The geography of natural resources is more than a matter of physical location—it is a political economy variable of profound consequence. Where resources are located, how the state is structured, and who holds political power all shape how extraction occurs and how its gains and losses are distributed. This section explores the political asymmetries that emerge when regions of extraction are systematically outvoted, outspent, and overlooked within national governance frameworks.

Representation and the Arithmetic of Democracy

In most democracies, decisions are made through institutions of representation: legislatures, councils, executives. These institutions are designed to reflect the preferences of the majority. But when resource-bearing regions are minorities—whether in population, ethnicity, language, or geography—they often find themselves on the losing end of political arithmetic.

In Nigeria’s Niger Delta produces the oil wealth that sustains the federation, but it holds only a small fraction of Nigeria’s total population. In Brazil, the Amazonian states are vastly outnumbered by the urban centers of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. In Canada, Indigenous nations represent a demographic minority despite their vast territorial claims. In Iraq, the Kurdish region must negotiate revenue and autonomy from a position of perpetual demographic disadvantage. Across these cases, the misalignment between where resources are and where political power lies creates chronic frustration and grievance.

Geography and Democratic Distortion

A resource region that contributes the lion’s share of national income but holds a small fraction of the vote has limited power to demand reform. Worse, if it is culturally distinct or politically stigmatized, its grievances may be actively suppressed or reframed as threats to national unity. In such settings, democratic institutions may legitimize exclusion rather than alleviate it.

Federalism as Partial Remedy?

Federalism is often presented as a solution to spatial inequity. By devolving authority to subnational units, federal systems allow regions to tailor policies to their needs and retain a share of economic benefits. In theory, this empowers local voices and dampens tensions over extraction. But in practice, federalism often falls short—particularly in resource contexts. Why? Because fiscal and legal centralization frequently undermines the promise of autonomy. In many federal states, subnational governments have little or no control over resource licensing, revenue negotiation, or environmental enforcement. The central state retains ownership of subsurface minerals, negotiates deals with foreign companies, and controls the security forces deployed to protect extractive sites. This creates a situation in which federalism exists in name, but not in fiscal or political substance.

In theory, democracy offers a mechanism for redress. Elections, legislatures, and courts should provide channels for burdened regions to express grievance, seek redress, and reshape policy. But in practice, democracy often amplifies spatial inequality when political representation is based on population rather than impact.

From Externalities to Exclusion

One of the core insights of the MASI framework is that resource wealth generates externalities—social, environmental, and political costs—that are not internalized by the decision-makers who authorize extraction. In centralized systems, these decision-makers often sit far from the extraction site. Their calculus is shaped by national budgets, geopolitical alliances, or elite bargains—not by the lived realities of the communities most affected.

The result is a structural exclusion that is geographic in form but political in substance. Resource-bearing regions become “othered” spaces—at once essential and expendable. They are heavily patrolled, lightly served, and routinely overlooked in national debates about development priorities.

This form of exclusion is hard to correct through conventional governance reforms. Adding more oversight, transparency, or fiscal transfers may help—but only if paired with mechanisms that reconfigure spatial voice in democratic institutions. Otherwise, extraction continues without accountability, and democracy becomes performative rather than participatory for those who carry the burden.

When Geography Hardens Inequality

Ultimately, the political economy of resource extraction is deeply spatial. It creates a map of winners and losers that is inscribed not just in revenue figures, but in power, infrastructure, voice, and dignity. This geography hardens inequality, normalizes sacrifice, and reduces the capacity of national institutions to respond to localized grievance.

The MASI framework incorporates this insight by focusing on how political representation and voice interact with geographic concentration and immobility. It moves us away from one-size-fits-all governance metrics and toward a more nuanced understanding of subnational fragility. It recognizes that political economy is not only about actors and interests—it is also about place.

Spatial burden is intensified or mitigated by another structural variable: mobility—the degree to which individuals and communities can move, adapt, or escape the costs imposed on them.

Space as a Structuring Variable

In many development models, space is treated as neutral. Resource wealth is assumed to be fungible, and redistribution mechanisms are expected to equalize outcomes over time. But this assumption misses the structuring power of geography. Where a resource is located determines:

• Who bears its externalities
• Who negotiates its extraction
• Who is militarized to protect it
• And who is politically represented in decisions around it

This has critical consequences. When extractive industries are concentrated in politically weak or culturally distinct regions, they generate zones of exceptionalism—places where the rules of citizenship, governance, and justice diverge from the national norm. In these zones, state institutions are often viewed not as protectors but as enforcers. Democracy becomes thinner, surveillance grows thicker, and resistance becomes more rational.

Spatial injustice is not only a consequence of bad governance—it is a manifestation of institutional design that privileges some geographies over others. The absence of adequate voice, protection, or compensation for burdened regions is not a failure of implementation; it is often the intended or tolerated cost of centralized political bargains.

From Externalities to Exclusion

One of the core insights of the MASI framework is that resource wealth generates externalities—social, environmental, and political costs—that are not internalized by the decision-makers who authorize extraction. In centralized systems, these decision-makers often sit far from the extraction site. Their calculus is shaped by national budgets, geopolitical alliances, or elite bargains—not by the lived realities of the communities most affected.

The result is a structural exclusion that is geographic in form but political in substance. Resource-bearing regions become “othered” spaces—at once essential and expendable. They are heavily patrolled, lightly served, and routinely overlooked in national debates about development priorities.

This form of exclusion is hard to correct through conventional governance reforms. Adding more oversight, transparency, or fiscal transfers may help—but only if paired with mechanisms that reconfigure spatial voice in democratic institutions. Otherwise, extraction continues without accountability, and democracy becomes performative rather than participatory for those who carry the burden.

The MASI Framework: Why Space Matters

The Mobility-Augmented Stability Index (MASI) explicitly integrates geography as a core dimension of subnational conflict risk. It does this in three key ways:

Geographic Externalities (ΔW): MASI measures the disparity between the well-being of a resource-bearing region and what that region could reasonably attain under more equitable or autonomous governance. This “welfare delta” captures the material consequence of spatial marginalization.

Mobility Constraints (M): MASI accounts for the extent to which communities can escape the burden imposed on them. Physical, economic, legal, and cultural constraints to mobility are measured to reflect how trapped a population is within a high-externality space.

Perceived Injustice and Political Representation (B): MASI factors in both objective indicators and subjective perceptions—how much a community feels it is being excluded, how it is portrayed in national discourse, and whether its electoral or institutional leverage matches its burdens.