Iterations from the past: a no-nonsense approach to the importers of the virus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Mongolia

During the COVID-19 pandemic, widespread paranoia set in, with intense demands from Mongolians within the country to block the return of citizens who were stranded abroad. Public paranoia often took on xenophobic tones, with potential repatriates perceived as deadly carriers of the virus and sources of a novel threat. Rather than being a top-down decision the early state of emergency was triggered by public demand. With a population of 3.5 million people and a perceived sense of dilapidation in healthcare many argued that it made sense to abandon those who were stuck abroad in order to protect the majority in Mongolia. The early state of emergency and the delayed onset of internal COVID-19 transmission fostered an image of the outside world as hostile, while simultaneously bolstering national pride in the country’s virus-free status. By engaging with the broader literature, this paper aims to contribute by situating the oppressive sense of communitas not at the ethnic level – despite the lingering sense of China's proximity to Mongolia and the association with the virus's origin in international discourse – but rather in terms of power differentials, particularly the class-like dimensions that were heightened during Mongolia’s state of emergency.