New production of ‘critical’ minerals provides novel challenges to Global South states and societies. In Ghana, lithium’s central role in green energy production is generating new social and environmental claims and contestations about how to ‘add value’ to its lithium production. This presentation, examining the interplay between global/regional, national, and local political aspects of this process, explains how national and local expectations for social beneficiation and ‘added value’ are unfolding in Ghana. Drawing on interviews with government and company officials, alongside surveys of and interviews with mine-affected communities, it shows how party political rivalries, limited and uneven community consultation, and conflicting understandings of potential benefits and costs led to the paralysis of mining in 2023-25, frustrating local communities and placing lithium mining at the centre of Ghanaian political life.

The event presenter is Dr. Miles Larmer, Professor of History and Director of the Center for African Studies at the University of Florida. He has written widely on the postcolonial history of central and southern Africa, including histories of mining and urban development, nation-making and borderlands, wars of national liberation and environmental history. His most recent book, ‘Living for the City: Social Change and Knowledge Production in the Central African Copperbelt’ was published by Cambridge University Press in 2021.

The discussant is Dr. Patricia Ackah-Baidoo, AEGT Postdoctoral Fellow hosted by York University.

This seminar will be hybrid. Please kindly register for this event, whether you intend to participate in-person or online, by completing the registration form: https://yorku.zoom.us/meeting/register/cqaoTy9ASMasK5VYQiTYqA

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