The Criminalization of the Third Malón de la Paz as a Governance Strategy of the Lithium-Extraction Model in the Context of the Energy Transition, Jujuy, Argentina, 2023–2025

Abstract

From the beginning of the twentieth century, the expansion of the extractivist frontier has intensified socio-environmental conflictivity in Latin America, especially on indigenous territories. Renewed interest on minerals of strategic importance for the energetic transition, such as lithium, copper, and rare earths, has triggered a “green extrativism” phase, wich combines historic forms of expoliation with new sustainability discourses. In this context, state elites from countries that are dependent on the extractivist rent, have strenghtened mechanisms of social control and criminilization strategies, to secure stability that allow to attract investment. This article examines the Tercer Malón de la Paz (TMP), an indigenous movement that emerged in Argentina’s Jujuy province. Adopting a multi-scale approach, which articlates pronince, national, and regional levels, we discuss how punitive practices, discourses, and dispositives are interrelated and reconfigured. We argue that, since 2015, Argentinian political elites have aligned themselves with a regional logic by which indigenous communities are constructed as threats, which legitimizes repressive policies and the militarization of the social order. The case of the TMP makes evident the strenghtening of a regime of extractivist governability within the “green extractivism”, which deepens the lithium-bases model in the context of the current energetic transition.