5 - Regulatory Institutional Considerations for Preventing Mining Dam Disasters in Brazil

Summary

This chapter discusses the role regulation has in preventing socioenvironmental disasters in the Brazilian mining industry. In doing so, the chapter focuses on two issues that may be less commonly associated with disaster law but have consequences that are just as severe. First, this chapter focuses on how industrial disasters, specifically mining dam collapses, are a natural consequence of risk incentivized societies’ anthropogenic activities. While anthropogenic activities are often associated with climate change-related natural disasters, some catastrophes are the sole consequence of calculated risk and industrial activities. Second, instead of focusing on the direct causes commonly associated with natural disasters – human intervention on the environment (leading, for instance, to climate change) and socioeconomic inequality (poverty) – this chapter investigates the impact poor regulatory government has on mining disasters in Brazil. Poor regulatory governance has been associated with industry inefficiency in developing countries, undermining policies that are important to citizens, consumers, and businesses. Because an incentive-based risk society can lead to enormous human and environmental catastrophes, human behavior must be contained through an efficient system of rules and institutions. In other words, by a well-functioning regulatory state.