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This paper addresses the impacts of climate change in Mongolia asking what legal instruments can help to assure the adaptation of pastoralism - being the predominant economic activity and mode of life of the rural population - to the changing conditions. Leading to more frequent disasters, climate change makes pastoral adaptation necessary and disaster risk management a primary need. The analysis of pastoralism in Mongolia shows that securing the mobility of herders and their access to the relevant natural resources (pasture land, water, salt-licks) is a key feature for the adaptation to climate change and the corresponding risk management. The traditional access regulation system has largely disappeared due to the political and socio-economic changes during the socialist time of complete state regulation and in the following transition to a market economy with the almost abandonment of any kind of regulation. To date, it has not been replaced by new working institutions. Neither the current situation of de facto open access nor a complete privatization of the pasture land (that would be unconstitutional and is rejected by herders) can ensure the access to the relevant resources for the majority of the pastoral population under the changing conditions. The unregulated and unlimited access - leading to an overly excessive exploitation of resources - aggravates the negative impacts of climate change; the splitting of the pasture in the course of privatization would not any longer allow a flexible access to resources in the event of disaster and therefore undermine the adaptation potential that pastoral practices are providing.
