BLOOD OF EXTRACTION
BLOOD OF EXTRACTION
CANADIAN IMPERIALISM IN LATIN AMERICA
TODD GORDON & JEFFERY R. WEBBER
FERNWOOD PUBLISHING
HALIFAX & WINNIPEG
Copyright © 2016 Todd Gordon and Jeffery R. Webber
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any means without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
Editing: Candida Hadley
Cover design: John van der Woude
Printed and bound in Canada
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Published by Fernwood Publishing
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This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Fernwood Publishing Company Limited gratefully acknowledges the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund, the Manitoba Department of Culture, Heritage and Tourism under the Manitoba Publishers Marketing Assistance Program and the Province of Manitoba, through the Book Publishing Tax Credit, for our publishing program. We are pleased to work in partnership with the Province of Nova Scotia to develop and promote our creative industries for the benefit of all Nova Scotians. We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $153 million to bring the arts to Canadians throughout the country.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Gordon, Todd, 1973-, author
Blood of extraction : Canadian imperialism in Latin
America / Todd Gordon and Jeffery R. Webber.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Issued in print and electronic formats.
ISBN 978-1-55266-830-6 (paperback).--ISBN 978-1-55266-845-0 (epub).--ISBN 978-1-55266-846-7 (kindle)
1. Mineral industries--Political aspects--Latin America. 2. Mineral industries--Social aspects--Latin America. 3. Mineral industries--Environmental aspects--Latin America. 4. Mining corporations--Latin America. 5. Mining corporations--Canada. 6. Investments, Canadian--Latin America. 7. Economic development-- Latin America. 8. Imperialism. 9. Canada--Foreign economic relations--Latin America. 10. Latin America--Foreign economic relations--Canada. I. Webber, Jeffery R., 1977-, author II. Title.
HD9506.L292G67 2016 338.2098 C2016-903185-3 C2016-903186-1
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
PART I INTRODUCTION
1. VELVET GLOVES AND IRON FISTS
Imperialism without Colonies
Ecology and Racism
Neoliberalism
The Expansion of Canadian Capital
Development Aid
Corporate Social Responsibility
Extractive Commodities and Militarized Neoliberalism
Structure of the Book
PART II CENTRAL AMERICA
2. AUTHORITARIAN CAPITALISM: THE NEW NORMAL IN HONDURAS
Historical Foundations
Cold War Counterinsurgency
Neoliberal Pacification
Violent Insecurity
The Zelaya Interregnum
Ottawa and the Democratic Coup
The Tegucigalpa-San José Accord
Sanitizing State Violence
Canada on Human Rights
Ethnographies of Opposition
Canadian Capital in Honduras
The Economics of Canada’s Strategic Engagement
Free Trade Agreement
Conclusion
3. MINING IN THE WAKE OF GENOCIDE: CANADIAN CORPORATIONS IN TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY GUATEMALA
Historical Portrait
Canada and the Re-Emergence of Mining in Guatemala
Dialectics of Resistance and Militarization
Conclusion
4. DISPOSSESSION AND SECURITY IN CENTRAL AMERICA
El Salvador
Costa Rica
Nicaragua
Panama
Towards a Regional Security Agenda
Conclusion
PART III THE ANDES
5. CANADA’S EVIL HOUR IN COLOMBIA
Historical Backdrop
Special Violence of Extraction
Canadian Investments and Grassroots Resistance
Janus-Faced Free Trade
Development Aid as Trojan Horse
Conclusion
6. AGONIES OF MINERAL DEPENDENCY IN PERU
Mining Boom
Water Stress
Historical Backdrop: Race, Class, Geography, Terror
Fujimori and Authoritarian Neoliberal Rule
Continuities in Post-Fujimori Peru
Canadian Mining Conflicts: The Cases of Tambogrande and Ancash
Violence and Eco-Destruction beyond Tambogrande and Ancash
Humala’s False Promise
Candente Copper and Cañariaco Norte
Canadian Mineral Diplomacy
Conclusion
7. TAPPING THE VEINS OF ECUADOR
The Shifting Political Winds of the Correa Government
Birth Pains of the Neoliberal Mining Order in Ecuador
The Embassy Makes its Move
Mining Mandate
The New Mining Law
The Sanctity of Foreign Investments
The Uses of Aid
Conclusion
8. VENEZUELA’S THREAT OF A GOOD EXAMPLE
Canadian Capital in Venezuela
Who Was Chávez?
