Mining as Development? Corporate/Community Relationships in the New Gold Mining Sector of West Africa: The Case of Sabodala, Senegal

摘要

This dissertation investigates overall the impacts of the modern extractive mining industry on the lives of local people in the region of Kedougou, and in particular in the villages of Sabodala and Faloumbo. It explores also, how the utilitarian narratives about corporate mining impacts shape both the understanding of the scope of mining- and of corporate-community relationships. Sabodala is one of the many communities all over the world that lack significance in the global economy simply because they are geographically isolated and were abruptly introduced to modern corporate mining. This dissertation investigates the impacts of modern extractive industry on the lives of rural communities in eastern Senegal. It investigates also how utilitarian discourses by the Senegalese state and corporations contradict the reality of corporate social (ir) responsibility in the mining region. Using the lenses of political economy, political ecology and livelihood sustainability, I investigate how governance plays out in the process of implementing corporate social responsibility as a vehicle for local community development. This case study has also shed the light on the fact that the state has neglected ethical issue. Doing an anthropology of place in Sabodala helped me to understand how this place is "wired" into the global market of gold and how this new "order" creates "disorders" at the local level. For example and interestingly, the realignment of power relations in the community was responsible for tensions, conflicts and de-structuring social cohesion and traditional stratification, as some members of the community have seen their economic status changed overnight while others were deprived. In reality, the expected grand benefits haven't "trickled down" to the wider society, and to paraphrase Ferguson, industrial mining in Senegal is not "socially thick". Meanwhile, as the pace of gold mining increases in Sabodala so too, do its rapacious demands on local natural resources (land, water, flora, and fauna), which simultaneously affect local livelihoods system.