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The unintended consequences of national regulations: Large-scale-small-scale relations in Philippine and Indonesian nickel mining

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  • Camba, Alvin

Abstract

Debates on large-scale and small-scale mining (ASM) relations are divided between those who argue between cohabitation and autonomy. While the former holds that states and organizations need to help large-scale mining and ASM work together, the latter suggests that states need to institute different policy frameworks, goals, and organizations for ASM. Arguing in favor of autonomy, I contend that cohabitation arrangements suffered from the unintended consequences of indirectly related national regulations. These national regulations, which in the Philippines are intended to protect communities and in Indonesia are designed to enhance the country's economic development, instead transformed large-scale-small-scale relations. A counter reaction to these regulations occurred in the context of surging Chinese nickel demand. Large-scale mining firms were emboldened to maximize their nickel concessions, withdrawing from their informal agreements with and inevitably displacing the adjacent ASM groups. Financiers and other large-scale mining firms took advantage of the situation by employing the newly-displaced ASM miners to compete over high-grade nickel, operate illicitly in other large-scale mining concessions, or become underpaid workers. These competitive dynamics externalized the political, social, and environmental costs onto the communities. Drawing from fieldwork in Mindanao and Central Sulawesi, I find that a newer iteration of the extractive monopoly in the Philippines and an industrial oligopsony in Indonesia engendered new forms of competition between and within large-scale mining firms and ASM groups.

Suggested Citation

  • Camba, Alvin, 2021. "The unintended consequences of national regulations: Large-scale-small-scale relations in Philippine and Indonesian nickel mining," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jrpoli:v:74:y:2021:i:c:s0301420721002257
    DOI: 10.1016/j.resourpol.2021.102213
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    References listed on IDEAS

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