Charges of Autocracy, Clientelism, and Decay
Canada and the Authoritarian Drumbeat
Canadian Media and Venezuela
Canada’s Engagement with Post-Chávez Venezuela
Conclusion
9. AN EXERCISE IN CYNICISM: “DEMOCRACY” AND “SECURITY” IN THE ANDES
Security Policy
Conclusion
PART IV CONCLUSION
10. EXPANSION CONTINUES, RESISTANCE PERSISTS
Geographies of Canadian Capital
Human Rights and Ecology
NOTES
INDEX
Todd Gordon dedicates this book to his mother, Barbara Gordon
Jeffery R. Webber dedicates this book to his parents, Roger and Elaine
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In the course of researching and writing this book we relied on an expansive network of friends, family, activists, journalists, and scholars. Without this collective infrastructure, Blood of Extraction would have been impossible.
In Canada, we presented early iterations of our research at Ideas Left Out, as well as consecutive Historical Materialism conferences in Toronto. Thanks to Paul Kellogg and Abbie Bakan for their organizational efforts in arranging our presentation in the former venue, and to the Toronto organizing team of Historical Materialism for their support in the latter forum. David McNally, Greg Albo, and Henry Veltmeyer shared their expertise and offered us crucial support at various stages of the research process. Geoff McCormack shared data on domestic Canadian profit rates. Dawn Paley read our manuscript closely, and
made available to us her first-hand knowledge of Mexico, Central America, and Colombia. Jennifer Moore of Mining Watch provided us with important information on mining throughout Latin America generally, as well as specific contacts and ideas for our research on Ecuador. Kevin Thomas from the Maquila Solidarity Network in Toronto offered his knowledge of Canadian operations in the Honduran garment sector. Todd benefited greatly from Spanish lessons and regular conversations with our friend and comrade Carlos Torchia, a lifelong participant in the struggle for a better world. Carlos generously shared his knowledge of, and passion for, Latin American history and politics. Melisa Breton and Caren Weisbart offered their exceptional translation and transcription skills for many of our field interviews in the Guatemalan case. Jeffery also relied on his parents Roger and Elaine Webber, to whom he dedicates this book, as well as his sisters Elizabeth, Ruth, and Theresa. Olga Shustyk, Gerry Dykstra, and Rebecca Dykstra were consistently supportive.
In the United States, Greg Grandin and Noam Chomsky demonstrated yet again their selfless solidarity with and support for dissident research projects such as ours, as did Sinclair Thomson, Charlie Post, and Forrest Hylton. Dana Frank showed enthusiasm for our research and provided us with contact information and ideas for our research trips to Honduras. Gerardo Renique, an expert on Peru, provided us with leads and resources on the mining sector in that country. Bhaskar Sunkara offered space in the pages of Jacobin for some of our early, exploratory writings on Honduras and the rest of Central America, and enthusiastically agreed to read our manuscript.
In Honduras, Karen Spring went above and beyond reasonable expectations in her assistance to our research, and fed us a steady stream of insights on the intricacies of Honduran politics. Her intimate knowledge of the country’s social movements opened up new worlds that would otherwise have remained outside our reach.
In Guatemala, Grahame Russell of Rights Action, a leading solidarity organization working with communities resisting Canadian extractive projects in Central America, shared with us his intimate knowledge of the country, including its scars from centuries of imperialism, and introduced us to many of the heroic activists in the country who continue to fight, often at great personal cost, for social justice.
In Ecuador, Michelle Báez, Alejandra Santillana Ortíz, and William Sacher were instrumental in supporting our investigations and helping us understand the complexities of the country’s politics and economics. Michelle and Alejandra helped us to understand the shifting balance of forces between complex socio-political configurations and ideological currents, and there are few people who understand mining in Ecuador better than William.
In Venezuela, many of the interviews conducted for this book were carried out together with Susan Spronk. Many thanks to Susan for her friendship and political acumen during those investigations. Atenea Jiménez Lemon and William Gudiño helped us make connections and better understand the Venezuelan conjuncture.
In London (U.K.) we presented parts of our preliminary research in the Historical Materialism and World Development working group. Particularly beneficial were the comments we received from Ben Selwyn, Liam Campling, Satoshi Miyamura, and Jonathan Pattenden.
This book was written with support from the Social Sciences and Human Research Council.
Our heartfelt appreciation to all of the courageous activists throughout the Americas, facing off against Canadian imperialism, who agreed to speak with us over the last five years. We hope they receive this book as a modest contribution to the struggle.
As ever, our deepest thanks go to Jackie Esmonde and Tieneke Dykstra.
PART I
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER 1
VELVET GLOVES AND IRON FISTS
In recent years, the Canadian state has lent its support to a repressive post-coup regime in Honduras; it has provided military and ideological backing for a repressive regime in Colombia, one which boasts the hemisphere’s worst record on human rights; it has aggressively interfered in the domestic affairs of left-of-centre Latin American governments, such as that of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela and Rafael Correa in Ecuador; it has supported ecological destruction and the dislocation of vulnerable populations in the region through its support for Canadian natural resource companies; it has provided cover for exploitative working conditions in the factories of Canadian companies operating in the export processing zones of Central America; it has sought to delegitimize, coopt, or coerce popular movements that have directly challenged the economic interests of Canadian capital—this is the reality with which any honest study of Canada’s growing political and economic engagement with Latin America must start. These are not extreme or isolated examples, unrepresentative of the broader character of Canada’s foreign policies in the Americas. As we argue in this book, the trends mentioned above are at the core of Canadian foreign policy in Latin America, animating the dialectic of Canadian capitalist expansion and popular resistance in the region.
