Transgressing National ‘Green Culture’ and the Moral Authority of Nature in ‘Age of the Market’ Mongolia

Elizabeth Turk

doi:10.1163/22105018-12340176

Abstract

Abstract This article explores the concept of nature (baigal) and the natural world (baigal delkhii, baigal khangai) as cosmological ‘beyond’ (tsaana) that derives particular moral authority in contemporary Mongolia. Interlocutors detailed an agentive nature, able to punish and save, cause illness and restore health that has become increasingly fierce (dogshin) and distant from humans in recent years. This trend was narratively linked to increased disorderly and ‘uncultured’ actions that disrupt the balance between humans and the natural environment which Mongolians’ ‘nature culture’ (baigaliin soyol) notionally upholds. Although notions of natural and nomadic culture were transformed during the twentieth century from concepts associated with ‘backwardness’ to celebration of unique forms of heritage, culture’s fundamental tie to nature endured. As ideas of nature uphold social order and ‘stand in’ for order itself, baigal normatively governs, reacting to lack of moral guidance and state-led regulation today.

Highlights

During my fieldwork exploring health-related practices and strategies in and around Ulaanbaatar, conversations with practitioners, patients and clients via free access
People I spoke with detailed the ways in which health has been negatively impacted by the shift from centrally planned to market economy, changed labour relations and perceived competition between one another that living in such a society entails
Many considered nature’s movements and fluctuations evidence of its alive-ness: from shifting sand dunes to statues buried during the state socialist era that moved underground because the earth itself moves, to changing patterns of rivers and ‘eternal’ snow caps that shift in shape and size, year in and year out

Summary

Introduction

During my fieldwork exploring health-related practices and strategies in and around Ulaanbaatar, conversations with practitioners, patients and clients via free access. Interlocutors described nature as ordered in a particular way; it anticipates human illness and provides the right medicinal plants, regulates the temperature and flow of mineral springs to suit human needs. Such transgressions against nature were linked to human morality in the narratives of many people with whom I spoke.

Results

Conclusion