Reversing Emancipation?

Bolivia is currently experiencing a severe economic crisis, driven by the decline in natural gas production and exports—a key source of national revenue—along with a shortage of U.S. dollars, high inflation, and fuel shortages. These shortages have particularly highlighted the role of fuel smuggling in sustaining the informal economy, especially artisanal mining, which in some areas has nearly ground to a halt. A complete shutdown of this sector would have undoubtedly deepened the crisis, as it provides employment for approximately 150,000 workers nationwide. At the same time, the political system is in crisis, marked by significant conflicts between the current president, Luis Arce, and former president Evo Morales, who until recently were allies in the country’s most important political party, the Movement for Socialism. Both have sought to secure the support of the artisanal mining sector, sometimes even fueling clashes between rival miner groups, as the presidential election approaches in August 2025.

An important underlying factor contributing to this conflict lies, paradoxically, in Bolivia’s progressive Constitution. More specifically, it involves the relationship between the country’s extensive and largely informal mining sector —cooperatives— and the constitutional economic framework. Established in 2009, the Constitution introduced the concept of a Plural Economy (Economía Plural), which recognizes cooperatives as economic actors alongside the state and private sector. Ironically, while this model provides an income to thousands of often poor families, it exacerbates the country’s macroeconomic decline due to the weight of the contraband surrounding it, especially in the Amazonian gold areas, as well as worsening challenges related to working conditions and occupational health.

Mining and Cooperatives in Bolivia

As in other Andean countries, mining remains central to Bolivia’s economy, contributing approximately 6.5% to its GDP over the past decade and accounting for nearly 50% of its total export value in recent years. What distinguishes Bolivia, however, is the political and social significance of its artisanal cooperative mining system, consisting of over a thousand groups of varying sizes extracting small- and medium-scale deposits. These cooperatives focus predominantly on gold, with expanding alluvial technified production in the Amazon basin, while also engaging in the underground extraction of tin, silver, lead, wolfram, and other minerals in the Andes using rudimentary techniques. In reality, the practices of Bolivian cooperatives and the risks they undertake are largely similar to those of small- and medium-scale mining operations in countries such as Ecuador, Brazil, or Peru (Lagos et al., 2002). However, as a vital source of labor and a political force—particularly since the commodity supercycle of the 2000s through the mid-2010s—the sector has distinguished itself by achieving a series of political victories, ensuring substantial exemptions from taxation, environmental regulations, and labor standards. This situation, as we will see, has raised significant concerns, particularly regarding occupational health and safety risks.

The cooperative sector in Bolivia is not new; its history is closely tied to jukeo (mineral theft), which dates back to the colonial period, and to the autonomous extraction practices of the kajchas (Absi, 2005). During the 20th century, these autonomous entities played a strategic role by absorbing unemployed labor and becoming key partners of the Bolivian Mining Corporation (COMIBOL), the large state-owned enterprise that took over nationalized tin operations following the 1952 Revolution. Over time, cooperatives increasingly assumed tasks outsourced by COMIBOL, a response to the recurring stagnation and crises faced by the state enterprise. During this period, they were also formally recognized as institutions of a social and solidaristic nature, emerging as an alternative to capitalist mining and grounded in principles such as voluntary membership and the proportional distribution of surpluses. The role of cooperatives expanded further when the privatization of COMIBOL occurred in the 1980s, a process that left more than 20,000 workers unemployed and led to the shutdown of numerous operations, some of which were later resumed and managed by the cooperatives.

The presence of cooperatives in the mining landscape is thus both consistent and well-established, though it was not until the boom of the 2000s that they emerged as politically and socially dominant actors. The surge in prices sextupled the value of mining production and drove an increase of more than threefold in extracted tonnage. This boom, along with Evo Morales’s rise to the presidency in 2006 and the adoption of the Political Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia in 2009, paved the way for the influential position that cooperatives hold today. Thousands of people joined cooperatives in search of new income opportunities, including Indigenous and agro-pastoral populations who took on temporary mining work compatible with their agricultural rhythms and the flexibility that cooperatives offer. Additionally, the sector expanded its operations by increasingly managing outsourced areas of large-scale private mines (Le Gouill, 2016, 2021). While there were around 700 cooperatives employing approximately 50,000 workers in the mid-1990s, today there are over 2,300 cooperatives with nearly 150,000 people engaged in the sector, representing more than 90% of the mining workforce (EJU, 2024; MMM, 2021). This expansion has reinforced the role of cooperatives across various regions, engaging local populations who have turned to mining either temporarily or permanently. A counterpoint to this community involvement is the limited escalation of socio-environmental conflicts associated with mining, as complaints rarely advance when local populations are both the agents and the primary victims of mining’s impacts (Marston & Perreault, 2017).

