The extraction of critical minerals for the green transition has devastating consequences for the
environment in many producer regions. Although protest against so-called green extractivism is on
the rise in some regions, other regions have seen surprisingly little organized protest. This is the
case for the DRC, where the majority of cobalt is currently being produced. This project situates itself
within the debates on green extractivism and environmental protest, adding an important new
dimension: how the race for critical raw materials shapes and is shaped by (sub)national politics. It
seeks to conceptualize 'green extractivist populism' as a novel concept that can help understand the
relationship between green extractivism and politics at the subnational level. It does so by focusing
on the provinces of Lualaba and Haut-Katanga in the heart of the Congolese Copperbelt. Using
ethnographic methods and discourse analysis in a collaborative approach, the research team will try
to (1) gain a better understanding of relationship between green extractivism and extractive
populism in the Congolese Copperbelt and (2) explain the relative absence of environmental protest
against green extractivism in the Congolese Copperbelt. The team is composed of a promotor and a
postdoctoral researcher with extensive experience in the field and the region, who will collaborate
with three Congolese researchers throughout the project.