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Purpose – This chapter examines how structural dynamics of the global mining industry condition and limit the positive impacts of corporate responsibility and sustainable development strategies, despite considerable efforts on the part of both the Canadian government and the global mining industry to promote the twin concepts.

Methodology/approach – The chapter reviews current literature highlighting the structural elements of corporate irresponsibility in the mining industry, arguing for a radical reconceptualization of governance in the mining industry based on four dimensions of responsibility and backed by a flexible and robust international legal framework.

Research/practical implications – This chapter presents practical implications for improving policy for and regulation of mining companies, Canadian or otherwise, with international operations. While further research needs to be undertaken to explore in more detail the ideal roles of different actors in a system of international governance, this chapter provides a theoretical framework for integrating four dimensions of responsibility into a governance framework that can address the systemic dynamics of organized irresponsibility in the mining industry.

The purpose of this study is to gain increased knowledge about gender diversity and innovation in mining by analyzing how women are discursively represented in relation to these two concepts, and in doing so establish how diversity management is received and communicated in the industry.

The study is based on analysis of texts including references to gender diversity and innovation in mining found on the web. The tool used to retrieve the data has been WebCorpLive, a tool designed for linguistic analysis of web material.

Although increased female representation is communicated as a key component in the diversity management discourse, based on the idea that diversity increases innovation and creativity, closer analysis of texts on diversity and innovation in mining shows that what women are expected to contribute with has little explicit connection with innovation.

The study contributes with increased knowledge about diversity management by providing an example of how it is received in a traditionally male-dominated industry.

The findings indicate that for diversity management to have a real effect in mining, it needs to be based on gender equality and social justice motives, rather than on a business case rationale – the principal motive today. To enable this change, stereotypical gender patterns, as shown in this study, need to be made visible and problematized among policy makers, practitioners and actors on all levels of the industry.

The study contributes with new knowledge about gender in the mining industry previously not attended to by using a method which so far has been sparsely used in discourse analysis, although pointed out as promising.

This research aims to examine the smelter industry’s investment competitiveness in Indonesia as well as to find solutions to improve its competitive advantage for the nation.

This research applies a sequential mixed-methods approach with a second quantitative phase building on an initial first qualitative phase. The qualitative phase is conducted by interviews to find the root causes of problems as well as solutions to gain smelter industries’ competitiveness. The quantitative phase is conducted by a system dynamics model. A descriptive causal loop diagram is created based on interviews and focus group discussions to describe the problems. The concept of competitive advantage of a nation from Porter’s diamond model is applied in this research.

The results reveal the complexity of smelter industries in Indonesia. The paper also addresses the causes of problems and interaction of variables using a causal loop diagram. To gain the smelter industry’s competitiveness, this paper suggests the potential policy development to increase competitiveness of the smelter industry such as policy for different fiscal incentives to each different mineral, effective export duty and exploration obligation.

The result of this study provides a good basis for government in making policy to improve the competitive advantage of the smelter industry investment in Indonesia.

This is the first research on smelter industry competitiveness that applies Porter’s diamond model and system dynamics model to find solutions in designing appropriate policy to gain competitiveness.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute with increased knowledge about gender in mining by exploring how women are discursively represented in texts produced by actors in the international mining arena.

The study combines corpus linguistic methods and discourse analysis. It implies a combination of quantitative and qualitative analyses, where the former is used as the point of departure for the latter, and where the material analysed is chosen on the basis of certain selected search phrases. The source for the study is the web, and the search engine used for the retrieval of data is WebCorp Live, a tool tailored for linguistic analysis of web material.

The analysis reveals that although the overarching theme in the women-in mining discourse is that women are needed in the industry, the underlying message is that women-in-mining are perceived as problematic.

The study shows that if mining is to change into a modern industry, the inherent hyper-masculine culture and its effects on the whole industry needs to be problematised and made evident. To increase the mere number of women, with women still heavily underrepresented, is not enough to break gender-biased discrimination.

The research contributes with new knowledge about gender in mining by using a method, which so far has had limited usage in (critical) discourse analysis.

Good social relationships and connections to place are key aspects of work‐life balance that are rarely considered by employers because of a focus on the work part of the dichotomy. In response to this omission, this paper aims to investigate women's experiences of frequent relocations due to their partner's employment in the mining industry.

Interviews were conducted with 20 women, who had partners employed in the mining industry. Thematic analysis focussed on participants' individual stories of relocation to identify common and divergent experiences.

