ABSTRACT

The concept of governance, with origins in the Global North, is widely used in the discipline of international relations, although it is applied to institutions, organisations and processes with different ideological backgrounds and for different purposes. In the 90s, when it was believed that the state sought to lead ‘too many’ processes, it was instrumentally used to displace the discussion from government to governance. In this context, this chapter proposes to discuss and analyze the specific forms of governance in natural resource exploitation in a context of neo-extractivism in South America. The boom of natural resources at the beginning of the new century found governments of different political signs taking advantage of the benefits for their political and policy challenges. This led to the emergence of the term ‘neo-extractivism’ to refer to the processes of re-primarisation of South American economies, which includes the questioning of a subordinate form of international insertion and discussing aspects of the North–South relationship, as well as the region’s role in the international division of labour. Thus, the notion of governance acquires specific forms and does not necessarily respond to ideal types.