Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Absentee Ownership and Common Property Resource Management: The Case of Herd Management in Rural Mongolia

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Graduate student Daniel Murphy, under the supervision of Dr. Peter Little, will undertake research in rural Mongolia in order to examine the effect of absentee herd-ownership on the ability of local institutions to manage communal resources. The growing numbers of wealthy, market-oriented absentee herd-owners in the pastoral economy of Mongolia provides an excellent case in which to examine these issues. During 12 months of ethnographic research in a pastoral district of eastern Mongolia, the researcher will examine whether or not absentee herd-ownership weakens the ability of local resource management institutions to effectively regulate resource use. The researcher hypothesizes that: (H1) Absentee herd-owners' herd management and resource use practices are different from those utilized by other resource users due to the primacy of market-oriented production strategies in absentee herd-owner decision-making, (H2) Absentee herd-owners' herd management and resource use practices are more likely to contravene local norms of resource use and consequently are a primary cause of resource conflict, and (H3) Absentee herd-owners' herd management and resource use practices are less susceptible to enforcement and sanctioning by local resource management institutions than the practices of other resource users. The researcher will test these hypotheses by collecting a range of quantitative and qualitative data through several ethnographic methodologies, including participant observation, household surveys, interviewing, and case studies of conflict.This study will add to a growing body of detailed anthropological and social science research on the ways in which broader systematic changes affect local modes of production, resource use, and human engagement with the environment. The results of the study will also fill significant gaps in the anthropological literature on pastoralism, as few researchers have made the involvement in the pastoral economy by absentee herd-owners a central focus of study. In addition to its scholarly significance, this research also has broader policy implications. Improved knowledge on the politics of resource use in common property systems and the relationships between the state, the market and resource users is critical in order to facilitate the development of resource management models that are both flexible and powerful enough to enforce sustainable resource use. This research also will contribute to the education of a social scientist.