The Enigma of the Hippogriff. Following the Traces of the Subaltern Work in (and from) the Sierra Leone’s Mines

Drawing from my archival and fieldwork research on the alluvial diamondiferous areas of Sierra Leone (2007-2011), my work follows two main levels of analysis. The first level of analysis examines the discourses produced by analysts and experts on Sierra Leone’s artisanal miners. Over the last decade, diamonds extracted in Sierra Leone have been the focus of an intense debate among analysts and development experts for two main purposes: firstly, understanding the political and economic reasons that sustained the civil war from 1991 to 2002 and, secondly, figuring out how to convert a potential resource for war into a resource for peace and prosperity. In this debate, miners are at the centre of several stereotypes, which I have analysed in my recent paper (D’Angelo 2013). Against these stereotypes, I examine the main forms of the organisation of work at a small and artisanal level in order to show the cultural complexity and historical density of work practices, as well as the vocabulary of contingency employed by miners to make sense of the unpredictability of events. The second level of analysis explores the imaginaries and discursive practices of artisanal miners. In my recent article (D’Angelo 2014), I discuss what workers think about the uses of diamonds in Western countries. In addressing this question, I also explore how the miners’ imaginary of diamonds, money and illicit wealth have been shaped through the prism of a particular regional history. Both levels of analysis advocate the value of an approach that links micro- and macro-history (van der Linden 2005). Indeed, my work aspires to be part of a “universal history of work”, and at the same time, a “history of globalized work” (van der Linden 2008). The issue that I would like to consider here is how (and if) the miners of Sierra Leone have become global workers. Experts, journalists and development analysts have often compared the work of diamond miners to a form of modern slavery. According to these analyses, those who finance the mining operations in this West African country do not adequately compensate the workforce, which is thus forced into debt. Therefore, most miners have to work to repay their debts rather than to improve their lives (see for example, USAID 2001, p. 5; Even-Zohar 2003, p. 7; Moyers 2003, p. 6). By taking into account the forms of distribution of earnings among these miners, I will show how this representation of the mining reality is misleading. In fact, it ascribes the main problems of artisanal diamond mining to local or internal factors and underestimates or denies the historical and geographical connections between these places and the global diamond industry. On the contrary, this paper emphasizes how practices and social relations widespread in the mines of Sierra Leone are informed by specific social, political and economic processes, both short and long term