Mining Policy Variation: Controlled Comparison of Four Latin American Cases

• In Event: Beyond the Resource Curse: The Politics of Extraction in MENA and Latin America

Abstract

Natural resource extraction, once promoted by international lenders and governing elites as a promising development strategy, is beginning to hit a wall in Latin America. After decades of extractive sector expansion under mining friendly rules, the number of bans, moratoria, suspensions and standoffs have multiplied in the region. Demands for mining prohibitions proliferate at the community level, and mining restrictions have been approved in legislative acts, public referenda, and judicial rulings. Using controlled comparison and process tracing over a twenty-year time frame, this paper provides a multidimensional explanation for mining policy change and variation. It examines two cases where mining policy has been highly favorable to the industry (Guatemala and Nicaragua) and two (El Salvador and Costa Rica) where open pit and metallic mining have been banned. Drawing on over 250 interviews with participants and observers in Central America, this study identifies three factors that led to different policy trajectories: the extent of elite cohesion in support of mine development; the characteristics of mining resistance networks and the frames they employ; and the degree to which state institutions are open and penetrable versus restricted and insular. These factors are found to shape the course of extractive sector policy development and lead to divergent outcomes.

Author

• Rose J. Spalding, DePaul University