Book contents
- Ecoviolence Studies
- Ecoviolence Studies
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- 1 Ecoviolence Studies and Human Security
- 2 The Links between Human Trafficking and Wildlife Trafficking
- 3 Preventing a Secondary Disaster: How Emergency Management Agencies Can Prepare and Respond to Disaster-Linked Exploitation
- 4 Ecoviolence at Sea
- 5 There Will Be Blood: The Return of the Frontier Logic in Guyana and Hyper-Exploitation in the Mining Sector
- 6 Artisanal Gold Mining in Uganda: Towards Formalization as Remediation of Dignity and Rights
- 7 Searching for Shelter in the Climate Crisis Era: Ecocide and Migration
- 8 Climate Change, Violence and Ecocide
- 9 Sea of Cortez Region: Crime and Ecosystem Crossroads
- 10 Minority Languages as Collateral Damage in the Climate Crisis: The Incidental Result of Ecoviolence on Y Gymraeg/Welsh Language
- Index
- References
5 - There Will Be Blood: The Return of the Frontier Logic in Guyana and Hyper-Exploitation in the Mining Sector
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 13 February 2025
Book contents
- Ecoviolence Studies
- Ecoviolence Studies
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Foreword
- Foreword
- Preface and Acknowledgments
- 1 Ecoviolence Studies and Human Security
- 2 The Links between Human Trafficking and Wildlife Trafficking
- 3 Preventing a Secondary Disaster: How Emergency Management Agencies Can Prepare and Respond to Disaster-Linked Exploitation
- 4 Ecoviolence at Sea
- 5 There Will Be Blood: The Return of the Frontier Logic in Guyana and Hyper-Exploitation in the Mining Sector
- 6 Artisanal Gold Mining in Uganda: Towards Formalization as Remediation of Dignity and Rights
- 7 Searching for Shelter in the Climate Crisis Era: Ecocide and Migration
- 8 Climate Change, Violence and Ecocide
- 9 Sea of Cortez Region: Crime and Ecosystem Crossroads
- 10 Minority Languages as Collateral Damage in the Climate Crisis: The Incidental Result of Ecoviolence on Y Gymraeg/Welsh Language
- Index
- References
Summary
This chapter provides an historical context for the emergence, and continuation, of a frontier logic of ecoviolence in Guyana, analyzing the hyper-exploitation of the Ameridians, minors and migrants in the mining sector. While Guyana’s Indigenous peoples, the Amerindians, named their home the “Land of Many Waters”, towns and villages such as Rose Hall, New Amsterdam, Queenstown and Anna Regina serve as a reminder of the European colonial regimes which spearheaded capitalist, frontier logics of extractivism which spatialized ecoviolence and precarity; the theft of Indigenous lands and territories; and ongoing structural racial, gender, and economic disparities intersected with environmental injustice. The return of neoliberal frontiers of logic and hyper-exploitation of workers forces readers to think more holistically about harm and hyper-exploitation.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Ecoviolence StudiesHuman Exploitation and Environmental Crime, pp. 86 - 100Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2025
References
Bartlett, T. (2005). Amerindian development in Guyana: legal documents as background to discourse practice. Discourse & Society, 16(1), 341‒364.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bhagirat, L. (2022, June 19). Chinese Landing Toshao Reports Increased Threats From Miners, Police. Stabroek News. https://www.stabroeknews.com/2022/06/19/news/guyana/chinese-landing-toshao-reports-increased-threats-from-miners-police/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Bulkan, J. (2013). The struggle for recognition of the Indigenous voice: Amerindians in Guyanese politics. The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs, 4(1), 319‒404.Google Scholar
Colchester, M. (1997). Guyana, Fragile Frontiers: Loggers, Miners and Forest Peoples. Ian Randle Publishers.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collier, P. & Hoeffler, A. (2004). Greed and grievance in civil war. Oxford Economic Papers, 56(4), 563‒595CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Guyana Chronicle. (2022, October 6). Data on Suicide Tells Only a Part of the Story. https://guyanachronicle.com/2022/10/06/Data-on-suicide-tells-only-a-part-of-the-story/. Accessed March 21, 2023.Google Scholar
