How Extractive Capitalism’s Logic Reshaped Global Mining: BHP’s Six-Year Cycle of Critical Mineral Extraction
Original framing: “How Mike Henry Reshaped the World's Largest Mining Company” — Bloomberg
The history of mining is a history of colonial violence, from the Spanish conquest of Potosí’s silver to the British South African Company’s copper extraction in Zambia. BHP’s operations in Australia and Latin America follow this pattern, with Indigenous dispossession and environmental degradation as recurring themes. The energy transition’s demand for critical minerals is not a new phenomenon but the latest iteration of resource colonialism, repackaged as sustainability.
Mike Henry’s tenure at BHP exemplifies the extractive logic of global capitalism, where minerals are commodified, communities are displaced, and the planet is treated as a sacrifice zone—all in the name of the 'energy transition.
' This narrative, amplified by Bloomberg, obscures the colonial continuities of mining, the false promise of 'green extraction,' and the ways AI is being weaponized to accelerate these processes. Indigenous epistemologies, such as the Andean concept of 'buen vivir' or the Maori principle of 'kaitiakitanga,' offer radical alternatives to this paradigm, framing land as a living entity rather than dead capital. The solution pathways—community-led governance, degrowth, AI for ecological monitoring, and an international treaty—require dismantling the power structures that concentrate resource control in the hands of corporations like BHP. These alternatives are not utopian but grounded in historical precedents, such as Bolivia’s 2009 Constitution or Ecuador’s Sumak Kawsay, which demonstrate that resource governance can be reimagined beyond extraction. The challenge is not technological but political: shifting from a system that treats land as a resource to be liquidated to one that treats it as a living ancestor to be stewarded.