Promises of the Plurinational Era

The election of Evo Morales in 2006, Bolivia’s first Aymara president and a proponent of neo-developmentalist policies, seemed to mark the return of the state as an active player in natural resource management, with plans to reshape the mining landscape. The government declared all national territory a fiscal reserve to “plan, manage, and carry out mining activities” (2007), while the new Constitution (2009) established the nationalization and industrialization of natural resource exploitation (articles 348 et seq, 359 et seq). This framework enabled key policies, including the nationalization of hydrocarbons and the renegotiation of contracts with natural gas companies, which significantly increased state revenues. Public spending tripled, and social policies were introduced that substantially boosted household consumption (Martinez & Poupeau, 2021).

The government’s agenda also brought the role of cooperatives into question, although their situation remained ambiguous. In theory, cooperatives are social organizations that promote self-managed employment. In practice, however, they may at times operate as private corporations, governed by a variable number of members, or socios, ranging from as few as six to over a thousand, who gained their status through payments that could reach several thousand dollars, contingent upon approval by the existing socios. The legal status of cooperatives granted them significant advantages, including royalties set at only a third of those paid by the private sector, extensive tax exemptions, access to support funds, and the subcontracting, despite its current illegality, of day laborers by many cooperatives. Subcontracted miners operated in a legal gray area, often working under precarious, unsafe, and rudimentary conditions, much like the socios, who, though generally in a less precarious position, were equally affected by the lack of regulation within cooperatives. At the same time, this deregulation provided sufficient flexibility to facilitate temporary and solidarity-based access to mining work for individuals facing urgent economic hardship (Le Gouill, 2016; Poveda, 2014).

The radical reforms of Morales’s government thus appeared to challenge cooperatives—a highly deregulated segment of the mining sector that also exhibits a complex social nature: deeply rooted in the Andean region’s history and serving as a key driver of employment, solidarity networks, and economic support among communities that are both agrarian and mining-based. However, cooperatives not only resisted these reforms but emerged even stronger. This was due, first, to the relatively modest changes introduced in the mining sector compared to other economic sectors: the nationalization of mining deposits fell short of expectations, failing to generate the anticipated productivity gains, while private mining experienced only a minor increase in taxation. Second, the new Constitution formally recognized cooperatives as part of a “plural” economy, upheld their pre-constitutional rights, and mandated the promotion of their activities (articles 306 et seq). The constitutional principles were later codified in the 2014 Mining Law, a process that allowed the National Federation of Cooperatives to further strengthen its position. They successfully blocked a proposal that would have allowed Indigenous communities to establish enterprises to exploit mineral deposits—an initiative perceived by cooperatives as a threat—while securing greater access to Indigenous lands, protected areas, and deposits still under fiscal reserve. In 2016, they opposed another reform that sought to unionize cooperative workers, a conflict marked by violent actions, including the murder of the Vice Minister of the Interior by cooperativists. In response, the government introduced measures such as the right to unionize, fiscal oversight, and the reversion of unproductive cooperatives to state control (Le Gouill, 2016). The impact of these measures has been minimal, enabling cooperatives to continue benefiting from substantial advantages, including significant tax breaks. This is evidenced by their negligible contribution to mining revenue—less than 2% of the sector’s total, compared to over 96% contributed by private companies (Rodríguez López et al., 2020). Meanwhile, cooperatives have greatly benefited from public infrastructure investment, particularly in road development. The 2018 inauguration of the paved Jaime Mendoza diagonal highway is emblematic, as it greatly improved transportation logistics in the agro-mining region of northern Potosí.

