From International to Transnational Mining: The Industry’s Shifting Political Economy and the Caribbean

Abstract

This paper examines the historical trajectory and changing political economy of the mining industry in the Caribbean. It will trace how mining operations have occurred in the region through a fragmentation of earlier national development policies and international corporate models, shifting to a globalized industry of transnational corporations, flexibilized labor, and a host of subcontractors and exploratory firms. State interaction with the industry has gone from practices of direct or partial control (or guidance) toward policies favoring global competitiveness and transnational capitalist investment. With a specific focus on mining operations in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and Jamaica, this article seeks to illuminate the transition from the international to the global phase of world capitalism. The article concludes that labor, local communities, environmentalists, and social and political movements must tackle these shifting conditions.