A vote to derail extraction: popular consultation and resource sovereignty in Tolima, Colombia

Abstract

In July 2013, a consulta popular (referendum) was organised by municipal authorities in Tolima, Colombia, to judge public opinion on the establishment of activities by an international mining conglomerate ie the Colosa (the Giant) gold mine. In this article study is made of the referendum, and emphasis given to its linkages with wider regional, national and Latin American efforts to anticipate damage and derail projects for resource extraction. Recognising the techniques and networks, and similar expressions of identity and territoriality, expressed in other campaigns against extraction, resource sovereignty is suggested as an approach to interpret the motivations for and dynamics of recent popular consultations.