Architecture of Transfers, Art, Politics, Technology and many forms of extractivism since colonial times

FROM ECONOMIC EXTRACTIVISM TO EPISTEMIC EXTRACTIVISM AND ONTOLOGICAL EXTRACTIVISM, AS A WAY OF BEING AND EXISTING IN THE WORLD.

By Ramón Grosfoguel, Department of Ethnic Studies, UC-Berkeley

Extractivism continues to be one of today’s most problematic exploitation processes, not only in Latin America, but in the whole world. An important project regarding this subject is that directed by the internationally renowned Chilean artist Ingrid Wildi Merino, entitled Architecture of Transfers, art, politics and technology. In this project she analyses the different dimensions of the exploitation of copper in Chile and its use in diverse projects; space, scientific, military and cultural; in diverse parts of the world. Extractivism is the mechanism that, in the international division of labour, connects the exploitation of copper in Chile; with all its damaging consequences for the life of the miners, their communities and the environment; with scientific projects. Extractivism has consequences that relate not only to the economic impoverishment of the miners, but also to the processes that destroy life and the planetary ecology.

This extractivist exploitation is not new. It has endured since the European colonial expansion of 1492. As the Ecuadorian Alberto Costa expresses so well[1]:

‘Extractivism is a form of accumulation that began to be forged on a massive scale 500 years ago (2). With the conquest and colonisation of America, Africa and Asia began the structuring of the world economy: the capitalist system. Since then, this form of extractivist accumulation was determined by the demands of the metropolitan centres of nascent capitalism. Some regions were specialised in the extraction and production of raw materials, that is to say, in primary goods, whilst others assumed the role of manufacturing producers. The former export Nature, the latter import it…’

Extractivism follows the western-centric concept of ‘nature’ to the letter. The problem with the concept of‘nature’ is that it continues to be a colonial concept, because the word is inscribed in the civilising project of modernity. For example, in other cosmogonies the word ‘nature’ does not appear, does not exist, because the so called ‘nature’ is not an object but a subject, and forms part of life in all its forms (human and non-human). Therefore, the concept of nature is of itself already euro-centric, western-centric and anthropocentric. It is a highly problematic concept because it implies the division between subject (human) and object (nature), where the subject (human) is that which has life, and all other things are nature because they are considered as inert objects. As a result, these forms of life are inferior to the human, and are inscribed in the means-end logic of western rationality, where nature becomes a means to an end. In summary, in the western-centric world-view, the human is conceived as external to nature, and nature as a means to an end. When one accepts this rationality and applies it to the production of technology during the last five centuries of modernity, you have the rationality for the destruction of life. This is because any technology that is created based on a concept of nature understood in this western-centric manner will have inscribed within itself the rationality for the destruction of life, because no thought has been given to the matter of reproducing life. Thus, it is a problematic concept of the colonialism of power, knowledge and being. However, in ‘non-western’ world-views, that do not share the dualistic view of the world but that contain the concept of diversity within uniqueness, you have a completely different view. ‘Nature’ does not exist, there is ‘cosmos’, and we are all within it. Ecology and its forms of life and existence are not therefore a means towards an end, but an end in itself. Any technology that is created based on this principle carries within itself the rationality for the reproduction of life. It is important to note how a cosmological principal has enormous consequences for the production/reproduction of life (human and non-human), for the cosmos and for the planetary ecology. Modernity is a civilising project and, as say the indigenous peoples of the planet, is a civilisation of death, because it has destroyed more forms of life (human and non-human) that any other civilisation in the history of humanity, to the extent that today we do not know if the human species, or other species, will survive western civilisation. The decolonisation of the western-centric view of the cosmos, towards more holistic views, is fundamental for the future of life on the planet.  Extractivism is one of those industries that destroy life.