Canadian multinational corporations (MNCs) have expanded rapidly into Latin America as a whole since the 1990s with devastatingly destructive force. Their deleterious impact on human rights has been matched only by their enormous ecological offences—indeed, the two often go hand in hand. Expansion of Canadian capital has in turn engendered waves of creative and militant community resistance, which has proved the most successful way thus far of containing predatory Canadian MNCs and the state policies that abet their operations. This dialectic of capitalist expansion and popular resistance is well understood by Canadian policymakers. For example, Stockwell Day, the former Minister of International Trade, frequently noted the increasingly large amount of Canadian foreign investment flowing into Latin America. Summing up the drive of Canadian foreign policy towards the region quite effectively, he said, “These are substantial figures, and they indicate where our interests lie.”1
But as a considerable portion of that investment is in the land-hungry and environment-imperilling resource sector—sometimes linked simultaneously to the Canadian financial sector—the realization of those Canadian interests, we argue, is never fully guaranteed. As surely as Canadian investment spells future mega profits for the investor, it faces opposition from local communities. Even when some governments do not openly oppose Canadian resource investment, their plans are not strictly reducible to the interests of the investor: an Ernst and Young report cited “resource nationalism” as the biggest risk to mining companies in 2013, up from tenth largest in 2008. “Resource nationalism” encompasses moves by governments of the Global South to capture a greater share of windfall profits earned during the most recent commodity boom.2 A central argument of this book is that Canadian “interests” are, by their very nature, fraught with contradiction and instability in Latin America, and require state protection if they are not to be undermined. Providing such protection is the overarching goal of Canadian foreign policy in the region—whether in its diplomatic, developmental, or security form—to ensure the successful expansion of Canadian capital in its relentless and insatiable drive for more profit.
Canada’s intensified engagement in Latin America has received increased attention from observers in both popular and academic literature in recent years. With some notable exceptions most of the analysis, though, has been limited in its insights.3 Conflicts between Canadian companies and local communities, for example, are covered inconsistently and typically in isolation from the broader pattern of conflagration that has marked the expansion of Canadian capital. The systematic failure of the Canadian state to hold MNCs legally accountable for their practices, or otherwise rein them in, is rarely discussed in the extant literature. When it is covered, the analysis is commonly bound up in a narrative that presents Canadian foreign policy as confused, rooted in a misunderstanding of the region, or as a simple expression of our subordinate relationship to the United States. To the extent criticism of the actions of the Canadian state is advanced, it is tepid, and the scale of violence
and destruction meted out by Canadian companies and the security forces supporting them is downplayed.
Furthermore, while the expansion of Canadian capital into Latin America and contemporary expressions of Canadian foreign policy begs serious consideration of the imperialist dynamics of the world system in the twenty-first century and the role of the Canadian state therein, no observers have thus far conducted such research. Contemporary scholarship on Canada’s relations with the region routinely fails to situate Canada’s interventions within the broader context of the starkly asymmetric dynamics of global capitalist accumulation. What such an analysis reveals, is that Canada is one of the richest countries in the world, and it is operating within a global system of imperialism that continues to systematically benefit capital from the Global North at the expense of the people and ecologies of the Global South. A related lacuna is the missing analysis of the sheer scale of the Canadian drive to dominate the natural resources and human labour of Latin America. The novelty and scope of this domination has never been properly documented and analyzed.4 What is more, the issues at hand are not reducible to the question of capital penetration, as important as that is; the expansion of Canadian capital is inseparable from a more outwardly aggressive Canadian foreign policy stance and the effort of the Canadian state to imprint itself on the decision making of Latin American states and communities.
Now, one objection to our theoretical framework might be that it no longer makes sense to use the term “Canadian” capital. There is a widely held notion that in an age of transnational globalization it is no longer accurate to refer to national capitals and their particular interests; rather, it is said that we should speak of transnational capitals which root themselves in this or that nation state opportunistically and flexibly. While we recognize that there has indeed been a certain intensification of trends in transnational coordination of capitals (alongside ongoing competition) over the last forty years or so, we maintain that it continues to be crucial to retain the concept of national capitals, and in our case, to speak of Canadian capital—that is, capital that has a clear and indentifiable Canadian owner, whether as an owner of a private company or as a majority or minority (with controlling influence) shareholder of a publicly-traded company.