Three Mining Charters and a Draft: How the Politics and Rhetoric of Development in the South African Mining Sector are Keeping Communities in Poverty

In the postapartheid South African economic landscape, the idea of “empowerment” has been given special meaning in the concept “black economic empowerment,” or BEE. BEE serves as a vehicle for the transformation of the South African economy in general by promoting, amongst other things, increased black ownership and management of businesses, skills development and rural community development. These empowerment aspirations are also pursued in the mining industry in terms of the Mining Charter. The development of mining communities is one of the main features of empowerment in the mining industry. An analysis of the various versions of the Mining Charter shows a certain progression in the approach to the empowerment and development of rural mining communities: There is an increased emphasis on the poverty still faced by these communities, years after the introduction of the first Mining Charter. The question is whether the increased emphasis will mean much for mining communities. This article argues that the empowerment of mining communities in terms of the Mining Charter can be situated in the development paradigm and is subjected to the politics of development. For the purposes of this article, the politics of development refer to the underlying political and ideological assumptions of the idea of development, which have consequences for how a development problem is framed and the development beneficiary is represented. Inevitably, the problem faced by development beneficiaries is reduced to mere poverty, showing how the politics of development will affect how development solutions are constructed. Regarding the Mining Charter specifically, the politics of development causes uncertainty as to who may benefit from community development initiatives. The inability to identify or demarcate the mining community accurately means that the drafters of the Mining Charter can only employ poverty alleviation rhetoric. The rhetoric creates expectations with mining communities that mining companies cannot meet, placing significant pressure on the already volatile relationship between mining companies and mining communities.