The spatial restructuring of resource regulation : the gold mining enclave of Zaruma and Portovelo, Ecuador, 1860-1980

This dissertation explores the production of space and the spatial restructuring of resource regulation in the gold mining enclave of Portovelo and Zaruma, Ecuador, between 1860 and 1980. I use the theoretical tools of critical human geography, regulation theory, and political economy to analyze the spatiality of regulation over time in a dialectical manner. Methodologically, I develop an extended case study with explicit attention to scale as produced through material practices and their associated discourses and power relations. I argue that transnational mining companies, in responding to the international demand for raw materials, do not indiscriminately "penetrate" but, rather, negotiate the conditions for their deployment. Hence, there is an ongoing restructuring and rescaling of regulations that is a product of mediation between extractive capitalism and state formation in Ecuador.