The CEU Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy cordially invites you to
Natural Resources, Cultures, and Collisions:
Socio-Environmental and Governance Lessons from Andean Mining
A public seminar by
Vladimir R. Gil Ramón
Catholic University, Peru
The Earth Institute at Columbia University, USA
The recent world-wide mining frontier expansion, fueled by the urbanization of China, has created conflictive encounters between governments and companies against remote marginalized populations. Although mining is generally presented as beneficial for national development, the number of conflicts are rising.
This presentation contributes to understandings of the causes of mining conflicts through evidence-based information, supporting scientifically informed public policies as well as debates on sub-national mining impacts and their governance challenges. The seminar is based on long-term multi-sited ethnographic field work comparing transnational Andean mining, which works to unveil the causes of conflicts based on local contests for definitions of development and environmental risks. The results illustrate a particularized version of events that are unfolding globally, in an era when national governments concede spheres of their sovereignty to corporate networks and NGOs, with an unexpected governance outcome: the possibility of vulnerable populations to find ways to improve their articulation in the nation, while also contesting national institutions and re-appropriating discourses of development and its environmental impact.
Vladimir Gil Ramón is a faculty member at the Environmental Development Master´s Program and the Department of Social Sciences at the Catholic University of Peru, and an affiliated Research Scientist at the Earth Institute Center for Environmental Sustainability at Columbia University. His research focuses on socio-environmental challenges, including mining impacts and adaptation to climate change. He has lead scientific consortiums examining the impact of climate change in the Andes, with the support of the IDB and UNEP. His most recent publications, including co-authorships, include Mining Landing: Culture, Conflict, Negotiations and Lessons for Development (IEP), Adaptation to Climate Change (Cambridge University Press), Less Carbon Development (World Bank), as well as articles at journals such as Climate and Development, Anthropological Quarterly, Visual Anthropology, and Bulletin of the World Health Organization. His forthcoming publications include a book on Andean mining conflicts and governance at The University of Arizona Press, and a meta-analysis of Andean ecology research at Oxford University Press.
Introduction by Dr. Laszlo Pinter
Professor, Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy,
Senior Fellow, International Institute for Sustainable Development