Donald, D. (2009). The curricular problem of Indigenousness: Colonial frontier logics, teacher resistances, and the acknowledgment of ethical space. In Nahachewsky, J. and Johnston, I. (Eds.), Beyond ‘Presentism’ (pp. 23‒41). Brill-Sense.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ezenwa, O. (2022, July 15). What’s in a Name? Making the Case for the Sahel Conflict as “Eco-violence.” New Security Beat. https://www.newsecuritybeat.org/2022/07/whats-name-making-case-sahel-conflict-eco-violence/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Galtung, J. (1969). Violence, Peace, and Peace Research. Journal of Peace Research, 6(3), 167‒191.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Global Environment Facility. (2017, February 1). Guyana launches “El Dorado” project to eliminate mercury use from small-scale artisanal gold mining. GEF. https://www.thegef.org/newsroom/news/guyana-launches-el-dorado-project-eliminate-mercury-use-small-scale-artisanal-gold. Accessed March 23, 2023.Google Scholar
Hennessy, L. (2005). Fission and Fusion: Economic Transformations and Indigenous Resistance in Guyana. Doctoral Dissertation, University of California.Google Scholar
Hinton, J., Veiga, M. & Beinhoff, C. (2009). Women and artisanal mining: gender roles and the road ahead. In Hilson, G. (Ed.), The Socio-Economic Impacts of Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining in Developing Countries (pp. 37‒51). Swets Publishers.Google Scholar
Homer-Dixon, T. & Blitt, J. (1998). Ecoviolence: Links Among Environment, Population and Security. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.Google Scholar
InSight Crime. Venezuela Investigative Unit. (2021, July 13). Venezuela’s Indigenous Warao Press-Ganged into Guyana’s Illegal Gold Mines. https://insightcrime.org/news/Venezuela-warao-indigenous-guyana-illegal-gold-mines/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs. (2021, November 12). Impacts of Gold Mining on Wapichan Wiizi. www.iwgia.org/en/guyana/4563-impacts-of-gold-mining-on-Wapichan-wiizi.html. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Kaieteur News. (2021). Marudi residents’ protest … Rescind mining agreement and apologise to Indigenous People – Caribbean Human Rights lawyer. (2021, November 21). https://www.kaieteurnewsonline.com/2021/11/30/rescind-mining-agreement-and-apologise-to-indigenous-people-caribbean-human-rights-lawyer/. Accessed March 23, 2023.Google Scholar
Kurtz, L. (2021, June 4). Uncovering the Four-Volume Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace, and Conflict. Mason Korea: George Mason University. https://masonkorea.gmu.edu/articles/16089. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Lammouchi, E. (2017, March 21). Eco-violence: The Genocide of Germination. English Literature of the Long Eighteenth Century (1660‒1837) Gone Global. https://english102literaturesurvey.wordpress.com/2017/03/21/eco-violence-the-genocide-of-germination/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Launius, S. & Boyce, G. (2021) More than metaphor: settler colonialism, frontier logic, and the continuities of racialized dispossession in a southwest U.S. city. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 111(1), 157‒174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lazenby, H. (2021, May 31). Goldsource seeks to chart scalable development of Eagle Mountain. Mining.com. https://www.mining.com/goldsource-seeks-to-chart-Scalable-development-of-eagle-mountain/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Lindsay, B. (2022, September 18). Fighting Guyana’s Mental Health Crisis. The Borgen Project. https://borgenproject.org/guyanas-mental-health-crisis/. Accessed May 18, 2023.Google Scholar
Le Billon, P. (2001). The political ecology of war: natural resources and armed conflicts, Political Geography, 20(5), 561–584.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manley, R. (1979). Guyana Emergent: The Post Independence Struggle for Nondependent Development. G. K. Hall.Google Scholar
