The Anthropology of Extraction: Critical Perspectives on the Resource Curse

Abstract

Attempts to address the resource curse remain focussed on revenue management, seeking technical solutions to political problems over examinations of relations of power. In this paper, we provide a review of the contribution anthropological research has made over the past decade to understanding the dynamic interplay of social relations, economic interests and struggles over power at stake in the political economy of extraction. In doing so, we show how the constellation of subaltern and elite agency at work within processes of resource extraction is vital in order to confront the complexities, incompatibilities, and inequities in the exploitation of mineral resources.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. This is encapsulated in the statement of the former chairman of Anglo American and Shell to shareholders in 2006: ‘The revenues that we generate are often volatile … and extractive revenues have sometimes been subject to wholesale embezzlement by government … Whilst we cannot and should not take on responsibilities that are properly those of governments, we cannot stand aloof from major governance and social issues in the countries where we operate’ (Mark Moody-Stuart, Anglo American Annual General Meeting, 25 April 2006).

2. Illegal uranium mining in Namibia (Rio Tinto); co-architects of South Africa’s labour repressive apartheid economy (Anglo American); complicity in the oppression of the Ogoni in Nigeria and the execution of Ken Saro Wiwa (Shell); complicity with paramilitary outfits in forced relocations in Columbia (BP); environmental disaster at Brent Spar (Shell again); involvement in the mine-related conflict on Bougainville, Papua New Guinea (Conzinc Rio Tinto); asbestos poisoning in the Cape (Cape Industries); ChevronTexaco in Angola; Talisman in Sudan … the list goes on.

3. Michael Watts is a geographer who uses anthropological methods to conduct in-depth social analyses

4. Sir Robert Wilson, Interview 19 May 2004.