Local Governance and Labor Organizations on Artisanal Gold Mining Sites in Burkina Faso

Lala Safiatou Ouedraogo and Patrick Mundler
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Lala Safiatou Ouedraogo: Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences, Department of Agri-Food Economics and Consumer Sciences, Université Laval, Pavillon Paul-Comtois, 2425 Rue de l’Agriculture, QC G1V 0A6, Canada
Patrick Mundler: Faculty of Agriculture and Food Sciences, Department of Agri-Food Economics and Consumer Sciences, Université Laval, Pavillon Paul-Comtois, 2425 Rue de l’Agriculture, QC G1V 0A6, Canada

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 3, 1-21

Abstract: This paper based on the institutional analysis and development framework (IAD) is to discuss the local governance and labor organizations on artisanal gold mining camps in Burkina Faso; a West African country that in recent years has been increasingly exploiting its gold reserves. Field data were collected from three sites in the villages of Diosso, Siguinoguin and Zincko in accordance with the purposive sampling. One major finding gleaned from the on-site research is that forms of governance vary along a continuum from flexible (enforced by a joint powers: artisanal miners’ union, customary authorities and landowners) to rigid (enforced by landowner). Another finding is that the type of relationship between indigenous communities and miners depend on the importance of the authocthony of the artisanal miners. Indeed, they are harmonious in Zincko, where miners originate from the village, whereas they are tense in Siguinoguin, which is populated by migrants. Eventually, this paper relies on the French school of proximity to enrich the definitions given to the attributes of the physical world and the attributes of the community highlighted by Ostrom’s theory as geographical proximity fails to detail forms of relational proximity that clearly structure the way governance is organized on the mining camps.

Keywords: community-based management; common-pool resource; artisanal gold mining; institutional analysis development framework (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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