GOMIAM — Gold Mining in the Amazon
2010–2016 · NWO CoCooN Programme · International Comparative Research · Artisanal and Small-Scale Gold Mining · Amazonia
Small-Scale Gold Mining · Social and Environmental Conflict · Formalization · Resource Governance
Project Overview
GOMIAM — Gold Mining in the Amazon was an international multidisciplinary research project on artisanal and small-scale gold mining in Amazonia. Bringing together social scientists, geologists and engineers, the project examined the social, political, environmental and technical dimensions of small-scale gold mining and the conflicts associated with its expansion and regulation.
The project developed in two phases. From 2011 to 2013, research concentrated on the comparative analysis of socio-political and environmental conflicts related to small-scale gold mining, taking into account both the economic motivations and cultural dimensions of the actors involved. From 2013 to 2016, the emphasis expanded toward knowledge exchange, network building and the communication of research findings through policy briefs and other forms of dissemination.
Comparative research encompassed Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru and Suriname, providing an opportunity to examine how small-scale gold mining and attempts to regulate it developed under different social, political and institutional conditions.
GOMIAM was funded through the NWO-WOTRO CoCooN programme — Conflict and Cooperation over Natural Resources in Developing Countries.
Research Focus
GOMIAM investigated artisanal and small-scale gold mining as a field in which livelihoods, economic interests, technologies, environmental impacts, regulation and social conflict interact.
The research addressed interconnected questions concerning:
- social and economic organization of small-scale gold mining;
- livelihoods and access to mineral resources;
- socio-political and environmental conflicts;
- formalization and legalization of mining activities;
- relationships between formal regulation and informal practices;
- legal and institutional arrangements;
- mining technologies and their social and environmental implications;
- relations between miners, governments and other organizations;
- possibilities and limitations of policy intervention.
An important characteristic of the project was its combination of social, political and technical perspectives. Small-scale mining was therefore not approached solely as a technical problem or an informal economic activity, but as a field in which technologies, livelihoods, institutions, regulation and conflicts are closely interconnected.
Comparative and Empirical Context
GOMIAM's core comparative research encompassed Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru and Suriname, while the wider research network also included activities involving French Guiana.
The Brazilian research team encompassed different mining regions and research problems. Research associated with the team included work in the Tapajós region, Serra Pelada, mining areas of Amapá, and border regions involving Brazilian miners in the Guiana Shield.
These different settings made it possible to investigate variation within Brazilian small-scale mining itself, including differences in mining organization, mobility, labour, environmental conflicts, technology, regulation and relationships with protected areas.
The wider comparative design therefore enabled GOMIAM to investigate not only differences between countries but also the heterogeneous regional and institutional contexts in which small-scale gold mining takes place.
Research Approach
GOMIAM combined multidisciplinary and comparative research involving social scientists and specialists in geology, mining and engineering.
Research across the project addressed mining practices, conflicts, livelihoods, institutions, formalization and regulation through field-based investigation and comparative analysis.
Among the methodologies developed within GOMIAM was a technographic approach to small-scale gold mining. This approach examined interactions between miners, skills, technologies, tools and wider social contexts. Comparative research using technography combined questionnaires, open-ended interviews with experienced miners, video documentation, group discussions and technical characterization of mining sites.
This methodological component illustrates the broader GOMIAM approach of connecting technological processes with the social and institutional organization of mineral extraction.
My Research within GOMIAM
I participated in the GOMIAM Research Team Brazil, building upon my earlier research on artisanal gold mining and regional development in the Brazilian Amazon.
An important precursor was the 2003–2004 research project [Organization and Institutions in Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining in Brazil →], which examined organizations, institutional arrangements, formalization and resource governance through comparative research in the Tapajós region and Teófilo Otoni. The project was analytically distinct from GOMIAM, but several of the questions it addressed later reappeared in expanded comparative form within the GOMIAM research programme.
My research within this broader context focused particularly on the social organization of small-scale miners, labour and working processes, public policy, and the relationship between mining and regional development.
GOMIAM provided an opportunity to connect these long-term research interests with an international comparative programme concerned with conflict, formalization, legal arrangements and the governance of small-scale mineral extraction.
