Artisanal mining's democratizing directions and deviations

Abstract

This concluding chapter explores both the positive and negative sides of artisanal miners' transformative role in mineralization, asking when and why democratic tendencies thrive as opposed to where autocratic tendencies are likely to come to the fore. Defining democratization as a process of occupational and residential community formation around the principles of freedom of movement, egalitarian opportunity and local self-govenance.The chapter's analysis outlines the intricate interconnections between economic, political and social change embedded in Tanzanian artisanal mining's occupational formation, and then relates it to other parts of mining Africa through the construction of a typology of African mining complexes