Themes identified included the role of industry practices and expectations in supporting relocation; personal strengths and strategies developed over time; individual and family needs during relocation; the impact of life stage on decisions about relocation and the important aspects of place.

Mining has a relocation culture common to those involved in the industry. While this culture presents challenges, most of the participants in this study also found benefits in moving often and had developed strategies to cope with relocation upheaval. Participants expanded their social relationships, adding to community resources of the places they lived in by participating in social and cultural events.

Relocation disrupts workforce stability and cohesion desired by industry. Understanding relocation culture is one way family members survive in the industry. It is critical for the mining industry to acknowledge the life part of work‐life balance.

The paper conceptualises relocation as a significant part of the mining industry's culture creating mining families as itinerant. This is the first paper that examines family experiences and social relationships, external to the industry they are connected to. The finding that family members of mining industry employees are very likely to live in remote locations at some point is new. The way these individuals can be used as resource in deprived locations requires further exploration.

Using a theory of translation of ideas, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how the mining industry has implemented and practices lean production as well as the form of this practice.

The study reviewed the scientific literature on lean production in the mining industry, as well as in the reported practice of the concept in a mining company. The results were then analyzed using content analysis.

Lean production has not seen a full implementation in the mining industry. Rather, select practices are focused, though the literature covers several more. The findings suggest that the form and extension of lean production in mining differ from other industries owing to characteristics of the industry itself.

The scientific literature on the subject is limited. Additional material was used to attempt to offset this. However, there are still blind spots relating to practice that is not reported in the type of material investigated.

This paper contributes to understanding the evolution of lean production in a unique industry. It suggests why lean implementation may be unsuccessful in this type of industry while also identifying the focal point of its lean production practice.

Emerging technologies have been transforming most industries. A wide range of emerging technologies such as blockchain, internet of things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), robotics and many others have changed the way in which firm value chain activities or processes were executed traditionally. The mining industry has also witnessed the introduction of these emerging technologies in various processes from the exploration stage to the final processing of ores. The purpose of this paper is to understand the pace of adoption of emerging technologies in the Indian mining industry and identify the challenges that managers confront while adopting emerging technologies.

The authors undertook qualitative research. Data collection was done in two stages. Secondary research was conducted to arrive at a repository of use cases of the adoption of emerging technologies in the global mining industry. Primary data collection was also done. The insights on emerging technology adoption and challenges faced in the Indian mining industry were captured by in-depth interviewing of subject matter experts. The authors interviewed 21 mining subject matter experts with a semi-structured open-ended questionnaire. The responses were content analyzed by thematic content analysis. Technological-organizational-environmental (TOE) and diffusion of innovation (DOI) frameworks were applied to segregate different factors affecting the adoption of emerging technologies in the Indian mining industry.

Emerging technologies such as blockchain, IoT, AI, ML, robotics has been applied across various mining engineering value chain activities such as in drilling, blasting, excavation and ore hauling. However, emerging technologies adoption was hindered because of a lack of managerial awareness, cultural inertia, substantive upfront investments and the nature of intangible benefits in the short run.

The research applied technology adoption frameworks in the mining industry. The authors used TOE and DOI frameworks to understand the challenges faced by Indian mining firms. The research findings, thus added to the conversation of TOE and DOI frameworks in the context of the Indian mining industry.

The research finding would help mining firm managers to anticipate the challenges with respect to technology adoption. This would allow mining executives to create a proper technology adoption plan and intervene proactively. The research would also provide information about the steps taken by competing firms with respect to emerging technologies adoption. The research would help managers to decide technology implementation steps in drilling, blasting, excavation and ore hauling to be undertaken for successful adoption of emerging technologies. Technology firms could gain insights into the issues faced by mining firms in adopting emerging technologies. This research would help managers to influence organizational technology policy and endorse the addition of pro-technology policies in mining activities. Policymakers involved in the mining sector could also incorporate industry-level policy decisions so as to facilitate the adoption of emerging technologies among mining firms and remove the barriers to the adoption of emerging technologies. This would create an opportunity for technology providers to redesign product offerings, which could be a good fit for Indian mining firms.

Indian mining industry contributed significantly to the Indian economy. Despite this, limited focus has been put regarding the adoption of emerging technologies in the mining industry. Mining managers did not have any framework to understand the challenges faced in the adoption of technologies across the mining value chain that is in drilling, blasting, excavation and ore hauling. This study focused on identifying those challenges through the use of technology adoption frameworks. This research was one of the first studies to gain insights on emerging technologies adoption in the context of the mining industry through the theoretical lens of TOE and DOI frameworks.

