IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/prodev/v14y2014i4p383-399.html

Whose resources are they anyway? ‘Development assistance’ and community development agreements in the Mongolian mining sector

Author

Listed:
  • Peter Blunt

    (Non-resident Visiting Fellow, School of Social Sciences University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5001, Australia)

Abstract

This is a case study of ‘development assistance’ that demonstrates how the interests of the supposed beneficiary of such assistance – Mongolia – were discarded as soon as there appeared to be the slightest risk that, if served, those interests might have jeopardized the economic or political interests of the donor country (Switzerland) and/or those of its (Western) trading partners and their mining corporations. Donor interests were deemed to be put at risk by a government and donor sponsored research report that made a case for strengthening mining legislation pertaining to community development agreements in Mongolia. The offending research report also challenged the establishment view of the aetiology of the ‘resource curse’, emphasizing the predisposing conditions established by neoliberal design and international financial institutions and the roles of foreign mining corporations, which are rarely mentioned in conventional accounts. The case provides further evidence for the view that Western ‘development assistance’ rendered by state capitalist ‘democracies’ (and others) is first and foremost designed, directly or indirectly, to serve the interests of the countries providing such ‘assistance’ and that development rhetoric and practice is intended to create an impression of altruism where, in reality, little or none exists.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Blunt, 2014. "Whose resources are they anyway? ‘Development assistance’ and community development agreements in the Mongolian mining sector," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 14(4), pages 383-399, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:prodev:v:14:y:2014:i:4:p:383-399
    DOI: 10.1177/1464993414521491
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1464993414521491
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/1464993414521491?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paul Collins & Alan Doig & Peter Blunt & Mark Turner & Henrik Lindroth, 2012. "Patronage'S Progress In Post‐Soeharto Indonesia," Public Administration & Development, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 32(1), pages 64-81, February.
    2. Suzanne Dansereau, 2005. "Win-win or new imperialism? Public-private partnerships in Africa mining," Review of African Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 32(103), pages 47-62, March.
    3. Ralph Hamann & Paul Kapelus, 2004. "Corporate Social Responsibility in Mining in Southern Africa: Fair accountability or just greenwash?," Development, Palgrave Macmillan;Society for International Deveopment, vol. 47(3), pages 85-92, September.
    4. Peter Blunt & Mark Turner & Jana Hertz, 2011. "The Meaning Of Development Assistance," Public Administration & Development, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 31(3), pages 172-187, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Artan Karini, 2016. "Coordination Without Effectiveness? A Critique of the Paris Agenda in the Experience of Development Aid in Albania," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 28(4), pages 741-757, September.
    2. Peter Blunt & Ganbaatar Sainkhuu, 2015. "Serendipity and stealth, resistance and retribution: Policy development in the Mongolian mining sector," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 15(4), pages 371-385, October.
    3. Wang, Jian & Huang, Xu & Hu, Ke & Li, Xin, 2018. "Evaluation on community development programs in mining industry: A case study of small and medium enterprise in China," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 516-524.
    4. Vintró, Carla & Fortuny, Jordi & Sanmiquel, Lluís & Freijo, Modesto & Edo, Joaquín, 2012. "Is corporate social responsibility possible in the mining sector? Evidence from Catalan companies," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 118-125.
    5. Petra F. A. Dilling, 2016. "Reporting on Long-Term Value Creation—The Example of Public Canadian Energy and Mining Companies," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(9), pages 1-26, September.
    6. Deberdt, Raphael & Smith, Nicole M. & Malone, Aaron & Bullock, Robin, 2025. "From opposition to conditional acceptance: Corporate environmental and socio-economic engagement in critical minerals mining in Michigan," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    7. Lite J. Nartey & Witold J. Henisz & Sinziana Dorobantu, 2023. "Reciprocity in Firm–Stakeholder Dialog: Timeliness, Valence, Richness, and Topicality," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 183(2), pages 429-451, March.
    8. Stuart, Alice & Bond, Alan & Franco, Aldina M.A. & Baker, Julia & Gerrard, Chris & Danino, Vittoria & Jones, Kylie, 2023. "Conceptualising social licence to operate," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 85(PA).
    9. Katundu Imasiku & Valerie M. Thomas, 2020. "The Mining and Technology Industries as Catalysts for Sustainable Energy Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(24), pages 1-13, December.
    10. Bongani Munkuli & Renee Horne, 2018. "Financial Markets Value Reputation for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) – A Study of the South African Mining Sector," Africagrowth Agenda, Africagrowth Institute, vol. 15(2), pages 17-22.
    11. Kvangraven, Ingrid Harvold, 2025. "Cracks in the “gold standard”: The Eurocentrism of mining in development economics," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 192(C).
    12. Deanna Kemp & John Owen & Nora Gotzmann & Carol Bond, 2011. "Just Relations and Company–Community Conflict in Mining," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 101(1), pages 93-109, June.
    13. Frederiksen, Tomas, 2018. "Corporate social responsibility, risk and development in the mining industry," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 495-505.
    14. Peter Blunt & Farid Mamundzay & Nader Yama & Hamidullah Afghan, 2015. "Policy paradigms, subnational governance and the state sovereignty gap in Afghanistan," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 15(3), pages 270-285, July.
    15. Irfan Hameed & Zeeshan Hyder & Muhammad Imran & Kashif Shafiq, 2021. "Greenwash and green purchase behavior: an environmentally sustainable perspective," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(9), pages 13113-13134, September.
    16. Peter Blunt, 2012. "Toxic technical assistance in conditions of state fragility: Field notes from Iraq," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 12(4), pages 337-352, October.
    17. Gregor Dorfleitner & Sebastian Utz, 2024. "Green, green, it’s green they say: a conceptual framework for measuring greenwashing on firm level," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 18(12), pages 3463-3486, December.
    18. Peter Seele & Lucia Gatti, 2017. "Greenwashing Revisited: In Search of a Typology and Accusation‐Based Definition Incorporating Legitimacy Strategies," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(2), pages 239-252, February.
    19. Cyrlene Claasen & Julia Roloff, 2012. "The Link Between Responsibility and Legitimacy: The Case of De Beers in Namibia," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 107(3), pages 379-398, May.
    20. Monowar Mahmood & Janet Humphrey, 2013. "Stakeholder Expectation of Corporate Social Responsibility Practices: A Study on Local and Multinational Corporations in Kazakhstan," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 20(3), pages 168-181, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:prodev:v:14:y:2014:i:4:p:383-399. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.