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Making Mining Good: Tracing the Semiotics of Justification in Mineral Exploration and Mining

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Title: Making Mining Good: Tracing the Semiotics of Justification in Mineral Exploration and Mining
Authors: Olofsson, Tobias
Contributors: Lund University, Faculty of Social Sciences, Departments of Administrative, Economic and Social Sciences, Department of Sociology, Lunds universitet, Samhällsvetenskapliga fakulteten, Samhällsvetenskapliga institutioner och centrumbildningar, Sociologiska institutionen, Originator
Source: Valuation Studies. 12(1):119-142
Subject Terms: Social Sciences, Social and Economic Geography, Economic Geography, Samhällsvetenskap, Social och ekonomisk geografi, Ekonomisk geografi
Description: What does it mean for a business or industry to be and do good? And who can count themselves within the good economy? This article investigates the justification of goodness in mineral exploration and mining and uses the entwinement between value creation and destruction characteristic of mining to trouble notions of goodness in impactful industries. Based on analyses of indepth interviews, ethnographic fieldnotes, and archival materials, the article follows the ways in which mining industry actors seek to negotiate contradictions between creation and destruction; and does so while using an innovative conceptual framework based in Peircean semiotics to open up justification for analysis of the underlying semiotic machinery that actors rely on to signify goodness. Mobilizing this conceptual toolkit, the article investigates how miners and explorers emphasize certain values, or signs, over others and how values are used to assert that some mines and miners do more good than others.
Access URL: https://doi.org/10.3384/VS.2001-5992.2025.12.1.119-142
Database: SwePub
Description
Abstract:What does it mean for a business or industry to be and do good? And who can count themselves within the good economy? This article investigates the justification of goodness in mineral exploration and mining and uses the entwinement between value creation and destruction characteristic of mining to trouble notions of goodness in impactful industries. Based on analyses of indepth interviews, ethnographic fieldnotes, and archival materials, the article follows the ways in which mining industry actors seek to negotiate contradictions between creation and destruction; and does so while using an innovative conceptual framework based in Peircean semiotics to open up justification for analysis of the underlying semiotic machinery that actors rely on to signify goodness. Mobilizing this conceptual toolkit, the article investigates how miners and explorers emphasize certain values, or signs, over others and how values are used to assert that some mines and miners do more good than others.
ISSN:20015992
DOI:10.3384/VS.2001-5992.2025.12.1.119-142