Extractive Industries and Community Governance in Latin America

The extractive industries in Latin America — encompassing large-scale mining of minerals such as copper and gold, petroleum extraction in river basins and more recently the burgeoning demand for energy transition minerals — have long been a pillar of regional economic growth. These operations intersect intimately with local and indigenous communities, shaping complex governance arrangements in which state agencies, private firms and civil society actors contest resource rights, environmental safeguards and benefit-sharing mechanisms. In many areas, longstanding grievances over land tenure, pollution and social inequality have led to protests, blockades and legal challenges, prompting the introduction of formal procedures for dialogue and consultation. Over the last decade, frameworks such as free, prior and informed consent and participatory environmental impact assessments have gained traction, aiming to redress power asymmetries and foster more equitable outcomes. Yet persistent challenges remain: regulatory fragmentation, uneven enforcement and scepticism towards corporate-led grievance mechanisms undermine trust, while socio-economic disparities and historical marginalisation continue to fuel tensions. Research in the region emphasises the need for integrated approaches that combine rigorous environmental monitoring, robust transparency measures and genuine community participation to ensure that extractive projects contribute to sustainable development and respect local governance traditions.

Research from Nature Portfolio

Recent studies have mapped the global footprint of critical minerals required for the energy transition and revealed that over half of these resources are located on or near territories inhabited by Indigenous and peasant communities in Latin America. This research employs geospatial analysis to overlay mineral project locations with indicators for land rights, environmental risk and governance capacity, highlighting significant overlaps that raise concerns over the adequacy of consultation and consent processes. The findings call for strengthened institutional frameworks to ensure free, prior and informed consent, more transparent permitting procedures and collaborative benefit-sharing models that align renewable energy targets with the protection of local livelihoods and cultural heritage.

Extractive Industries and Community Governance in Latin America publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in extractive industries and community governance in latin america across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Extractive frontier: The geographical and socio-political interface where resource extraction operations meet local and indigenous territories.

Free, prior and informed consent (FPIC): A procedural right ensuring that communities can give or withhold agreement to projects affecting their lands and resources.

Grievance mechanism: A formal process established by companies or governments to receive, process and resolve complaints from affected communities.

Governmentality: The ensemble of rationalities, techniques and administrative practices through which governing authorities shape resource management and societal behaviour.

References

1. Corporate Responses to Community Grievance: Voluntarism and Pathologies of Practice. Journal of Business Ethics (2023).
2. Governmentality in evidence? Evolving rationalities of forest governance in Peru. Land Use Policy (2023).
3. Tactics of dispossession: Access, power, and subjectivity at the extractive frontier. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers (2019).
4. Energy transition minerals and their intersection with land-connected peoples. Nature Sustainability (2022).