This paper aims to critically examine how dual-listed multinational enterprises (MNEs) that are embedded across multiple national contexts interact with other actors to shape the diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) narrative, outcomes and the associated dynamics of social change in the mining industry.

The authors use data from the publicly available sustainability reports of two global mining conglomerates with dual-listing structure, Rio Tinto and Anglo American, alongside prevalent DEI regulations in the UK, Australia and South Africa to understand how DEI discourse and practice and the corresponding role of key actors have evolved since 2015. The authors combine a case study approach with topic modelling and qualitative content analysis to critically analyse the linkage between actors’ stated posture and actions in their DEI field and their impact upon various exchange relationships within the mining industry exchange field over the period 2015–2021.

The analysis revealed three broad phases of evolution in the DEI involvement of the MNEs emphasizing on diversity, equality and inclusion, respectively. Both firms progressed at a different pace across the three phases highlighting the need for a systemic perspective when addressing DEI concerns.

This paper is one of the earliest to adopt an issue and exchange field perspective towards examining the complexity of DEI. Taking a critical performative stance, the authors argue that for improving convergence between MNEs’ DEI rhetoric and reality and to advance DEI in new ways organizations and policymakers must devise structural interventions in the DEI field that substantively impact MNEs’ industry exchange field relationships.

This research is intended to assess the nickel smelter industry’s investment competitiveness in Indonesia and identify ways to improve its competitive advantage for the nation.

This research uses a sequential mixed-methods approach, expanding on a first qualitative phase with a second quantitative phase. Interviews are used in the qualitative phase to identify the underlying causes of issues and potential solutions to increase the competitiveness of the nickel smelter industry, while a system dynamics (SD) model is used to conduct the quantitative phase. This study uses the idea of a country’s competitive advantage from Porter’s diamond model (PDM). The model was tested and validated using SD simulation resulting in a new policy scenario, which was evaluated in metallurgy expert conferences and high policymaker discussion forums.

The results reveal the complexity of the nickel smelter industry in Indonesia and conclude that the integrated export duty beneficence policy is the most effective way to boost competitiveness. This policy gives a significant improvement both in the number of smelters and state revenue compared to the current policy. The industry’s investment competitiveness is enhanced by the six factors of the diamond model, with the first three factors being integrated strategy, limited export of excess production and export duty beneficence, while the remaining factors are metal price fluctuation, domestic demand and mineral supply which are related to mining conditions uncertainty.

The research creates a SD model to support Indonesia’s competitive advantage in the smelter industry. Despite limitations like interpretations and distorted semantic analysis, it provides a useful framework for exploring complex industry themes, excluding social factors due to limited data and knowledge requirements.

The findings of this research offer a framework for policymaking by the government to enhance the competitiveness of investments in Indonesia’s nickel smelter industry.

This study delves into Indonesia’s nickel industry competitiveness using PDM. Using a more detailed SD model with quantitative analysis, it goes beyond strategy development to provide a comprehensive approach to the nickel smelter industry.

The competitiveness of mining regions largely depends on the performance of the regional supply chains that provide services to mining companies. These local supply chains are often highly intertwined and represent a regional supply network for the industry. Individual companies often use supply chain strategies that are sub-optimal to overall supply network performance. To effectively respond to an uncertain business environment, policy-makers and supply chain participants would benefit by a governance framework that would allow to incentivise the formation of supply networks structures enabling effective operations. The purpose of this paper is to offer an empirically grounded conceptual framework based on Complex Adaptive Systems (CASs) governance principles, which links network governance mechanisms with supply network structure and operational performance to incentivise the formation of adaptive and resilient supply networks in the mining industry.

A mixed method research design and a case study of the South Australian mining sector were used to collect empirical data. Qualitative interviews and network analysis of the SA mining industry regional supply network structure were conducted. The relationships between network parameters were interpreted using CAS theory.

An empirically grounded conceptual framework based on CAS governance principles is developed. The case study revealed that supply chain strategies and governance mechanisms in the SA mining industry have led to the formation of a hierarchical, scale-free structure with insufficient horizontal connectivity which limits the adaptability, responsiveness and resilience of the regional supply network.

The findings are drawn from a single case study. This limits generalisability of the findings and the proposed framework.

The proposed framework draws the attention of the policy-makers and supply chain participants towards the need for utilising CAS governance principles to facilitate the formation of adaptive, responsive and resilient regional supply networks in the mining industry.

The proposed conceptual framework is an attempt to parameterise the governance of the regional supply networks in the mining industry.