Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/273776 
Year of Publication: 
2021
Series/Report no.: 
Asia-Pacific Environment Monograph No. 15
Publisher: 
Australian National University Press, Acton, Australia
Abstract: 
Standing on the broken ground of resource extraction settings, the state is sometimes like a chimera: its appearance and intentions are misleading and, for some actors, it is unknowable and incomprehensible. It may be easily mistaken for someone or something else, like a mining company, for example. With rich ethnographic material, this volume tackles critical questions about the nature of contemporary states, studied from the perspective of resource extraction projects in Papua New Guinea, Australia and beyond. It brings together a sustained focus on the unstable and often dialectical relationship between the presence and the absence of the state in the context of resource extraction. Across the chapters, contributors discuss cases of proposed mining ventures, existing large-scale mining operations and the extraction of natural gas. Together, they illustrate how the concept of absent presence can be brought to life and how it can enhance our understanding of the state as well as relations and processes forming in extractive contexts, thus providing a novel contribution to the anthropology of the state and the anthropology of extraction.
Subjects: 
Public administration
Regional government policies
Environmental economics
Mining industry
Construction & heavy industry
Resource Extraction
State
Absent Presence
Papua New Guinea
Australia
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
ISBN: 
978-1-76046-449-3
Creative Commons License: 
cc-by-nc-nd Logo
Document Type: 
Book
Document Version: 
Published Version
Appears in Collections:

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.