Gold Mining and the Discourses of Corporate Social Responsibility in Ghana

Description

This book critically examines the practice and meanings of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and how the movement has facilitated a positive and somewhat unquestioned image of the global corporation. Drawing on extensive fieldwork material collected in Ghanaian communities located around the project sites of Newmont Mining Corporation and Kinross Gold Corporation, the monograph employs critical discourse analysis to accentuate how mining corporations use CSR as a discursive alibi to gain legitimacy and dominance over the social order, while determining their own spheres of responsibility and accountability. Hiding behind such notions as ‘social licence to operate’ and ‘best practice,’ corporations are enacted as entities that are morally conscious and socially responsible. Yet, this enactment is contested in host communities, as explored in chapters that examine corporate citizenship, gendered perspectives, and how global CSR norms institutionalize unaccountability. Front Matter ....Pages i-xvii Gold Mining and CSR: Responsibility to Whom and for What (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 1-33 “We Need Social Licence to Actually Mine and We Believe Communities Are Part of What We Do”: Contested Corporate Citizenship (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 35-69 “We Want to Bring Everyone on Board but It’s Quite Difficult”: Responsibilization via the Newmont Ahafo Development Foundation (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 71-103 “A Woman Can Also Speak Out”: Gendered Perspectives on Responsibilization (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 105-132 “There Is No Yardstick to Measure [Our Performance] With”: A Global Movement for Institutionalizing Unaccountability (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 133-168 The Bigger Picture: Implications for ‘Engendering’ CSR, De-responsibilization and Re-responsibilization (Nathan Andrews)....Pages 169-193 Back Matter ....Pages 195-227