By Julian Dierkes
Seemingly, Mongolian democracy has been backsliding since 2019.
Shifts in the V-Dem indices are not huge, but noticeable and consistent. Mongolia now ranks as an “electoral autocracy” not a democracy. These shifts appear to be roughly in line with a degrading academic freedom index which I have discussed in more detail before. As I do with academic freedom, I have some doubts about what fellow experts are measuring with regard to democracy. But, I will shelve that question for another time.
Here, I want to to think about the corrosive impact that perceived repression may be having.
The Appearance of Self-Censorship
The complete freedom to ask and say what I want has been one of the aspects that I have really appreciated about Mongolia. I try to recognize the responsibility that comes with that freedom, for example by offering a discussion of transparency and independence to help readers develop criteria for their trust in my analyses. While I am free to research and write, I do try to offer some accountability to readers. But, I offer no accountability to corporate or government organizations.
I cannot reconstruct when it was mentioned to me for the first time that I should or should not talk about a particular issue in a public presentation, but I remember that I was shocked.
When I spoke to others who are watching the state of democracy closely in April 2025, for example, self-censorship has become a big topic. Yes, everyone is free to say what they want, but some choose not to say some things that they would like to say for fear of repercussions.
Feared Repercussions
My immediate question to mentions of self-censorship is: “but, what are you afraid of?” The most common answers I receive to this is “online trolls” and arrest.
By comparison to all truly repressive regimes (including Mongolia’s immediate neighbours, obviously) those appear to be relatively mild sanctions, esp. when mention of arrest is almost always coupled with an expectation that arrest would only be brief. Yet, that does not mean that these are not sanctions that are driving behavior.
I also acknowledge that my surprise about the fear of speaking out comes on the backdrop of significant privilege in this context. I am neither a Mongolian citizen, nor do I live in Mongolia. I am employed at a German public university that offers very strong protection regarding academic freedom. The greatest risk I face is thus some kind of restriction on travel to Mongolia or activities in Mongolia, but those kind of restrictions seem quite far-fetched at this time.
Troll Armies
Yes, colleagues and acquaintances in Mongolia are actually afraid of online trolls. I am not questioning their fear, but rather expressing my surprise that online trollery has taken on such dimensions that it induces fear. The actions that people are afraid of include direct threatening language in posts and messages, and especially the spreading of false rumors that are disparaging or defamatory about a person, i.e. what I would call Rufmord – reputation murder – in German. This may well be the flipside of the observation that Mongolians are very much online, especially on Facebook, but large parts of the NGO, academic and policy world also remains active on what once was Twitter.
As an aside, I can only continue to urge Mongolians to abandon Twitter and move over to BlueSky, the most Mongolian-named social network imagineable, and a place where discourse remains civilized and safeguards for respect are stronger. Find me there at Mongolia Focus.
In this online world, several acquaintances have assured me that “troll armies” are regularly deployed in a targeted manner against particular individuals.
While many used to be concerned about foreign interference via social media, the present concern is much more focused on domestic political actors. It appears (from the patterns of targeting of individuals and particular issues/topics) that these kind of attacks are coordinated by political actors.
Note my very guarded language here. Because of the nature of fears of these actions, no one seems to be eager to publish evidence of such troll armies and their connection to particular political actors. I have not been subject to any such attacks, so I cannot directly speak to this issue, but the fears that are reported to me in this regard certainly seem very credible.
Vision 2050
I was even more surprised to hear from academics that they have been given the impression that they need to be extolling the virtues of PM Oyun-Erdene’s Vision 2050, though here as well, the nature of any sanctions is unclear to me. I can’t help but be reminded of the inane mentions of Xi Jiping I heard in “academic” presentations at the last Congress of Mongolists. Perhaps those activities will decline in salience now, half a year after the end of Oyun-Erdene’s time in office.
Arrests
There have been several instances of arrests at demonstrations and arrests of journalists (like the recent Noorog case) where the reasons for arrest have been very unclear, prosecution was either vague (“breaking national unity”) or did not result, making these arrests very much look like deliberate harassment. Yes, if no prosecution results, there is no direct harm, though I cannot imagine that remand cells are a joy to spend the night in, such arrests make for a lot of mental anguish, and they also do taint the person somewhat as subsequent non-prosecution is clearly not as noticeable as initial arrest is.
Why?
In considering reports of what seems like harassment, I do have to wonder what would prompt actors to pursue these kind of threats.
I have no insights into whether it is political leaders themselves who are initiating threats. But, if these threats are made (more obvious as in the cases of arrests), they are surely made with the knowledge of some such actors. What democratic political actor would consider threatening critical voices? None! I am left to conclude that those who are shown to be involved in such activities (again, most obviously in the case of arrests, those in charge, whether they have ordered actions directly or not) are not committed democrats and therefore should not hold public office in a democracy.
Implications
There are some catchy phrases that come to mind in considering the implications that self-censorship might hold for democracy.
“Democracy requires democrats” This phrase is generally attributed to Friedrich Ebert, Social Democrat and first president of the Weimar Republic until his death a hundred years ago this year. He is also namesake of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation which has been active in Mongolia for many years and with whom I have collaborated on a number of occasions. Or, reversing this phrase, “no democrats, no democracy”. If critical voices are driven toward self-censorship, that means that democrats are falling silent which does pose a threat to democracy.
“Democracy dies in darkness” This is attributed to Bob Woodward, legendary journalist at the Washington Post which adopted the phrase as its slogan in 2017. What this phrase is often interpreted to mean is a plea for transparency and public examination to safeguard democracy. Again, if self-censorship becomes widespread, this safeguard deteriorates and threatens democracy itself.
As the sense of rising self-censorship is murky and anecdotal, it is not clear to me how I would recognize a turnaround in this regard, other than through reports of contacts. Various indices struggle with measuring the sense of oppression that comes through online attacks and even if the situation were to improve in this regard, it would take some rounds of scoring for the large indices to shift. As is the case with many democracies that are facing a populist right that is threatening some of the underpinnings of democracy, this is a time for Mongolian democrats to mobilize to protect what has been won.
