The Local Community Of "strangers"

The booming of civilization in the 21st century fosters the most frequent appearance of the term "development" in different countries and among various project documents, while some basic questions like the types, connotations and functions (whether development is the Panacea of social and culture dilemma) of development still left unanswered. Sand storm and the rapid increase of GDP of Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (abbreviated as IMAR hereafter) attract public attention. The distance from Xilingol Steppe to Beijing is the nearest among all the pasturelands in IMAR and it is also recognized as the prototype of Eurasia temperate steppes. I did my field work at Baiyinxil State-Owned Ranch which is the core of first national steppe reserve in China. Some scholars believe that the development of the ranch is so typical that it could reflect the development of Xilingol steppe, even IMAR. The thesis depicts the relationship of herders, steppe and stocks which further account for the discussion of three pairs:population flow and development, the concept of nature and institutions as well as science and power. It is the author's wish that the thesis could help to understand the dilemma of the Mongol herders, their culture and the environment in which they live.The thesis is composed of five parts. PartⅡ,ⅢandⅣare the main body.Part I Introduction This part introduces the history and some basics of the Ranch. A point to note is that the concept of stranger refers not only to a certain group of people, but also science—which is the key of the Ranch's modernization development, but it is still a familiar stranger to the Ranch.PartⅡThis part depicts the population flow in the Ranch. The inward flow happened from 1950s to 1984 and members are mainly enrolled workers from surrounding provinces, youth intellectuals and the soldiers organized by the country to reclamate the steppe; the outward flow happened when the ecological resettlement policy implemented in the Ranch. Further analysis focuses on the nature of development—the improvement of well-being or development as a process which leads to the change in social structure.Part III After a short review of the Ranch's management history and the corresponding institutional change, this part discusses the connotation of the term "nature" in different context and how the nature and culture were dichotomized as well as the consequences reflected in the management policy on Xilingol steppe. It is the author's argument that grassland fencing policy is the co-product of agriculture civilization and western modernization science.Part IV The history of Breeding Stock Factory part is of utmost importance to the Ranch, scientific history as well as the initiation of IMAR's grassland policies. Science and technology become the authoritative discourse and the edge of grassland knowledge. Respective talks with a natural scientist, a social scientist and a local herder about the environment dilemma in the Steppe provided the following three conclusions:1. The spread of animal husbandry science shows that it is strongly interfered by the government;2. The fact that stock breeding science was and is the focus of modern animal husbandry, even though it is doomed to fail in the Steppe since the founding of the Ranch, reveals that modernization is greatly valued in Steppe.3. Modern science plays a key role in the non-equilibrium steppe and is the representation of power as well.Part V Conclusion...