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This summer, with the generous support of APSI, I had the chance to conduct fieldwork in the Ar Horqin Grassland of Inner Mongolia. The Ar Horqin Grassland Nomadic System was designated as a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in 2022, recognizing its unique preservation of nomadic lifeways.
Every summer, herders gather their livestock and move toward the higher-quality summer pastures, a seasonal migration known as Otor. This involves temporarily relocating livestock beyond assigned boundaries to find better grass or water.
I spent my days moving between herders’ camps, sometimes walking along dusty tracks with only my notebook and camera, sometimes caught in the swirl of summer festivals filled with music, horse races, and the hum of community life.
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This is a lifestyle that resists being pinned down, and it made me realize that governance here must also adapt, it moves with the people rather than fixing them in place. Because of this mobility, governing the grasslands cannot rely on static institutions. Instead, local authorities established the Otor Police Station, a mobile unit that accompanies herders during their seasonal journeys. But during my fieldwork, I found that its role goes far beyond policing. Officers not only handle theft cases or mediate disputes, but also help herders move their camps, repair vehicles, search for missing livestock, and provide assistance whenever difficulties arise on the steppe.
During my fieldwork, one officer recalled a case from several years ago when dozens of cattle and horses disappeared. A special investigation team was quickly formed, and after weeks of undercover work they dismantled two theft rings and arrested 17 suspects.
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One of my photos shows the mediation yurt, which travels with the herders as a mobile office. Conflicts inevitably arise in these temporary encampments, mostly over pasture use or livestock. Instead of waiting until herders return to their permanent settlements, disputes can be addressed on the spot.
Inside the yurt, officers and mediators provide a space for dialogue. It is both practical and symbolic. Governance, like the yurt itself, has reshaped itself to match the rhythm of movement.
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During this short visit, what fascinated me most was how state authority adapts itself to nomadic mobility, rather than the other way around.
Governance here is not about drawing lines on a map or keeping people fixed in place, it is about traveling alongside them, embedded in their seasonal cycle.
In this sense, Otor is more than just a word for “camp”; it reveals how movement itself creates new forms of order.