Mongolia's Political Change and Human Rights in Five‐Phase Spiral Model: Implications for North Korea

Abstract

This study examines the changes in Mongolia's human rights policy in relation to its political change, using the “five‐phase spiral model” proposed by Thomas Risse and colleagues, which offers a framework to explain the process whereby repressive governments adopt human rights. As a result, my findings clarify the theoretical relevance and deviance of the model in the case of Mongolia, while identifying possible implications for the case of North Korea. According to the model, the process whereby international human rights norms are internalized and affect domestic institutional change requires sustained pressure from bilateral and multilateral networks on the repressive government in the first and second phases to induce policy changes in the third phase, “tactical concessions.” I examine the extent to which Mongolia followed such a process, along with the role of its regime change as a requisite for its successive move from the third to the fourth phase, “prescriptive status.” When Mongolian human rights policy moved from the second phase, “denial,” to the third phase, transnational human rights networks were not dominant actors. Yet, clear changes in human rights occurred in the aftermath of the regime change, suggesting that this transition was, indeed, a prerequisite. As to whether the change in the Mongolian government's human rights policy was also a result of “boomerang effects” brought about by a developed civil society and transnational networks, the effects were found to be reserved under the socialist regime, yet positive after democratization. Therefore, the Mongolian experience suggests the need for an engagement policy with North Korea, based on its significantly extended “second social sphere,” in order to facilitate a civil society and social networks, democratization of the governing party, and the emergence of a moderate government in North Korea with a self‐sacrificing supreme leader like Jambyn Batmonkh.