Geography
Document Type
Article
Abstract
Tanzania is the third largest gold exporter in Africa, thanks in part to the liberalization of the mining sector which started in the early 1990s. Neoliberal mining reforms promised a win-win situation in which government, investors and local host communities would benefit through export earnings, profits, local employment, andcorporate social responsibility initiatives (e.g., the building of schools and clinics). While the rising price of gold and foreign investments in mining activities have delivered on some of these promises, many residents in mining regions have not benefited socioeconomically. Worse still, their communities have unjustly borne the brunt of the environmental, social, and public-health costs associated with large-scale mining operations. This paper examines these injustices through research in Geita and Kahama, two of the most active gold miningareas of Tanzania. Drawing on Kuehn's [1] taxonomy of environmental injustice, we detail the negative impacts of mining activities in these communities and describe how residents have developed strategies of resistance as means to obtain reparations. We then explore the political, financial, organizational, and social limitations on these resistance strategies and argue that the social movements associated with mining lack the political space necessary to affect significant changes to structure, quality, and impact of the industry in western Tanzania.
Publication Title
Resources
Publication Date
2012
Volume
1
Issue
1
First Page
3
Last Page
22
ISSN
2079-9276
DOI
10.3390/resources1010003
Keywords
environmental justice, gold mining, political ecology, rural development, Tanzania
Repository Citation
Makene, Madoshi H.; Emel, Jody; and Murphy, James T., "Calling for justice in the goldfields of Tanzania" (2012). Geography. 405.
https://commons.clarku.edu/faculty_geography/405
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.