Of copper, water and glaciers in the global metropolis. The emerging role of mega-mining in santiago de chile’s environmental governance

Abstract

Through a case of large mining exploitation in the periphery of Santiago de Chile, this ar-ticle aims to study the socio-territorial impacts of the new mining front advancing in the heart of the metropolitan region of Chile. Located some 60 km north of central Santiago, the Los Bronces mine is one of the largest open-pit mines in the world and is currently planning a new underground expansion project. Based on a qualitative research using primary and secondary sources, we questioned the scales of the project’s impact on wa-ter resources and glaciers in Chile’s most populated region, as well as the perception of these impacts by different actors. Our analysis of the company’s corporate strategies in response to these challenges leads us to the following hypothesis: an increase in environmental problems due to extractive pressure, added to the advance of urbanization, local hydro-climatic changes and a greater awareness of civil society, causes a rescaling of the mining company’s social and environmental responsibility policies. From an application to the peri-urban areas of northern Santiago, it is now moving to the whole region by integrating the mining company into various natural resource governance structures at the metropolitan level. The company’s institutional anchorage, based on these governance platforms, reflects a strategy of territorialization of its corporative responsibility policies through environmental issues.