Doctoral Dissertation Research: Mining Investment, Mineral Rights, and Land Tenure

这项研究考虑了采矿投资、对底层土壤的合法权利和对地表土地的合法权利之间的联系。最近的学术研究表明，在采掘投资的速度和类型方面，美洲的底土所有权的地理位置正在发生重大变化。这项研究通过对在这些变化中占突出地位的两个地区进行有针对性的比较分析来探索这些变化。这项研究不仅将有助于研究人员，也将有助于公众在以下情况下了解所有权的法律变化：所有权迅速变化，新的土地治理结构正在开发过程中，所有权历史复杂，从现有记录中难以辨别。长期案例研究将在两个新形式的采掘投资地点进行：西弗吉尼亚州中北部的Marcellus和Utica页岩地层，以及厄瓜多尔西北部的Intag地区，据信蕴藏着矿石。本研究以土地权收购为研究对象，采用定性和定量相结合的方法进行研究。下层土壤所有权模式的地理位置是如何变化的，以及(Ii)体制和治理做法如何促进或阻碍这些变化。

This research considers the links between mining investment, legal rights to the subsoil, and legal rights to surface lands. Recent scholarship indicates that the geography of subsoil ownership in the Americas is undergoing significant changes regarding the pace and type of extractive investments. This study explores those changes by undertaking a targeted comparative analysis of two regions that figure prominently in these changes. This research will contribute to the development of methods not only for researchers but also for the public to understand legal changes to ownership in contexts where it is rapidly changing, new land governance structures are in the process of development, and ownership histories are complex and not readily discernible from available records.Long-term case studies will be undertaken in two sites for new forms of extractive investments: the Marcellus and Utica shale formations in north central West Virginia and the Intag region of northwest Ecuador, believed to contain mineral ores. The research focuses on subsoil rights acquisitions, and uses both qualitative and quantitative methods to determine (i.) how the geography of subsoil ownership patterns is changing, and (ii.) how these changes are facilitated or impeded by institutional and governance practices.