Mineral Extraction, Insecurity, and Conflict

Date & Time
Jun 18, 2026 | 11.00 - 12.30

Participants
Chair: Lauren Risi, Stimson Center (United States)
Päivi Lujala, Geography Research Unit, University of Oulu (Finland)
Ginno Martinez, University of Ottawa (Peru)
Laura Kilbury, University of Massachusetts Boston (United States)
Marta Furlan (Italy)

This panel examines the complex and often contested relationship between the rising demand for critical and “green” minerals and conflict dynamics. As demand accelerates, extraction processes are increasingly intersecting with local socio-environmental systems, governance structures, and community rights, raising critical questions for environmental peacebuilding. Bringing together diverse methodological and regional perspectives, the panel explores how mineral extraction can generate, transform, or intensify conflict, as well as the conditions under which cooperation may be challenging. It highlights the importance of governance frameworks, community engagement, and competing environmental narratives in shaping outcomes. Overall, the panel contributes to a deeper understanding of how mineral extraction often produces unintended and potentially overlooked social and political consequences, and what this means for building more equitable and sustainable pathways forward.

Governing Lithium, Fracturing Territory: The Failure of Environmental Cooperation in the Salar de Atacama, in Northern Chile

Ginno Martinez, University of Ottawa (Peru)

Extraction as Inheritance: Longue Durée, Militarized Mineral Access, and State Choice in the Sahel

Laura Kilbury, University of Massachusetts-Boston (United States)

Green Minerals and Armed Conflict

Päivi Lujala, Geography Research Unit, University of Oulu (Finland)

'In the Name of “White Gold”, People in the Salar are Bleeding’: Lithium Mining and Conflict in the Indigenous Territories of Argentina’s Puna

Marta Furlan, Free the Slaves (Italy)