Natural Resource Conflicts as a Struggle for Space: The Case of Mining in Tanzania

Natural resource extraction in Africa has been characterised by conflicts between large scale and small scale miners on the one hand and large scale miners and the communities on the other. In some countries such as Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola, Mozambique, Sierra Leone and Liberia, natural resources have bred political instability and civil wars. A great deal of academic discourse on resource conflicts in Africa focuses on greed, corruption, political struggles for state capture and control over resources, economic liberalisation policies for attracting foreign investors and creating conducive climate for them to invest their capital in natural resource extraction, and foreign forces. While recognising the significance of the above approaches in explaining resource conflicts in Africa, this paper aims at explaining resource conflicts as a struggle for space between the communities, artisanal and small scale miners and large scale foreign mining corporations. Using secondary sources, we argue that some natural resource extraction conflicts in Africa can well be understood if we approach them as a struggle for space. This however, does not mean that current approaches are rendered useless. It rather compliments current approaches.