Unearthing Greenland’s Resource Frontier: Mineral Resource Extraction and Naalakkersuisut’s Bid for Greenlandic Independence

Abstract

This dissertation analyses the role that mineral resources have played in visions of Greenlandic Independence over the last decade of Self Rule. As climate change and melting ice make Greenland greener, the trope of a “New North’ increasingly open to exploitation is reinforced. However this depoliticising trope tends to erase any narrative of the Arctic as a homeland, making an engagement with political framings emerging from the Arctic countries themselves and a consideration of the ways their governments are co-opting such ideas crucial. This investigation endeavours to do just that by offering a more sustained engagement with the political discourses employed by Naalakkersuisut [the Self-Government of Greenland] regarding mining, building on previous work concerning non-renewable resource extraction and its significance for increased autonomy in Greenland. By carrying out a critical discourse analysis of recent government acts, speeches and policy documents which have not been subjected to scholarly scrutiny before, it will be able to offer new insights. Accordingly, this dissertation will seek to reinsert the ‘geo’ back into critical Arctic geopolitics by answering two research questions: ‘How has Naalakkersuisut constructed Greenland as a resource frontier?’ and ‘What priorities and challenges does Naalakkersuisut foresee for securing Greenland’s mining future?’. By considering the material and symbolic significance of the subsurface for territorial claims to statehood, it breaks new ground in the field of political geology, proving highly relevant for scholars interested in resource geographies, indigenous rights and selfdetermination.