By Anabel Marin and Santiago Cunial
The global race for minerals is accelerating. Minerals like lithium, copper, and nickel are increasingly treated as the “new oil” of the energy transition and other global agendas. From critical mineral alliances to supply chain pacts, consumer countries are seeking “secure and sustainable” flows of these resources.
But in mining territories, “sustainable” is too often an empty promise. Recent evidence strongly suggests that without legitimacy, even the most technically advanced projects face roadblocks, reversals, or outright cancellation. Yet legitimacy cannot be built through communication campaigns, tokenistic participation, or compensation alone; it requires transforming how decisions are made and how projects are designed from the ground up.
Continue reading “Legitimacy at the Core: Transformative Green Industrial Policy for a Just Mineral Extraction”
