Strategic Sovereignty: Essays on goods provision, conflict, and governance in regions of natural resource extractio

Why do some natural resource extractive projects experience local resistance and others do not? Why does a government vary in its response to this resistance? I explore the strategic interaction among a firm, government, and local population in order to explain variation in the following local governance outcomes: goods provision, protest, and government repression in regions of natural resource extraction. I argue that the extent and nature of government engagement reflects perceived tradeoffs between revenue and political support specific to the region. In doing so, I advance our understanding of the effect of non-state actors on governance outcomes in regions of limited state presence. I introduce a formal model of firm, local community, and government interaction to develop the strategic logic underpinning the different outcomes in regions of natural resource extraction. I then conduct a comparative case study of coal extractive sites in Mozambique, and copper extractive sites in Zambia and DRC, which provides a plausible account of the mechanisms proposed in the formal model. Finally, I develop a dataset and find empirical support for the hypotheses derived from the formal model and which are elucidated in the comparative case study.