Strangers in their own land: Impacts of mining felt acutely by an original population

Socio-environmental injustice is vexing wherever mining corporations originating from so-called advanced economies extract minerals to satisfy global demand. Asymmetries arise between original populations in remote places and these corporations, as backed by military and civilian representatives of sovereign governments. Our aim is to elevate local voices on the impacts of mining, identifying and distinguishing the most acute impacts and opening them to criticism. Our study is set on New Guinea, in the ancestral territory of the Mimika People, speakers of Akwere Kamoro . A south-north corridor through that territory affords a mining corporation access from the sea to mineral deposits they are extracting in a neighbouring, mountainous territory. To critique the mining activities and their impacts we analyse qualitative data obtained from members of the Mimika People who recount their experiences and emotions about the mining corporation's 60-year presence. We find that the mining has brought changes in longevity and modernity (e.g., epitomised in knowledge and skills, goods, services, amenities and infrastructure) which the Mimika People see as positive. Conversely, they have endured far greater negative impacts. These impacts are territorial, demographic, ethnonymic and culturally genocidal in nature. They include upheaval and disemplacement, because of being in the way of the mining and through being greatly outnumbered in what they continue to regard as their own land. The Mimika People now feel like strangers to that land, in the sense of their surroundings changing so thoroughly that it is like having unwillingly resettled in a different place. Further sources of discontentment pertain to their identity and severalty as Mimika People, and their lifeways, autonomy and sense-making capability. By bringing out how acutely these impacts are felt, our study demonstrates that socio-environmental justice relates to physical and emotional circumstances, including discontentment from feeling unjustly treated. Our findings have policy implications. Hearing the perspectives of original populations brings economic, legal, ethical and moral benefits. Giving a voice to the otherwise unseen, unheard and unconsidered can avoid or mitigate wrongs from decisions and actions of far more powerful others. Through that voice, these others can be held accountable for specific consequences and externalities of corporate mining activities. • Impacts of mining are considered from the perspective of an original people in a mining district on New Guinea. • Impacts felt acutely respecting themselves and their lands relate to territory, demography, ethnonym and cultural survival. • Impacts not just physical or affecting livelihoods: they transform original peoples into strangers, as if living elsewhere. • Becoming strangers represented in damage to cultural, spiritual, emotional, socially reproducing and other abstract things. • Corporations oblivious to these impacts, less prepared to mitigate or avoid them, or bear financial or emotional costs.