Transnational Law and Local Struggles: Mining, Communities and the World Bank(Hart Monographs in Transnational and International Law)

The global spread of transnational mining investment, which has been taking place since the 1990s, has led to often volatile conflicts with local communities. This book examines the regulation of these conflicts through national, transnational and local legal processes. In doing so, it examines how legal authority is being redistributed among public and private actors, as well as national and transnational actors, as a result of globalizing forces. The book presents a case study concerning the negotiation of land transfer and resettlement between a transnational mining enterprise and indigenous peasants in the Andes of Peru. The case study is used to explore the intensely local dynamics involved in negotiations between corporate and community representatives and the role played by legal ordering in these relations. In particular, the book examines the operation of a transnational legal regime managed by the World Bank to remedy the social and environmental impacts of projects which receive Bank assistance. The book explores the nature and character of the World Bank regime and the multiple consequences of this projection of transnational law into a local dispute.

Table of Contents:
1 Understanding Regulation and Legitimation: The Challenges for Transnational Law 2 The Selective Absence of the State: Delegating Responsibility for Mining and Community Conflicts 3 Transnational Law-making in a Global Policy Arena: Addressing Mining and Community Conflicts 4 The World Bank Safeguard Policy Regime: A Globalising Regulatory Model 5 Communities and Corporations 6 Case Study: Antamina in San Marcos 7 Assessing the World Bank Safeguard Policy 8 Transnational Law and Democratic Governance

About the Author :
David Szablowski is Assistant Professor of Law and Society at York University in Toronto, Canada.

Review :
...Szablowski's work adds a valuable perspective to the literature on the World Bank, specifically deciphering how the Bank operates to legitimize its actions through social specialists and participatory models and questioning its ultimate effect...His questioning of the nature of legitimacy, how it is achieved and the status of the World Bank achieving it on the ground enhances the understanding of one of the most important issues applicable to all international organizations, but facing the World Bank in particular. Theoretically and empirically, this book offers a provocative and rich discussion on the intersection between transnational law and local struggles that emerge in a transnational mining project in the global south…[Szablowski's] contribution is to go beyond a state-centered view and to retain a concern for accountability, legitimacy, and justice. As such, this book is relevant not only to sociolegal scholars, but also to development scholars and social scientists involved in the process of mediation. Whether one be from the mining industry,…or a member of an NGO working with local communities affected by mining activities, a consultant or an academic from whatever disciplines specialised on these issues, this volume is a necessary read. It would be difficult to imagine a more timely book…For those interested in the spread of transnational mining investment globally and its implications for local communities – whether practitioners or researchers - this volume is a must.