Past Event

The Institute of African Studies presents

“Resource Politics and Advocacy Struggles in Zimbabwe: Encountering Power at Multiple Scales”

with

Sam Spiegel, University of Edinburgh

As the mining sector in Africa continues to expand, questions are being asked about how power relations are changing in mining economies as well as the extent to which global discourses engage with local advocacies on the ground. This talk will discuss global representations of power and politics in Zimbabwe’s gold and diamond mining sectors. Drawing on the author’s fieldwork in Zimbabwe between 2005 and 2015, it will explore gaps between the analytic focus points of global mining sector analysts and the advocacies of artisanal and small-scale miners’ associations, as economic struggles have driven large numbers of people to depend on rudimentary mineral extraction. The talk with examine how global discourses of modern order and regulation have been politically instrumentalised and how associations of artisanal and small-scale miners have sought to contest controversial national policies and rebuild livelihoods in the aftermath of widespread police crackdowns, with uneven results.

Dr. Sam Spiegel is a Lecturer in International Development at the University of Edinburgh and Director of the MSc Programme in Global Challenges and the Postgraduate Certificate Programme in Africa and International Development. His research engages multiple themes in the study of international development, human geography, environmental governance, public health and political ecology, with a focus on extractive sector issues and debates.

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