Activists and regulatory politics: Institutional opportunities, information, and the activation of environmental regulation

Abstract

This article asks why civil society groups appear to have been more successful in activating regulatory institutions in Chile, than in San Juan province, Argentina. The analysis underscores the central role of information flows at institutional “docking points” where activists interact with the state. Civil society organizations can strengthen bureaucratic enforcement, even in weak states, by providing information and material support to regulators. However, information provided by regulatory agencies to activists at official docking points is also essential to the mobilization and framing strategies of activists. Where institutional opportunities in regulatory bureaucracies are closed to civil society, and information about the project is limited, the ability of activists to mobilize and pressure for change can be circumscribed. The article is based on a comparative case study of the Argentine and Chilean sides of the Pascua Lama mining project, and draws on extensive fieldwork conducted with social-environmental activists and regulatory authorities in San Juan and Buenos Aries, Argentina, and the Huasco Valley and Santiago, Chile.