If we observe what occurs in places of extractivist production, in the peripheral spaces considered planetary non-being zones due to being thought of as inhabited by racially inferior subjects, the materiality of domination includes looting and violence. Places of copper extraction like Chile, or of gold extraction like South Africa, are spaces where these extractivist companies destroy the ecology of the area, causing illnesses in the zone’s inhabitants. These companies utilise shameless violence against workers who rebel against them. Meanwhile, in the planetary being zones; inhabited by those considered racially superior beings and, therefore, the fortunate of the earth; the finished objects, that produce death in the places of extraction, are enjoyed. The enjoyment of objects such as copper chips for computers or iphones and gold for jewellery and information conductors, is not within the reach of the human subjects who produce them in the non-being mining zones. Whilst life is produced in one place, the other place produces death. The means of enjoying life in one place has, as a condition of possibility, the destruction of life in the other; the fortunate of the earth live at the expense of the condemned of the earth. Death in one place produces life in the other. This system of global injustice is at the centre of the discussion about extractivism. As  Acosta says:

‘Extractivism has been a constant in the economic, social and political life of many countries of the global South. In this way, with varying degrees of intensity, these practices cut across all Latin American countries. This dependency on metropolises, through the extraction and exportation of raw materials, has been maintained practically unaltered until the present day ….Therefore, beyond a few differentiations of greater or lesser importance, the modality of extractivist accumulation seems to be the essence of the productive proposal of neoliberal governments as much as of progressive governments.’

I have cited Alberto Acosta extensively because he has brilliantly synthesised the economics-politics of extractivism.  As in the face of racism, in the face of extractivism there are no differences between westernised governments of the left or right. Irrespective of the government of the day, the same practices of exploitation, destruction and violence produced by the multinational extractivists are repeated.  In the face of their victims, these governments behave with equal measures of violence. The concept of development forms part of the western-centric logic of left or right, and in the face of this end all measures are justified, including the destruction of and violence against all forms of life (human and non-human) that extractivism produces.

Epistemic Extractivism

Cognitive extractivism is a concept that has been introduced by Leanne Simpson, an indigenous intellectual of the Mississauga Nishnaabeg peoples in Canada. Her thinking has extended the concept of economic extractivism to new areas of colonial domination practices. We begin by citing the following about what Leanne Simpson[2] calls cognitive extractivism:

‘When there was a push to bring traditional knowledge into environmental thinking after Our Common Future, [a report issued by the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development] in the late 1980s, it was a very extractivist approach:  ‘Let’s take whatever teachings you might have that would help us right out of your context, right away from your knowledge holders, right out of your language, and integrate them into this assimilatory mindset.’ It’s the idea that traditional knowledge and indigenous peoples have some sort of secret of how to live on the land in a non-exploitive way that broader society needs to appropriate. But the extractivist mindset isn’t about having a conversation and having a dialogue and bringing in indigenous knowledge on the terms of indigenous peoples. It is very much about extracting whatever ideas scientists or environmentalists thought were good and assimilating it… put it onto toilet paper and sell it to people. There’s an intellectual extraction, a cognitive extraction, as well as a physical one. The machine around promoting extractivism is huge in terms of TV, movies, and popular culture’.

Ontological Extractivism

Extractivism is a way of being and existing in the world, that is to say, it is a form of existence, an ontology. Leanne Simpson says:

‘Extracting is taking. Actually, extracting is stealing. It is taking without consent, without thought, care or even knowledge of the impacts on the other living things in that environment. That’s always been a part of colonialism and conquest. Colonialism has always extracted the indigenous—extraction of indigenous knowledge, indigenous women, indigenous peoples… Our elders have been warning us about this for generations now—they saw the unsustainability of settler society immediately. Societies based on conquest cannot be sustained, so yes, I do think we’re getting closer to that breaking point for sure. We’re running out of time. We’re losing the opportunity to turn this thing around. We don’t have time for this massive slow transformation into something that’s sustainable and alternative. I do feel like I’m getting pushed up against the wall. Maybe my ancestors felt that 200 years ago or 400 years ago. But I don’t think it matters.’

Extractivism is robbery, plunder, and pillage. It is a way of being and existing in the world, appropriating from others without their consent, and without thinking or being concerned about the negative impact that this generates in the lives of other living beings (human and non-human). The logic of the attitude of the ontological extractivist is: ‘Whilst I am benefiting myself, I do not care about the consequences for other living beings, human or non-human.’ These egocentric attitudes, these egomaniacal ways of being and existing in the world, are typical of the societies formed by way of a long history of imperialism and colonialism, that is to say, formed by way of plundering riches and knowledge from other peoples considered racially inferior, for the benefit of a few peoples considered racially superior. The imperial societies are unsustainable because they live by robbing and destroying the rest (human and non-human). Societies based on the conquest of humans and non-humans destroy the forms of the reproduction of life. Egocentrism is typical of the subjectivity associated with colonialism, because what matters is the egoistical interest of the coloniser, even though this entails the planetary destruction of humans and non-humans. Irrationalism predominates because, in the long term, the colonisers themselves are affected. The myth that human beings exist outside of the cosmos and of the planetary ecology does not exist, it is false. If you destroy the cosmos and the ecology of the planet, you destroy yourself. The wise of the ancestral communities have been warning about the consequences of this western-centric destruction for centuries. Leanne Simpson tells us that time is running out because planetary destruction is accelerating, and we are losing the opportunity of sustaining planetary life for future generations. Leanne Simpson continues:

