When miners become “foreigners”: Competing categorizations within gold mining spaces in Guinea

Using a boundary work approach, the paper shows how CSR interventions symbolically transpose the spatial concession border into symbolic and social boundaries among the artisanal mineworkers. CSR discourses and interventions transform “trespassers” into “foreigners”, as opposed to “natives”, who are often viewed as “traditional sedentary workers” by the mining company. In doing this, CSR programs reinforce and standardize autochthony-based relations, and extend autochthony boundaries in all segments of the gold mining socio-technical system. The attachment of these initially separated categories creates an idealized figure of “traditional” artisanal mining, while also stigmatizing the itinerant artisanal miners. As a consequence, I will discuss the emergence of conflict situations regarding access to mining spaces and resources within the surrounding villages.