The Future Course of Mongolia’s Foreign Policy Depends on Economic Gains www.thedialogue.co

By Dr. Vaishali Krishna

Like several post-Soviet states the landlocked location of Mongolia has significantly constrained its foreign policy options, though it has been able to attract many players who could help shape its foreign policy orientations. These players are the so-called “third neighbours” who are basically distant states having no geographical proximity with Mongolia unlike the two neighbours – China and Russia. Even though they are important partners at least at the diplomatic level in keeping a check on China and Russia to ensure Mongolia that it does not fall once again in the Cold War like situation.

Basically a chain of events such as the end of the Cold War, normalisation of Sino-Russian and Sino-Mongolian relations, as well as a shift to democracy and market economy paved the way for Mongolia to adopt an independent foreign policy in order to enter into international politics. The first and foremost desire of Mongolia was to keep its “national interest” intact while formulating its foreign policy because the main purpose of foreign policy for any country is to conduct foreign relations to the best possible advantage. It is for each individual state to decide as to what degree of its involvement in its relations with another state would guarantee and safeguard its national interest.

In terms of definition the national interest stands for “survival and security of the state”. According to Hans Morgenthau, the great realist thinker, all politics is struggle for power, and “as long as the world is politically organized into nations, the national interest is indeed the last word in world politics.” Therefore, it has often been seen that the nations arrange their priorities on the basis of their resources. However, the powerful nations with world-wide political, economic and military activities place high priority on security, while small nations with limited resources compel to reorder their priorities. Whatever may be the priorities, national interest is always considered as dynamic since it keeps on changing in accordance with the needs and requirements. That is what Mongolia has done in its foreign policy orientations.

Mongolia came up with its “Multi-Pillared” foreign policy, the basic tenets of which were explained in the Concept of Foreign Policy which was adopted by the Mongolian Parliament in 1994. Strengthening relations with China and Russia is a priority in Mongolia’s foreign policy, though this does not necessarily mean that it will be aligned with any one of these two neighbours or any third power. In fact, Mongolia aims to promote a balanced relationship with both of its neighbours. At the same time, Mongolia’s foreign policy objective cautions against becoming overly reliant or dependent, politically and economically, on any country.

Other than China and Russia, Mongolia is also diversifying its foreign relations through its ‘third neighbour’ policy, whereby it endeavours to align its interests with highly developed democratic countries and leading international organisations. The third neighbour countries have been identified in accordance with their potential contribution to Mongolia’s economic development and common values. These third neighbours include the United States, Germany, Japan, Turkey and India among others. Such a strategy of Mongolia to win over foreign partners away from China and Russia has been the result of changes witnessed both at the domestic as well as foreign front since the onset of the new millennium. This motivated Mongolian leadership to rethink about revising its existing foreign policy that was done in 2011.

Mongolia’s 2011 revised foreign policy concept somehow identifies China as the country’s largest security concern despite the fact that bilateral relations developed with China in the post-Cold War period appears to be one of the main factors in its external relations. That is also because Mongolia cannot afford neglecting China outrightly due to sharing a long geographic border line with China that helps Beijing dominate Mongolia economically. What is important to keep in mind is that Mongolia’s economy is almost entirely dependent on China as the latter has been Mongolia’s largest trade partner for a long time now, receiving 91 per cent of its total exports and providing 32 per cent of its imports. China is also the largest provider of foreign direct investment (FDI) to Mongolia so much so that it is very unlikely that in the near future Russia will provide a viable alternative for Mongolia for either exports or foreign investment.

An American expert on Mongolia, Alicia Campi is of the opinion that “although Mongolia is sensitive to Chinese activity [even] in the mineral sector, it is willing to let China become a significantly larger supplier of oil products, at least in the short term, to break the back of its dependency on more expensive Russian petroleum products”. In such a situation, it seems that Mongolia’s foreign policy has strongly been affected by its two geographic neighbours, and the third neighbours have not done much to the advantage of Mongolia so far as its national interests are concerned. Indeed, when geography comes into play, every resource has to go through either China or Russia, and the current situation indicates that most of the exports go through China. This is one of the key challenges that Mongolia cannot overcome due to its landlocked geographical location. The third neighbours have little options to make their viable economic presence in Mongolia, though in the democratic era the most important factor in Mongolia’s foreign relationship is tied to economics not politics. So, what course Mongolia’s foreign policy could take in future will depend on economic gains powered by external players where China has already taken a lead through its ‘One Belt, One Road’ project.

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