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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Mongolia
Index
The Council of Ministers is the "highest executive and
administrative agency of state administration." Under Article 42
of the Constitution, this body is composed of a chairman--or
premier, a first deputy chairman, five other deputy chairmen,
ministers, chairmen of the state committees, the chairman of the
State Bank of the Mongolian People's Republic, the president of
the Mongolian Academy of Sciences, and the head of the Central
Statistical Board. In the 1980s, the deputy chairmen regularly
included the chairmen of the State Planning Commission; the State
Committee for Construction, Architecture, and Technical Control;
and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
(Comecon--see Glossary)
Affairs. In 1986 the Council of Ministers was composed
of thirty-three members.
Members of the Council of Ministers also were party members
or candidate members. In 1989 Dumaagiyn Sodnom, a full member of
the party Political Bureau, was chairman of the Council of
Ministers, making him de facto premier. The principal
responsibilities of the Council of Ministers in the late 1980s
were to coordinate and to direct the work of the ministries; to
supervise national economic planning and to implement the
national plan; to exercise general direction over foreign
relations and defense matters; to take measures for the defense
of state interests and the concept of socialist ownership; to
ensure public order; and to direct and to guide the work of
aymag and somon executive administrations.
A general ministerial reorganization was carried out in 1987
and 1988 during which 3,000 administrative positions were
abolished--reportedly, a significant saving of funds. In December
1987, the Mongolian press announced the dissolution of six
ministries and two state committees and the subsequent formation
of five new ministries. These efforts to streamline the
government structure and to make it more efficient continued into
January 1988, when six state committees and special offices were
dissolved and two new state committees were formed. In general
this reorganization resulted in the performance of certain
functions by separate ministries or in the subsuming of several
committees under the mission of one. For example, the
responsibilities for agriculture and the food industry,
previously handled by two separate ministries, were combined in
the new Ministry of Agriculture and Food Industry. The newly
established Ministry of Environmental Protection indicated
Mongolia's recent and growing concern over one of its most
intractable problems: the protection and renewal of the national
environment.
There was no formally constituted permanent civil service to
staff government positions. Party organizations were paramount in
the selection and assignment of civil servants. The party decided
which person was suited to what kind of work on the basis of
individual loyalty, honesty, political consciousness, knowledge
of relevant tasks, and organizational abilities.
Data as of June 1989
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