Mohammed, F. (2015, June 3). Guyana: mental illness, witchcraft, and the highest suicide rate in the world. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/jun/03/guyana-mental-illness-witchcraft-and-the-highest-suicide-rate-in-the-world. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Omrow, D. (2017). Abyssal Ideology and the Amerindians of Guyana: an eco-crimes analysis of power, discourse and cognitive injustice. Doctoral Dissertation, York University.Google Scholar
Osborne, A. & Ramlagan, K. (2020, November 17). Humanizing Gender Dynamics within Guyana’s ASGM Sub-Sector. PlanetGOLD. https://www.planetgold.org/humanizing-gender-dynamics-within-guyanas-asgm-sub-sector. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Rainforest Foundation. (2022, May 16). A Push to Enshrine Greater Rights for Guyana’s Indigenous Peoples. https://rainforestfoundation.org/greater-rights-for-guyanas-indigenous-peoples/. Accessed March 22, 2023.Google Scholar
Ramcharan, R. (2007). The National Security of Guyana: A Study in Foreign Policy. Edwin Mellen Pr.Google Scholar
Rawlins, W. & Bishop, M. (2018, June 29). Trying To Stop Suicide: Guyana Aims To Bring Down Its High Rate. National Public Radio. https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2018/06/29/622615518/trying-to-stop-suicide-guyana-aims-to-bring-down-its-high-rate. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
Rustad, S., Ostby, G. & Nordas, R. (2016). Artisanal mining, conflict, and sexual violence in Eastern DRC. The Extractive Industry and Society, 3(2), 475‒484.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scott, J. (2014). Encyclopaedia of Gender and Mining: Key Initiatives, Best Practices and Actors. Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit.Google Scholar
Shaw, C., Stuart, J., Thomas, T. & Kolves, K.. (2022). Suicidal behaviour and ideation in Guyana: a systematic literature review. The Lancet, 11(1), 1‒24.Google ScholarPubMed
Stabroek News (2022, August 30). GGMC must be held accountable for mining devastation, not junior officers – GHRA. https://www.stabroeknews.com/2022/08/30/news/guyana/ggmc-must-be-held-accountable-for-mining-devastation-not-junior-officers-ghra. Accessed March 22, 2023.Google Scholar
Sutherland, L. (2021, December 22). Secrecy shrouds new gold mining deal in Guyana’s Marudi mountains. Mongabay. https://news.mongabay.com/2021/12/Secrecy-shrouds-New-gold-mining-deal-in-guyanas-marudi-mountains/. Accessed May 18, 2024.Google Scholar
The Regional Protection Sector. (2021). National Roundtables of Consultation with Venezuelan Indigenous Peoples 2021: Guyana. The Regional Protection Sector.Google Scholar
UNDP. (2020). Socio-economic Impact Assessment of COVID-19 on Households in Guyana. United Nations Development Programme.Google Scholar
UNHCR. (2021, November 26). UNHCR concerned about difficult conditions of indigenous Venezuelans in Guyana. https://www.unhcr.org/news//briefing/2021/11/61a0be914/unhcr-concerned-difficult-conditions-indigenous-venezuelans-guyana.html. Accessed March 22, 2023.Google Scholar
U.S. Embassy ‒ Georgetown. (2022). Trafficking in Persons Report. Department of State, United States of America.Google Scholar
Kapé Kapé. (2021, June 28). Warao indigenous people are subjected to labor exploitation in Guyana. https://kape-kape.org/2021/06/28/indigenas-warao-son-sometidos-a-explotacion-laboral-en-guyana/. Accessed March 23, 2023.Google Scholar
Watson, K. & Westerman, K. (2021). Gender in Guyan’s Artisanal, Small-Scale Gold Mining (ASGM) Sector. Guyana.Google Scholar
Watson, L., Hurtado-Gonzales, J., Chin, C. & Persaud, J. (2020). Survey of methylmercury exposures and risk factors among Indigenous communities in Guyana, South America. Journal of Health & Pollution, 10(26), 1‒24.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Watson, C. & Chin, C. (2018). A Rapid Risk Assessment on Mercury Exposure and Accumulation in Four Indigenous Communities in the Southern Rupununi Region, Guyana. GGMC.Google Scholar
Yadav, G., Egoume-Bossogo, P., Weisman, E. & Jones, D. (2001). Guyana: Statistical Annex. International Monetary Fund.Google Scholar