolia in Transition (London: Routledge, 1996), p. 242.
29. The MDP fielded 68, the NPP 15, and the MSDP 18 candidates.
30. N. Altantsetseg, 'Political Reform in Mongolia', IIAS Newsletter, Issue 21 (February 2000), http://www.iias.nl/iiasn/21/regions/21CA3.html (accessed 7 March 2008).
31. T. Ginsburg and G. Ganzorig, 'Constitutional Reform and Human Rights', in Bruun and Odgaard, Mongolia in Transition (note 23), pp. 147-64. This constitutional commission received some foreign advice from various sources.
32. The key prerogative of the president is the possibility to veto laws adopted by parliament, which can only be overridden by a two-thirds majority of MPs. Furthermore, the president has important appointment powers over the judicial sector (but shared with parliament for the Constitutional Court), and he/she is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces (3§3.2). There is a limit of two terms for office holders.
33. Each citizen received three 'small coupons' (pink), worth 1,000 MNT each, and one 'large coupon' (blue), worth 7,000 MNT. An estimated total of 4,500 enterprises were privatized through this method between 1991 and 1994, of which some 550 were large enterprises. Small coupons could be sold and traded, while large coupons could not (but the shares to be received could be traded). For the small privatizations, auctions were to be organized by local authorities. The large companies were also to be privatized by auctions, and most individuals would bid for shares through brokerage firms/mutual funds. By 1992, most of the small enterprises had been privatized. Voucher privatization also extended to the privatization of livestock in the countryside.
34. See Cevdet Denizer and Alan Gelb, 'Monoglia: Privatization and System Transformation in an Isolated Economy', World Bank, Policy Research Working Paper No. 1063, Washington DC, 1992
35. Frederick Nixson and Bernard Walters, 'Privatization, Income Distribution, and Poverty: The Mongolian Experience', World Development, Vol. 34, No. 9 (2006), pp. 1557-79.
36. This motif for rapid (small) privatizations also existed elsewhere, e.g. in Lithuania.
37. See Georges Korsun and Peter Murrell, 'Politics and Economics of Mongolia's Privatization Program', Asian Survey, Vol. 35, No. 5 (1995), pp. 472-86
38. Klaus von Beyme, Systemwechsel in Osteuropa (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1994).
39. William Heaton, 'Mongolia in 1991', Asian Survey, Vol. 32, No. 1 (1992), p. 54.
40. Tom Ginsburg, 'Political Reform in Mongolia', Asian Survey, Vol. 35, No. 5 (1995), pp. 459-71.
41. Particularly in the early 1990s, there were some considerable disagreements between Mongolia's biand multilateral donors. Among the former were Japan, the US, and Germany; among the latter were the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the Asian Development Bank. While the multilateral donors had a strong focus on economic reforms and suspended their assistance when programme targets were not met in 1992, bilateral donors had different reasons for supporting Mongolia.
42. T. Batbayar, 'Mongolia in 1993', Asian Survey, Vol. 34, No. 1 (1994), pp. 41-5.
43. Lise Rakner, Alina Rocha-Menocal, and Verena Fritz, Democratisation's Third Wave and the Challenges of Democratic Deepening: Assessing International Democracy Assistance and Lessons Learned, Overseas Development Institute (ODI) Working Paper No. 1, Research Project for the Advisory Board of Irish Aid, London, 2007.
44. Politbarometer surveys, various years, Sant Maral Foundation, Ulaanbaatar, http://www.santmaral.com
45. Juan Linz and Alfred Stepan, Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation (Baltimore, MD and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press), p. 5.
46. Andreas Schedler, 'What is Democratic Consolidation?', Journal of Democracy, Vol. 9, No. 2 (1998), pp. 91-107.
47. According to the Far Eastern Economic Review (FEER), 27 March 1997, a Contract with the Mongolian Voter was printed 350,000 times and was distributed around the country. Interviews with L. Sumati, head of the St Maral Foundation (sponsored by the KAS), 15 June 1997, Ulaanbaatar
48. and with S. Bayaar, local head of the IRI office in Ulaanbaatar, 17 June 1997.
49. L. Sumati, 'Back in Total Control', Eurasianet, 22 August 2000, http://www.tol.cz/look/TOLnew/tolprint.tpl?IdLanguage1& IdPublication4&NrIssue13&NrSection2&NrArticle217&ST1 body&ST_T1tol&ST_PS11&ST_AS11&STx_ma1 (accessed 7 March 2008)
50. It is not clear whether or to what extent any financial support was received, but Russian political experts (so called polit-technologists) advised the MPRP on its campaign.
51. See L. Badamkhand, 'Mongolia: A Shock to the System', Transitions Online, No. 06/29, 2004, available at www.tol. (by subscription only).
52. Interviews in Ulaanbaatar with various observes, representatives of political parties and of civil society and government, November 2005 and June 2007.
53. D. Ganbat, Mongolia Country Report: Second Wave of Asian Barometer Survey, Globalbarometer Working Paper No. 33, Taipei, 2007.
54. USAID (note 16).
55. IMF, Mongolia: 2005 Article IV Consultation, Country Report No. 05/ 396 (Washington DC: International Monetary Fund, 2005).
56. Maria Fernandez-Gimenez and B. Batbuyan, 'Law and Disorder: Local Implementation of Mongolia's Land Law', Development and Change, Vol. 35, No. 1 (2004), pp. 141-65.
57. For comparison, see William Mishler and Richard Rose, 'What are the Origins of Political Trust?', Comparative Political Studies, Vol. 34, No. 1 (2001), pp. 30-62.
58. Chris Finch, Civil Society in Mongolia's Development and Governance: An Overview of Trends, Constraints and Opportunities (Washington DC: World Bank, 2005).
59. Steven Fish, 'Mongolia: Democracy without Prerequisites', Journal of Democracy, Vol. 9, No. (1998), pp. 127-41.
60. Interviews with IRI, UNDP, and Mongolian civil society organizations, June 2007.
61. USStateDepartment, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, Mongolia - 2004, released by theBureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, Washington DC, 28 February 2005, http://www.state.gov/drl/ rls/hrrpt/2004/41652.htm (accessed 7 March 2008).
62. Verena Fritz, 'Democratization and Corruption in Mongolia', Public Administration and Development. Vol. 27, No. 3 (2007), pp. 191-203.
63. Lipset (note 1).