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Small-Scale Gold Mining and the State in the Philippines

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Contested Extractivism, Society and the State

Part of the book series: Development, Justice and Citizenship ((SIID))

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Abstract

This chapter analyses the expansion of informal small-scale mining (SSM) in the southern Philippines against the background of open-ended, contested processes of state formation. It is first demonstrated that the expansion of informal SSM has, somewhat counter-intuitively, gone hand in hand with a consolidation of local state structures. The parallel processes of SSM expansion and state expansion are epitomised by the emergence of a joint extraction regime that connects local miner-politicians to SSM interests. It is then argued that this joint extraction regime is a logical outcome of a longstanding tradition of decentralised state-building, which is, however, now at risk of being undermined by the expansion of large-scale mining forwarded by the national government, with potentially significant consequences for socio-political stability.

This chapter is an abridged, edited, and updated version of an earlier article that appeared earlier in Critical Asian Studies: Verbrugge, Boris. 2015. ‘Undermining the state? informal mining and trajectories of state formation in eastern Mindanao, Philippines’. Critical Asian Studies, 47(2), 177–99.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Throughout this chapter, I consistently use the term small-scale mining (SSM)—the legal and popular term in the Philippines—rather than the internationally established term artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM).

  2. 2.

    All relevant laws and regulations can be consulted on the website of the Mines and Geosciences Burewww.mgb.gov.ph.

  3. 3.

    Ferdinand Marcos was first elected as president in 1965, and then declared martial law in 1972. While the state of martial law was lifted in 1981, Marcos would only leave the presidency, to be succeeded by Corazon Aquino, in 1986.

  4. 4.

    For a more elaborate discussion of the relationship between SSM operators and local landed interests, including a comparison between the situation in the Philippines and that in the DRC and Liberia, see Verbrugge et al. (2015).

  5. 5.

    In addition to the local government code of 1991 and the Small-Scale Mining Act of 1991, the Indigenous People’s Rights Act of 1997 has also increased the importance of the local executive in mineral resource governance, see Verbrugge (2015b).

  6. 6.

    For popular accounts of the Diwalwal gold rush, see Regelado (2000), Gonzales and Conde (2002), Bagayaua (2008).

  7. 7.

    http://www.mindanews.com/top-stories/2016/02/11/npa-killed-in-comval-clash/.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Cultural Anthropology and Development Studies, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, Netherlands

    Boris Verbrugge

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  1. Boris Verbrugge
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Correspondence to Boris Verbrugge .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Bettina Engels

  2. Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Kristina Dietz

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Verbrugge, B. (2017). Small-Scale Gold Mining and the State in the Philippines. In: Engels, B., Dietz, K. (eds) Contested Extractivism, Society and the State. Development, Justice and Citizenship. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58811-1_5

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