Mining and Social Justice

In 1966, the United States supported the overthrow of Indonesian President Sukarto in favor of army general Suharto, mainly due to Suharto’s cooperation with multinational corporations.  Suharto’s bloody campaign left a trail of nearly 500,000 dead.  Forty years later, Indonesians are still paying the price.  Due to the United States support, multinationals in Indonesia were able to write their own contracts along with Indonesia’s investment and industry laws, guaranteeing them absolute access to Indonesia’s natural resources.

American mining company Freeport was one of these companies.  Under the industry and investment laws, Freeport had the right to claim any resources free of charge, and displace and resettle indigenous populations in order to gain access to the gold and copper hidden in Papua, Indonesia, and it did so, for thirty years.  Resistance from indigenous groups resulted in a combined government-corporation reign of terror.  Between 1994 and 1995, frequent village raids, intense torture, disappearances, indiscriminate killings and unlawful arrests occurred as a result of the Indonesian military acting as protection for the Freeport mining corporation.

Globalization has eliminated the boundaries for multinational corporations, allowing them to reach far into foreign countries to satisfy their demands.  It allows capitalism to run unchecked, without consequences.  It has enabled multinationals to view countries and their people as commodities, disposable materials to be used and discarded.  And it’s not just happening overseas.

In the United States, the government is giving mining corporations precedence over citizens.  In Bristol Bay, Alaska, the largest open pit copper mine in America has been proposed (to see what an open pit mine looks like, see my post “Mining: In Pictures”).  The community of Bristol Bay relies exclusively on salmon fishing, as it has for hundreds of years.  A copper mine would seriously damage the bay’s ecosystem, making it doubtful that salmon could return to the bay, obliterating the traditional way of life.

In West Virginia, where coal mining has carried on for generations, so-called “hillbilly activists” are fighting against the disastrous environmental effects and mono-economy created by coal mining, in which residents have no other choice but to enter into mining, with its dangers and health risks.

Globalization has allowed business to boom, and has spread capitalism to the far reaches of the world.  This often comes at the cost of the loss of the community’s way of life.  When a company enters a country like Indonesia, or even a small community like Bristol Bay, Alaska, it imposes its global system, and forces the people to become dependent on the company for their way of life.  It eliminates self-sufficiency.  Globalization has also allowed these people to become by-products in its wake, used up by a system that relies on disposability.  How can this be stopped?

The answer lies in social justice.  As opposed to the temporary band-aid of charity or the smug imposition of development, social justice empowers the people victimized by the system of globalization.  Change can occur from the bottom up, as citizens push for justice in their government and secure their idependence and self-sufficiency.

We see an example of this in the Bla’an people of the Philippines.  When Australian-based Western Mining Company pushed for the Bla’an to give up their land to make room for a mine, the Bla’an refused to move.  In this video, you’ll see that the Bla’an stood strong after numerous beatings and raids of their village.

Although the Bla’an were not ultimately successful, others have fought back and won.  In 2006, Papua New Guinea residents won a huge settlement when the sued the Rio Tinto mining company, which had conspired with the government to force islanders off of their land.  Many other victims of mining corporations are fighting back.  We can help by spreading awareness and avoiding purchasing dirty gold and blood diamonds.  We can advocate that corporations be held responsible for human rights, and support organizations that serve as human rights watchdogs.  We can fight to make sure that corporations stop paying local governments and are not allowed to use the government as protection.  We can demand that governments adopt the human rights conventions to ensure that their citizens are treated fairly by multinationals.   And we can start locally, by supporting the efforts against the proposed mine in Bristol Bay and other places like it, demanding that our government listen to its people instead of just seeing dollar signs.

Resource Guide

1. A speech given by a Papuan human rights activist, detailing the human rights violations and corruption resulting from mining in Indonesia.  The site also includes many links to other articles and information on mining in many countries.   http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=946
2. This site gives information on how globalization has changed mining, and the impact of this on women.  http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/mining-cn.htm
3. This site details how gold is mined and processed, and the effects of this on surrounding communities.  http://www.grinningplanet.com/2005/02-01/gold-jewelry-gold-mining-article.htm
4. This government site goes over the history of gold mining and the economics involved.  http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/prospect1/goldgip.html
5. A New York Times opinion article covering the cost of diamond mining, and why solving the problem isn’t as simple as just boycotting.   http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/17/weekinreview/17mcneil.html?_r=1
6. An older New York Times article about the many deleterious effects of diamond mining.  http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/14/fashion/14diamonds.html?_r=1
7. An article about how although men are the ones doing the mining in Asia, women are the ones that bear the brunt of its effects.  http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=8739
8. This article explains the link between the mining industry and HIV.  http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=176
9. An overview of China’s mining practices:  http://www.minesandcommunities.org/article.php?a=43
10. An interesting article about how Wal-Mart is launching a line of “green” jewelry, but using a company currently being sued over thousands of deaths:  http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2008/07/17/wal-mart-greening-its-jewelry/
11. The details on the lawsuit over mining protest deaths:  http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/37553/story.htm
12. This site explains the proposed Pebble Gold and Copper Mine in Alaska, and how it will be detrimental to the community.  http://www.pebbleminealaska.com/
13. This site gives an overview of indigenous peoples’ opposition to mines.  http://www.murdoch.edu.au/elaw/issues/v4n2/hunt42.html
14. An overview of uranium mines and their environmental hazards:    http://www.wise-uranium.org/uwai.html
15. This site contains many links to sites about the health hazards for mine workers, and lists many of the mining disasters that have occurred http://www.minesandcommunities.org/list.php?f=9&all=1

