Disastralization – a proposal of a conceptual tool to analyze created disasters cases

Abstract

This article is about the proposition of the concept-tool of "disastralization" as a theoretical-practical strategy to identify the "how" of disasters caused by mining activities. Having as reference the notion of "eventalization", the analytics of power and the genealogical procedure developed by Foucault, the idea of “disastralization” developed here aims to contribute to the critical understanding of disasters involving mining. Disasters understood as a chain of events that does not begin with a fact, such as the collapse of a physical structure (the bursting of a dam, for example), but as a process that precedes and perpetuates itself after this critical point. To this end, it will be necessary to analyze the concept of disaster, as well as the concept of “eventalization” in Foucault, in order to present the pertinence of the idea of “disastralization” as a tool-concept for what mining has been producing in the territories and communities affected by its economic activity. Although we intend to contribute to the critical Latin American debate, this study will focus on the Brazilian experience, considered an emblematic expression of the catastrophic effects of neoextractivism in the region.