“Laciana Is Black. Greens Go Away!” Environmentalists as Scapegoats in a Mountaintop Removal Conflict in Laciana Valley, Spain

Abstract

This article presents findings from a case study of a socioenvironmental conflict concerning mountaintop removal coal mining (MTR) in Spain. For 15 years, illegal and subsidised MTR has been providing a number of jobs along with significant negative environmental and social impacts in an area protected by European environmental legislation. In 2018, the European Union (EU) will prohibit state coal subsidies and the local population is already deeply divided, and the atmosphere confrontational. Drawing on ethnography, interviews, and document analysis, this article explores the narrative variations—“disease,” “traitor,” “lazy foreigner,” and “salon environmentalist”—characterising environmentalists as scapegoats, and the importance of these social processes for building an ecological resistance movement in a historical coal mining area. The article concludes that, as in related conflicts elsewhere, violence against those criticising MTR practices, as well as a “culture of silence,” have strongly limited the success of the anti-MTR movement.