Mining: In Pictures

Most of the gems and metals bought in the United States were mined elsewhere, out of sight.  Let’s shine a light on what goes on overseas.

This is Chuquicamata, the largest open pit copper mine in the world.  It’s more than a mile across, and has been used since 1915.  Heavy pollution from the mine has forced a nearby town to evacuate.  A similar copper mine in Papua New Guinea forced landowners off their land, seizing it, creating a civil uprising that was crushed by the combined efforts of the Rio Tinto mining company and the New Guinea government, resulting in thousands of deaths between 1989 and 1999.

This is a pit filled with cyanide from a gold mine in Khakassia, Russia.  Cyanide is doused over raw ore to leach the gold out.  The pits are poorly maintained, and cyanide often leaks into the water supply, polluting drinking water for the surrounding area.

Chilean children sift for gold in polluted water containing sulfur, mercury, and cyanide.

This man had both his hands hacked off by RUF fighters during Sierra Leone’s brutal civil war, financed by the diamond trade.

While 99% of the diamonds sold today come from conflict-free zones, diamonds are easy to smuggle, and the Kimberly Process, which requires that diamonds have a certificate of origin, is easy to fake.

It’s important to remember that diamonds are not a necessary good — their worth is what we make it.  “Creating new markets is the genius of DeBeers. Getting African-American men to wear bling works for them as well as their 1950’s campaigns to get Japanese brides to demand solitaires.” (Donald D. McNeill, Jr.  New York Times)

Diamond companies are taking steps in the right direction, by supporting trade of conflict-free diamonds and providing adequate pay and healthcare for miners.  But the diamond and other mining companies still have a long way to go.  And the sexist ads definitely aren’t helping.

A History of Mining

Mining has come a long way since the days of the gold rush.  When once miners would go down into underground mines, mining has transformed into large-scale operations requiring huge open pits, devastating the environment and surrounding communities.

As early as the 9th century, mining took place in Africa, with mined gold traded to people as far away as Asia.  An early form of globalization came with colonialism and imperialism, as the United States and European countries realized they could profit off of the gold mined from foreign communities.  Most of us have heard of the horrors that occurred when Spanish conquistadors went after Aztec gold, but many are unaware of the consequences of modern mining.

97% of the metals in the United States were mined from open pit mines.  These mines require all of the vegetation to be removed from a large area, blast a massive hole into the ground, and produce 8-10 times as much waste as underground mines.  In gold mining, the gold is extracted using a cyanide leaching process, which often results in cyanide poisoning surrounding groundwater.  But luckily for Americans, most gold mining occurs outside of the United States, where poor communities and countries in debt allow mining corporations to operate with few restrictions.   Many mining corporations are allowed to enter an area, claim land rights, and clear the area of residents.  In one district of Ghana, more than 30,000 people were displaced between 1990 and 1998.   And working in a mine is no cakewalk either; the International Labour Organization reports that mining accounts for 5% of all workplace deaths each year.

Luckily, there is hope on the horizon, at least where gold mines are concerned.  The “No Dirty Gold” campaign encourages consumers to purchase “clean” gold, gold not mined from pits.  Consumers can also purchase gold from companies that make jewelry from melted down jewelry, or purchase antique jewelry.

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Diamonds follow-up

To be more clear — this semester I’ll be focusing on the local impacts of mining, specifically of gemstone mining.

For more information on what the UN is doing about conflict diamonds:

http://www.un.org/peace/africa/Diamond.html

Diamonds are forever

“Give her what she really wants.”  “Women of the world, raise your right hand.”  “For your past, present, and future.”  There are few commercials that tug at the heartstrings as well as diamond ads.  Diamonds symbolize your love, they symbolize independence, they symbolize your worth.  But what the sentimental black and white jewelry ads regret to mention is the bloody history of the diamond industry.

