| Abstrakt: |
Since the 2000s, Brazil has witnessed a surge in socio-environmental conflicts fueled by the expanding control of transnational companies over the mineral extraction frontier. To mitigate the potential damage to their corporate image and shareholder value caused by socio-environmental conflicts, mining companies have resorted to using “corporate social technologies” in the affected territories. These practices aim to “pacify” the surrounding communities through “social risk and cost” management policies, which involve co-opting leaders of popular movements, through practices of assistentialism, and employing mitigation policies to establish and maintain the so-called “social license to operate”. This approach aims to prevent affected communities from organizing effective resistance to mining projects. This paper analyzes some specific cases of transnational mining in Brazil, focusing on how corporate social responsibility policies and technological projects operate as tools of conflict management within the framework of neoliberal governance. The research method consists of a case study and a literature review. Our findings have revealed the emergence of corporate social technologies designed to manage conflicts by controlling the surrounding communities. These practices aim to deflect social and environmental criticism while ensuring the continuation of the processes of mineral spoliation, effectively disrupting the organization of resistance by prioritizing the logic of preventing and/or pacifying the conflict. |
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