Resisting extractivism in the Sperrins: Countermapping and making relatives for post-extractive futures

As the extractive frontier expands out into peripheralised parts of Europe, branded as critical for the green transition, communities are resisting. Research on resistance to this extractivism has ballooned in recent years. I build on feminist and decolonial scholarship which has conceptually widened extractivism from a physical removal of resources to be understood as a logic, worldview, a way of relating in the world rooted in coloniality and about relations of power. This thesis contributes to these debates around grassroots resistance to extractivism by asking in what ways are communities resisting extractive logics in the Sperrin Mountains? Here in County Tyrone, North of Ireland communities have been resisting gold mining for almost ten years. There remains a large research gap in how communities resist extractivism in Ireland and particularly the North of Ireland. I use a mix of activist, creative and participatory methodologies to challenge academic extractivism. I detail how extractive logics are manifesting in the Sperrins as colonial constructions of place, embodied and emotional slow violence and through social engineering. I argue that in challenging these extractive logics, the resistance movement is “Making Relatives” and transforming relations with the human and more-than-human world. This is characterised in three ways, firstly through building relations within the campaign based on care and commoning, secondly, through relations with the more-than-human and thirdly by building relations with other translocal frontline communities. This is significant for understanding ways to challenge oppressive systems that underlie extractivism and work towards post-extractive futures. I contribute to debates around the ontological question of extractivism and how we build alternative life-worlds.

Funder

Irish Research Council

Publisher

University of Galway

Rights

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

cbn

Collections

University of Galway Theses (PhD Theses)