A special feature "Policy-Related Environmental Disaster and the Socio-Cultural Impacts in Mongolia" initiated by Professor Hiroki Takakura of the Center for Northeast Asian Studies (Graduate School of Environmental Studies), Tohoku University and others, was published in the international "Journal of Contemporary East Asia Studies" (Taylor & Francis) Vol. 11, No. 1 (September 28, 2022).

https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/reas20/11/1

 

 

This special feature clarifies the social context of disasters related to extreme weather events, mining development, and forest fires in Mongolia in the context of history and current globalization. These are the results of research collaboration by Mongolian and Japanese scholars under the scheme of Northeast Asian Area Studies Program of the National Institute for the Humanities.

 

The following is the content of the special issue:

- Introduction: environmental disaster in Mongolian modern history (Takahiro Ozaki & Hiroki Takakura)

 doi.org/10.1080/24761028.2021.2015837

- Forest-steppe fires as moving disasters in the Mongolia-Russian borderland (Mari Kazato & Battur Soyollham)

 doi.org/10.1080/24761028.2022.2113493

-Negotiating the coexistence of mining and pastoralism in Mongoli (Byambajav Dalaibuyan)

doi.org/10.1080/24761028.2021.2021356

- Dzud and the industrialization of pastoralism in socialist Mongolia (Takahiro Tomita)

doi.org/10.1080/24761028.2021.2011554

 

Mongolia's pastoral economy has traditionally provided livelihoods and cultural identity to its people while taking advantage of the local environment. While not denying the importance of historical ethnographic approaches, research on environmental hazards provides a useful perspective for understanding the resilience and vulnerability of this pastoral dynamic. The first paper summarizes how policy-related disasters have occurred in the modern history of Mongolia, and the changes in the living patterns of nomads. The focus of the second paper has been on the forest and grassland fires that occur on the border between Mongolia and Russia today, and the damage has spread to Inner Mongolia and as far away as Japan. The authors ethnographically explain the fire movement, the livestock loss, the correspondence of administration and the community resilience. The mining industry is one of booster of the economic development of modern China which made huge impacts to the Mongolian society. The third paper argues the relationship between the Mongolian mining industry and the local communities. The author emphasized the building a long-term trust between the two parties for the sustainability. Final paper describes the socialist industrialization of pastoral economy behind the current situation. The author clarified changes through the regimes in herd structure, such as the sex and age composition of livestock, have once contributed to profitable management but increased the vulnerability to dzud climate hazard.