Deepening Invisibility: Silicosis and Cooperatives

The legal regime under which cooperatives operate allows them to contribute only marginally to the country’s fiscal revenue—except in the case of the gold mining boom, which in recent years has surpassed the gas sector in export value. This situation not only undermines the state’s ability to enhance public infrastructure—advantageous to the mining sector—but also impacts miners directly by rendering their activities largely invisible and hindering the enforcement of effective occupational health and safety policies. One of the most dramatic consequences of this situation is the prevalence of silicosis, a progressive, irreversible, and fatal form of pulmonary fibrosis that continues to affect many workers. The disease originates from the systematic inhalation of fine silica particles, a common and abundant component in mining operations and other activities that release particulate matter, such as construction. Depending on the intensity and duration of exposure, symptoms may take years or even decades to manifest; once they appear, the disease progresses inexorably, leading to severe respiratory failure, fatigue, weight loss, and, ultimately, death.

Recently, an authority from the Ministry of Mining and Metallurgy acknowledged that there is no precise information on these cases “because we have neglected this issue” and because the cooperatives’ health insurance system “is unsustainable due to a lack of resources” (Fides, 2023). Despite these challenges, some studies provide partial data that help shed light on the situation. In the late 1970s, more than 70% of miners at the COMIBOL Siglo XX mine were reported to suffer from silicosis (Bernal, 1999). The situation appeared to improve, and by the 2010s just over 20% of cooperative miners in the departments of Oruro and Potosí—those affiliated with the National Health Fund—were reported to have some degree of silicosis (Cervantes et al., 2011). However, recent data indicate that these percentages are much higher, with 34% in Oruro and 53% in Potosí (Fides, 2024), while a former government official claimed that “85% of cooperative miners suffer from silicosis” (ANF, 2023). The data is alarming, and its disparity underscores the fragility of the institutional system responsible for overseeing labor health conditions.

In parallel, community-based initiatives, such as those led by Radio Pio XII in Llallagua, a city located in a major mining region that includes the Siglo XX mine, collect testimonies that reveal the daily realities of cooperative miners. In an interview with the station’s magazine K’epirina, a miner stated: “My health is bad; I already have advanced silicosis, [but] I have to keep working in the mine—it’s the only place we can work.”¹⁾. This testimony reflects the common fate of most cooperative miners, who work until their bodies can no longer endure another descent into the mine. Local people frequently invoke the notion of sacrifice when discussing this topic, emphasizing its perceived value in giving one’s life for the well-being of their families, their economic future, or the development of the community. Such an ethos is common across different regions and eras, where workers frame their labor as an act of self-sacrifice—whether as breadwinners or even as soldiers—dedicated to a greater cause (Rosental, 2017). The distinctiveness of cooperatives lies in their portrayal of sacrifice as a voluntary and personal choice. This perspective likely stems from the high level of informality within cooperatives and their horizontal structure among socios, which reinforces the perception that individuals are not coerced into a hazardous and unhealthy system of mineral extraction that offers minimal or no compensation in cases of accidents or debilitating illnesses leading to death. Instead, risk is perceived as a deliberate choice in exchange for work considered worthwhile—an understandable view given the region’s labor market, where alternative employment opportunities generally provide significantly lower wages.

Conclusion

 The interplay between Bolivia’s plurinational constitutional framework, its mining cooperatives, and the pervasive issue of silicosis reveals a paradox at the heart of the nation’s socio-political and economic landscape. While the 2009 Constitution enshrined progressive principles of rights, inclusion, and state oversight, its implementation has failed to address the vulnerabilities of cooperative miners. Instead, the exceptional regime granted to cooperatives has allowed them to flourish economically and politically while perpetuating precarious labor conditions and systemic neglect of occupational health risks.

Informal mining and its associated risks constitute a complex phenomenon that can transcend constitutional frameworks and is influenced by various factors, such as the state’s presence in these territories, metal prices, unemployment rates, and the economic dynamics of specific localities. A striking example is Peru, a neighboring country with a highly powerful informal mining sector that did not require a constitution to strengthen itself. However, constitutions and their legal frameworks can, in some cases, prevent powerful groups from imposing exploitative conditions on vulnerable sectors. This is particularly crucial in labor contexts where human life and the environment are at risk. The Bolivian case highlights the consequences of incorporating principles such as economía plural without substantial restrictions for self-organized groups that, operating similarly to private corporations, can undermine state authority and expose vulnerable populations to severe risks—a particularly critical issue in predominantly extractivist economies.