Leiden University Student Repository

Duysters, Boris (2022)

The Political Influence of Platinum Mines: Cronyism and the South African National Assembly

Master thesis | Political Science (MSc)

Primary goods make the world go round, and one that makes cars go round is platinum, which is needed in exhaust catalysts. It is a valuable precious metal, and 80 percent of all of the world’s platinum can be found in South Africa. Despite this, very few South Africans actually benefit from its lucrative platinum mining sector. In fact, this sector appears to cause more problems for most of the people in mining regions, from bad working conditions to air and water pollution. In this thesis I will argue that the lucrativeness of the platinum mining sector and its many negative externalities are related through the Resource Curse. I hypothesize that the owners of platinum mines will use a specific form of lobbying – cronyism, also known as the ‘revolving door’ – to influence members of the National Assembly of South Africa to adopt policies favorable to the mining sector. My research will focus specifically on the case of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act of 2002 ...Show morePrimary goods make the world go round, and one that makes cars go round is platinum, which is needed in exhaust catalysts. It is a valuable precious metal, and 80 percent of all of the world’s platinum can be found in South Africa. Despite this, very few South Africans actually benefit from its lucrative platinum mining sector. In fact, this sector appears to cause more problems for most of the people in mining regions, from bad working conditions to air and water pollution. In this thesis I will argue that the lucrativeness of the platinum mining sector and its many negative externalities are related through the Resource Curse. I hypothesize that the owners of platinum mines will use a specific form of lobbying – cronyism, also known as the ‘revolving door’ – to influence members of the National Assembly of South Africa to adopt policies favorable to the mining sector. My research will focus specifically on the case of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act of 2002 (MPRDA).Show less

Resource Curse

South Africa

Platinum

Extraction

Mines

Minerals

Lobbying

Cronyism

Author

Duysters, Boris

Faculty

Faculty of Social & Behavioural Sciences

Specialisation

International Politics

Supervisors

Bakalov, I.

ECTS Credits

20

Language

en