Engaging Citizens to Address Company-Community Conflict in Mines

Policy Context

Mining is a major source of employment, exports, and tax revenues for many countries in Africa (12 of the top 25 most mining-dependent countries are in Africa, according to the Mining Contribution Index (MCI)). At the same time, mining areas are often sites of protests, riots, and other forms of social conflict. For example, between 2010 and 2013, South African police recorded over 10,000 crowd incidents near commercial mining sites. The most common explanation for the protests is that mining leads to environmental degradation, crime, or resettlement — grievances which can erupt into costly social conflict if unaddressed.

However, governments often lack the capacity or desire to monitor the mining industry, even if regulations are on the books. Instead, civil society groups in South Africa have tried to fill this enforcement gap, but compiling evidence on thousands of mines spread across every province far exceeds their capacity.

Study Design

Researchers are assessing whether a mobile platform can help citizens and civil society uncover and communicate grievances in South Africa’s mining communities. The platform enables citizens to freely and anonymously submit complaints related to mining via SMS or voice in their preferred language and then disseminates that information to civil society and companies.

Rather than assessing the impact of the mobile platform, the goal of this pilot was to provide a proof-of-concept of this technology in South Africa and identify hurdles in implementing it. To do so, the researchers carried out three main activities: (1) focus groups and interviews with South Africans to inform the development of the platform, (2) pilot implementation of the platform and efforts to recruit users onto the platform, and (3) exploratory pilot surveys of citizens.

Results and Policy Lessons

During the five months that the platform was live, the researchers received 415 grievances, 333 of which were verified by the implementing partner, Oxfam South Africa. Most grievances (40%) were related to employment issues, 18% to blasting (exploding surface rocks to access minerals underneath), 14% to air pollution, and 11% to water (but issues around water received the highest urgency score, 3.8 out of 5). The researchers compiled the grievances into 14 reports, which were sent to the mining companies. By the end of the pilot, no issues were resolved by the companies.

Given these findings, the researchers do not expect to implement a full-scale RCT to study the grievance platform, given the high costs but relatively low use and resolution rates: only 333 grievances were reported by citizens, and none were resolved by companies.