Promise engineering: Investment and its conflicting anticipations in the French mining revival

Julien Merlin (), Brice Laurent () and Yann Gunzburger ()
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Julien Merlin: PACTE - Pacte, Laboratoire de sciences sociales - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - UGA - Université Grenoble Alpes - IEPG - Sciences Po Grenoble-UGA - Institut d'études politiques de Grenoble - UGA - Université Grenoble Alpes
Brice Laurent: Mines Paris - PSL (École nationale supérieure des mines de Paris) - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres
Yann Gunzburger: ENSMN - Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Nancy - IMT - Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] - UL - Université de Lorraine

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Abstract: This paper analyses promises made by companies to various publics, including global investors, national public administrative bodies, and local populations. We speak of 'promise engineering' to describe both the integration of the making of promises in mining exploration operations, and the attempted articulation of promises made to different publics with different concerns. We focus on the French 'mining revival', which prompted exploration projects that became controversial, and integrated a government-led approach meant to introduce an objective of 'responsibility' in mining operations. Mining junior companies attempted to make promises that were both technical and social, while responsibility proved consistent with the crucial role of financial investment. We show that promise engineering offers an analytical lens for studying anticipation practices in industrial projects and the opposition these projects face.

Keywords: mining exploration; financial investment; speculation; anticipation; responsibility; promise engineering; controversies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-06-18
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Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://minesparis-psl.hal.science/hal-03265197v1
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Published in Economy and Society, 2021, pp.1-28. ⟨10.1080/03085147.2021.1903772⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-03265197

DOI: 10.1080/03085147.2021.1903772

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