Governing the ground: critical raw materials policy, multi-level conflict and populist mobilizations in Western Europe

Introduction The Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA, Regulation EU 2024/1252) has elevated mineral extraction within European governance, creating tensions between supranational supply-security objectives and domestic political, territorial, and environmental interests. This article examines the political conditions under which EU governments implement, resist, or selectively reframe CRMA mandates. Methods The study employs a structured focused comparison of Spain, Portugal, Germany, and Sweden, combined with process-tracing logic and explicit causal process observations. Documentary evidence is selected, coded, and triangulated to evaluate coalition dependency, populist strategic ambiguity, and civil-society escalation, distinguishing descriptive associations from causal support. Results Coalition dependency receives partial support and is reformulated by the Spanish case from an expected hard veto to soft political ambivalence or constrained endorsement. Populist strategic ambiguity receives mixed support because differentiated positions across institutional levels do not independently establish strategic intent or electoral motivation. Civil-society escalation is observed most clearly in Portugal at the stage of EU-level legal escalation, while subsequent regulatory feedback remains unobserved. The comparison also identifies an extraction-transition tension that cannot automatically be interpreted as an ideological contradiction. State ownership in Sweden emerges as a potentially relevant conditioning factor, rather than an established causal effect. Discussion The findings refine multi-level governance explanations by distinguishing hard vetoes from soft political constraints, differentiated positioning from demonstrated strategic ambiguity, and supranational escalation from regulatory feedback. Opposition to particular extraction projects may coexist coherently with support for renewable-energy transitions where credible alternative material-supply strategies or project-specific environmental and social concerns are articulated. Further comparative research is required to evaluate the mechanisms and the potential influence of ownership structures.