‘Extraction and assimilation go together. Colonialism and capitalism are based on extracting and assimilating. My land is seen as a resource. My relatives in the plant and animal worlds are seen as resources. My culture and knowledge is a resource. My body is a resource and my children are a resource because they are the potential to grow, maintain, and uphold the extraction-assimilation system. The act of extraction removes all of the relationships that give whatever is being extracted meaning.’

Extractivism and assimilationism go together. In the extractivist world view everything is transformed into a resource to extract, to be sold as merchandise for a profit in the world market. From life forms (human and non-human) to cultural artefacts and knowledge, all are included. Everything is seen as instrumental to sustaining extractivist and assimilationist life. This way of being depoliticises and strips away the cultural and linguistic meaning of the artefacts and objects extracted. So, in addition to extracting from others to benefit oneself, extractivism, as a way of being and existing, also extracts/eliminates/removes indigenous meanings and cultures in order to re-signify/assimilate everything within western-centric ways of being, feeling and thinking. The artefacts and objects extracted have meanings within specific cultural contexts. A canoe, a plant and a drum all have ethical, political and spiritual meanings for peoples with ancestral traditions. However, when they are transferred to the west, the canoe becomes merchandise, the plant a hallucinogenic substance and the drum a rhythm without spirituality. In removing them from these contexts and placing them in new contexts, the indigenous meaning and significance are lost, becoming assimilated into the cultural matrix of modernity. This principle of assimilation is epistemicide, because it ends up destroying ancestral wisdom and practices. What was a sacred principle of respect for all forms of life becomes a secularised principle for the destruction of life. The same ancestral artefacts, objects and wisdom are inscribed/assimilated into other contexts that given them a very different meaning and significance. Epistemicide and existentialicide consist of destroying the knowledge and ways of life associated with the artefacts, wisdom and objects extracted in order to assimilate them into western culture. That which is different loses specificity on being assimilated into the same[E1] . The modernity machine transforms everything into a disenchanted world with neither soul nor spirit, destroying ‘Other’ ways of thinking and existing in order to favour western ways of thinking and existence. We pass from an enchanted world, with rituals and respect for other forms of life and existence, to a disenchanted world, where every different human culture and all that is non-human lose their specificity as subjects. They are changed into objects without life, subsumed into the destruction of life for the ego-centric ends of western colonialism. Inherent in extractivist capitalism is the granting of privilege to western forms of life and the destruction of all other culturally and biologically different forms of life. These privileged western forms of life then impose themselves as being the only possible human ontological forms, ontologising as animalesque and inferior other culturally and cosmogonically different forms of human existence. Simpson ends by interweaving this extractivist form of life, or ontological extractivism, with developist extractivist economics–politics:

‘Indigenous communities, particularly in places where there is significant pressure to develop natural resources, face tremendous imposed economic poverty. Billions of dollars of natural resources have been extracted from their territories, without their permission and without compensation. That’s the reality. We have not had the right to say no to development, because ultimately those communities are not seen as people, they are seen as resources.’

[1] All citations of Alberto Acosta in this text come from the following online article:                      

Alberto Acosta 2012 ‘Extractivismo y neoextractivismo: dos caras de la misma maldición’ [‘Extractivism and neoextractivism: two side of the same malediction’] ECO 25/07/2012 http://www.ecoportal.net/Temas_Especiales/Mineria/Extractivismo_y_neoextractivismo_dos_caras_de_la_misma_maldicion

[2] All citations of the Indigenous intellectual Leanne Simpson in this article refer to the following interview by Naomi Klein: ‘Dancing the World into Being: A Conversation with Idle-No-More’s Leanne Simpson’.

http://www.yesmagazine.org/peace-justice/dancing-the-world-into-being-a-conversation-with-idle-no-more-leanne-simpson

 [E1]Creo que en la version en castellano hay una errata: los mismo.