Exploring the minescape: engaging with the complexity of the extractive sector

Abstract

This paper introduces the concept of the minescape as a conceptual and imaginative tool through which to integrate and represent growing shifts in the way natural resource extraction is understood. In recent years, traditional perceptions of extractive processes as 'natural' and purely economic in nature have been increasingly challenged by new developments within the fields of human geography and anthropology. Likewise, growing insights into the multifaceted socio-cultural terrain of extractive operations, and burgeoning work on the interplay of materiality and discourse within the extractive sector, have also transformed the way that extractive processes (and their potentialities) are being conceptualised. The concept of the minescape aims to draw together significant insights concerning the extractive sector, which are increasingly being deployed when representing extractive spaces. Appropriating the term from its current use in fine art, the minescape joins a number of recent appropriations of the 'scapes' suffix to capture the expanding analytical scope of extractive sector inquiry. In essence, the minescape stands as a representational tool that underscores the intricate ways in which extractive processes are imbued with complex socio-cultural dynamics, and powerful material and discursive elements.

Contested fuelscapes: Producing charcoal in sub‐Saharan drylands

“…The “scapes” suffix has been adopted to analyse various aspects of human–environmental interactions. Examples include “cryoscape” for the entanglement between people and glaciers (Nüsser & Baghel, ), “minescape” in relation to the material‐discursive terrain of the extractive sector (Ey & Sherval, ) and “riskscape” with regard to the ways in which actors ascribe (spatial) meaning to perceived threats (Müller‐Mahn & Everts, ). Although focusing on rather different phenomena, all these approaches draw inspiration from Appadurai's () conceptualisation of global flows in terms of five different scapes.…”

Traditional Dimensions of Seabed Resource Management in the Context of Deep Sea Mining in the Pacific: Learning From the Socio-Ecological Interconnectivity Between Island Communities and the Ocean Realm

“…Many Pacific Island countries have joined international agreements promoting the conservation of whales and created whale sanctuaries, now covering over 11 million km 2 of the South Pacific Ocean. Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLCs) have a role as custodians of significant ecosystems and of species generally traveling between coasts and high seas (Ey and Sherval, 2016;Eckstein and Schwarz, 2019). They are central to the debate addressing gaps in governance in ABNJ and the lack of a comprehensive framework for biodiversity conservation and management (Vierros et al, 2020).…”

The Concept of Oceanian Sovereignty in the Context of Deep Sea Mining in the Pacific Region

“…The fact that communities do not have sufficiently close geographic proximity with actual DSM sites, which are located both within and beyond the limits of national jurisdiction, obscures the socio-ecological and ontological relationship these communities share with their environment. According to such obtuse or reductive understanding, it is worth noting that the environmental dimension of DSM is the primary dimension to be valued and therefore studied in the literature [Baker and Beaudouin, 2013; United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), 2014; Bourrel, 2015;UNEP-WCMC, 2016;Bradley and Swaddling, 2018;Sharma, 2019;Singh and Hunter, 2019;UNESCO, 2019;Kakee, 2020] This would explain why most of the Pacific Island communities have a distant deep sea "minescape, " by reference to environmental impacts, with actual DSM sites located both within and beyond the limits of national jurisdiction (Ey and Sherval, 2016). This vision obscures the highly complex socio-ecological and ontological relationships between these communities and their marine and coastal environments which are also changing rapidly.…”