Academics and analysts met at Government House on
September 15 to join the ongoing debate on the MPRP changing its basic ideology
from the present democratic socialism to national democracy.  The Terelj Manifesto prepared by its Managing
Council calls for the change and the coming General Assembly will take the
final decision. MPRP Chairman, Prime Minister S.Batbold, and the party’s
General Secretary, U.Khurelsukh, attended yesterday’s meeting.

Some speakers noted how the MPRP followed a national
democratic ideology in the 1920s and later adopted a more leftist orientation,
retaining this democratic socialist thrust until today. A return to the initial
ideology may seem to conflict with this thrust but will not necessarily mean
abandoning the leftist view. Similar ideological reviews were now taking place
in left-of-center parties in many places of the world, they said. Pragmatism
was being favored over ideological purity, both on the right and the left.

The trend started in the West in the1970s when
ideology-based politics started losing popularity. In Mongolia, about 40
political parties are registered in the Supreme Court since 1990. Very broadly,
they follow three ideologies, which sometimes overlap. The MPRP is mainly
leftist, while the DP is rightist, the National New Party conservative, and the
Traditional United Party of Mongolia has conservative and  democratic views.  Despite these different labels, the parties’
platforms are not really very different from one another.

The world trend is to shift towards a consensual center.
The MPRP debate is all about whether to keep to its left-of- center space or
move more to the center. The leadership favors the move but the primary and
middle level members are not sure about this break with tradition.

S.Odkhuu, Chairman of Research and, Training at the MPRP, and Director of the
Prognosis Academy, later said there is no hurry and the opinions of analysts
were valuable. The shift to pragmatism is inevitable with social relations
becoming liberalized. Even the rightist DP talks about a leftist ideology.  The MPRP will take the proper decision after
careful consideration of social realities and its members’ sentiments but will not
be guided by expediency.

Researcher G.Chuluunbaatar said even in its XXI General
Assembly in 1992, the MPRP had referred to “the national democratic ideology”
as “the main thrust of the MPRP and the theoretical basis of its platform”