2025/11/06 by Rafael Hernández Westpfahl · 1 voice
Engineering · Social Sciences · #Environmental law and policy #Mining and Resource Management #Politics and Society in Latin America
paper · doi:10.2458/jpe.8349
openalex publication_date 2025/11/06 · openalex created_date 2025/11/07 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
This is an accepted article with a DOI pre-assigned that is not yet published.The role of the state in social participation related to extractive projects in Latin America is a continuously relevant topic for Political Ecology, as the state intervenes and shapes the relationship between society and nature. Shortcomings have often been explained by an extractivist bias of the state. Even self-described post-neoliberal governments of the so-called ‘Pink Tide’ relied on the extractive sectors to generate public rents during a period of high-priced commodities. However, it is puzzling that the exclusion of Indigenous people in Mexico persists during the 4th Transformation (2018-2024), despite the state treasury being far less dependent on the mining sector, and the legal framework for FPIC having been reformed by the progressive factions of the state. So far, strategic relational approaches (SRA) to the state have only rarely found their way into political-ecological research, even though they provide a nuanced analysis of the state and state-society relations that adds further insights to unravel this puzzle. Examining the consultation process for the renewal of the EIA of the San José mining project, this paper reveals state selectivities in mining regulations that hinder genuine Indigenous participation. While regulations are intended to empower Indigenous communities, the contradicting agendas of state actors and bureaucratic constraints undermine these efforts, reflecting broader challenges of post-neoliberal state transformation in Latin America. This case contributes to the literature on state-society relations by illustrating the tensions between progressive mining policies and its exclusive and asymmetrical implementation.