Often called blood diamonds or conflict diamonds, 15% of the diamonds sold in the 1990s came from conflict zones, mined from riverbeds controlled by rebels in Africa. When the rebels, like those of the RUF in Sierra Leone, sold their diamonds, the profits helped fund bloody civil wars and attacks on civilians.  In the 90s, rebels from Sierra Leone financed their war with diamonds traded with arms traffickers for weapons while diamond companies revelled in the high selling prices brought through civil war.  While the UN did bar Sierra Leone from diamond trafficking, it still has yet to enforce any restrictions against neighboring Liberia, making it easy for smugglers to cross the border and pass off the diamonds as clean.

If the suffering incurred by the diamond trade in Africa doesn’t quite hit home, then the tie of blood diamonds to terrorism will.  As early as 1998, Al Quaeda began buying diamonds from the RUF in Sierra Leone.  By 2001, Al Quaeda had laundered millions by selling off untraceable conflict diamonds.  By buying diamonds, Americans were directly financing terrorism.

Numerous attempts since 9/11 to end the trade of conflict diamonds were fruitless.  Finally, despite the Bush administration’s reluctance to regulate business, the Kimberly Process was passed, stating that all diamonds should be accompanied by a non-forgable paper trail ensuring their conflict-free origins.  However, the nature of diamonds makes them easy to smuggle and pass off as legitimate.

It is estimated that today only about 1% of the diamonds sold are conflict diamonds.  This may owe more to the fact that the civil war in Sierra Leone has ended than to the increased regulation of the diamond trade.  Only when peace and security are found in places where diamonds are mined can there be hope of ending the diamond’s bloody path.  Or perhaps, once the Western world stops placing so much worth on a rock, once we stop quantifying love with karats, we will stem the flow of blood diamonds.

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Week One: Conspicuous Consumption and Utter Confusion

I have to say, over the week that I’ve been recording everything I consume, there was no revolutionary moment that made me realize how wasteful I am or inspired me to change my ways. I figured that I consume pretty responsibly for a college student; I pack my lunch each day, I don’t eat enormous amounts of Easy Mac or Top Ramen, I buy organic when I can. Sure, it would be better for my community, the environment, and the world if I got a membership to the Moscow Co-op for all my grocery needs, or bought in bulk at WinCo, but without a car, and with a monthly budget of $200 for food, that’s just not possible right now.  To say the least, I was feeling pretty confident about my consumption.

That is, until I looked at my closet. It began this morning, when I realized I could no longer shut one of the drawers on my dresser, where I kept all my t-shirts.  And this is a large drawer. Then I recalled how I recently had to buy more hangers, as my two ten-packs just weren’t doing the job. And then I looked at my shoes.  I still can’t bring myself to count how many pairs I own.

I’ll finally admit it: I’m an addict.  I’m addicted to cheap clothes, or “fast fashion”.  Forever 21 is my Mecca.  Every other week, after scouring the F21 website, I type in my debit card number, and a week later a package arrives in front of my apartment.  I like to think of it as a little gift from the UPS guy.  (Who comes to my apartment so often he recognized me at Safeway.)  It takes less than two minutes, there’s no hassle of a dressing room or sales clerks, I don’t even have to open my wallet (I have my card numbers memorized).  It’s fast, easy, impersonal, and almost guilt-free.  Almost.  Except for the huge effect on my bank account.  After working two jobs this summer, sixty hours a week, somehow I got to the point where I’m so worried I won’t be able to pay my electricity bill that I stopped turning my heat on.

I’m lucky enough to have excess income so I can spend it on things I want, rather than need, and yet I’m incredibly reckless with my money.  According to the Daily Mail, the people in Bangladesh who make my fast fashion clothes earn about five dollars a week, and most likely don’t save up to spend it on that oh-so-cute fringed mini-dress.  They probably just barely support their families.   So I should stop spending money supporting corporations that take advantage of the foreign poor, right?

Turns out it’s not that simple.  Kelsey Timmerman, author of Where Am I Wearing?  A Global Tour to the Countries, Factories, and People That Make Our Clothes, explains that factory jobs are often the best option for people in Bangladesh.  According to Timmerman, “there are other, way worse jobs in Bangladesh…all we’re doing by boycotting is removing our guilt.”

It flat out sucks that the best job someone could get in a country like Bangladesh is in a sweatshop.  The people that worked to put this shirt on my back live in a country whose government has failed to protect them from the complete desolation of poverty.  They are the by-products of a screwed up world that depends on necessary evils to keep turning.   So how can we stop it?  How could I fix this huge mess? Because right now the only idea in my head is to fly to Bangladesh and start a revolution.

So, bottom line time.  I get it.  I feel horrible about it, I feel guilty, I feel responsible.  You’ve raised our awareness, but what good are we doing?  How can we pull millions of people out of poverty?  I get that I’m lucky, I get that this is an outrage.  So tell me what to do to fix it.