One particularly important strand of this research concerned the relationship between the formalization of small-scale mining and the persistence of informal practices. Formal regulation does not necessarily replace informal arrangements. Legally formalized mining may continue to operate through combinations of formal rules, established practices, organizational arrangements and informal economic and social relations.
This challenged interpretations of formalization as a straightforward transition from informal or unregulated mining toward a coherent formal regulatory order and contributed to my subsequent research on resource governance and the organizational and institutional conditions of mineral extraction.
Contribution to My Research
GOMIAM represents an important stage in the development of my research on mining and regional development.
Earlier research on Amazonian gold mining had concentrated strongly on labour relations, economic organization, technological change and the connections between mineral extraction, regional transformation and wider markets. GOMIAM extended this research toward comparative questions concerning conflict, formalization, legal systems, organizations and resource governance.
The comparative perspective also reinforced the importance of regional variation. Similar pressures toward formalization, environmental regulation or political intervention can produce different consequences depending on historically established mining practices, organizational structures, institutional arrangements and regional conditions.
GOMIAM therefore contributed to a gradual shift in my research from the political economy of resource extraction toward a broader analysis of the heterogeneous economic, political, legal and organizational relations through which mineral extraction becomes regionally consequential.
From GOMIAM to Regional Development in World Society
GOMIAM was not conceived within the theoretical framework of Regional Development in World Society. Its relevance for the current research programme is therefore retrospective rather than programmatic.
The project nevertheless generated empirical observations that became important for later theoretical development. Small-scale gold mining connects regional mining activities to processes extending far beyond individual mining regions: international gold markets, national policies, legal regimes, environmental regulation, technologies, scientific and technical knowledge, and organizations concerned with mineral extraction and its consequences.
At the same time, these wider processes do not generate uniform outcomes. They encounter different histories of mining, institutional arrangements, organizations, livelihoods and material conditions and consequently acquire different regional forms.
From the perspective of my current research, GOMIAM therefore provides empirical material for examining how heterogeneous processes operating within world society become selectively connected and regionally consequential without producing homogeneous regional configurations.
Organizations and institutional arrangements · Formalization and informality · Regulatory expectations · Resource access · Conflict · Technological change · Regional differentiation
These observations form part of the longer research trajectory that eventually led to the development of Regional Development in World Society.
Selected Publications & Outputs
Formalized Small-Scale Gold Mining in the Brazilian Amazon: An Activity Surrounded by Informality
Kolen, J., de Theije, M. E. M., & Mathis, A. (2013). “Formalized small-scale gold mining in the Brazilian Amazon: An activity surrounded by informality.” In L. Cremers, J. Kolen & M. de Theije (Eds.), Small-scale Gold Mining in the Amazon: The Cases of Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru and Suriname (pp. 31–45). Cuadernos del CEDLA 26. Amsterdam: CEDLA.
Engaging Legal Systems in Small-Scale Gold Mining Conflicts in Three South American Countries
de Theije, M. E. M., Kolen, J., Heemskerk, M., Duijves, C., Sarmiento, M., Urán, A., Lozada, I., Ayala, H., Perea, J., & Mathis, A. (2014). “Engaging legal systems in small-scale gold mining conflicts in three South American countries.” In M. Bavinck, E. Mostert & L. Pellegrini (Eds.), Conflict over Natural Resources in the Global South: Conceptual Approaches (pp. 129–146). CRC Press/Taylor & Francis.
The wider GOMIAM research network produced academic publications, books and book chapters, dissertations, reports, policy briefs and other forms of research communication addressing small-scale gold mining across the Amazon.
View GOMIAM Publications →
Related Research
Mining & Extractive Transformations →
Research on artisanal and industrial mining, resource governance, global raw-material relations and regional transformation.
Amazonia as a Comparative Observation Field →
Amazonia as a field for comparing heterogeneous regional configurations and their differentiated connections to wider societal transformations.
Extractive Communities & Territorial Relations →
Research on resources, livelihoods, organizations and differentiated forms of participation and access within regional configurations.
Regional Development in World Society →
The current theoretical programme examining how heterogeneous world-societal processes become selectively connected and consequential within historically evolving regional configurations.