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Comment by 29athrowaway | Hacker News Reader

But they don't have the resources to build the infrastructure to extract it in a profitable way.

So likely what will happen is that China will do it and pay below market rate for the lithium.

I would not be surprised if the entire Boric fiasco is just Chinese infiltration.

That's one outcome, but they may find lots of companies and governments are willing to invest at more favorable conditions; the US is a logical candidate as well.

Why would more companies/states be interested investing in Chile if Chile nationalizes and takes a bigger chunk of the profits than before?

Stability and political counterweights.

Having a stable Chile as a source of resources to stack against other sources of resources may be worth the markup.

Because it is still profitable. Chile is one of the most stable Latinamerican countries.

So was Venezuela.

Was stable. Now it is the Monty Python Argument Clinic, constitutional version.

They're probably hoping to emulate Norway + Statoil, which has made the Norwegian state extremely rich[1]. It didn't stop oil exploration in Norwegian waters, quite the opposite.

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/99680a04-92a0-11de-b63b-00144feab...

They might end up emulating a petrodictatorship instead, because it's an open question whether they have the state capacity, institutions, and most importantly a populism-proof electorate to achieve what Norway has, instead of the default "resource curse" option most other oil-rich countries fell into.

Its always a dictatorship when a global south country refuses to play extraction-ball that will need to be "liberated".

I'm rooting for them to remain democratic, just saying the resource curse[0] is not a concept made up by evil dastardly westerners to keep "global south" countries down. It seems to be the default path, sadly.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_curse

Chile is actually a pretty well run country with a First World GDP. Yes, their economy is heavily based on natural resources but so is Australia or Canada.

Saudi Arabia on the other hand is fabulously corrupt but they were still able to take over their oil industry (Aramco) without problems and even go upmarket in petrochemicals with SABIC.

It used to. Now it is another leftist enabled Supermarket Sweep season.

Norway learned from other Iraq and avoided both the resource curse and Dutch disease:

https://psmag.com/environment/iraqi-vikings-farouk-al-kasim-...

Of course Norway has strong democratic institutions Iraq didn’t, but so did the Netherlands.

Why would you put a company in charge of a system controlled by nepotism and corruption?

For the same reason oil and gas companies still explore and agree to contracts with landowners for access to the underground minerals; it's still profitable after paying the owner of the mineral their cut.

In a world where Santa Claus exists, sure.

But in the real world, once you nationalize a company, it's a matter of time before it becomes a magnet for corrupt politicians.

The only world in which I would be OK with nationalization is where politician had shock collars connected to a nepotism/corruption detection AI. And where even false positives of such AI were OK.

> I would not be surprised if the entire Boric fiasco is just Chinese infiltration.

Large claims require citation. Got any?

Installing state officials in South America is historically a US tactic, not a Chinese tactic.

It has been a Russian tactic as well before the fall of the Berlin wall. The presence of Russians in Brazil during the military regime (mid 1900s) is well documented in history.

It's a "wealthier nation" tactic going back to Spanish/Portuguese first contact. Fuck, it's called "Latin America" and I'm pretty sure Latin isn't native language.

Rich people love pillaging and raping resource laden countries in the global south, assuming history is any indicator.

Edited for spelling

"I'm pretty sure Latin isn't native language."

Latin isn't native language anywhere except Latium. English isn't native language anywhere except England (even excluding places like Cornwall that used to speak Celtic languages until the modern era). Arabic isn't native language anywhere except the Arabian peninsula. Heck, Quechua isn't native language anywhere but a very small region around Cuzco and was deliberately introduced by the Incas to make management of their huge, multiethnic empire easier.

I don't think that ancient imperial language policies in itself are particularly shameful. Possibly the opposite. You can pillage and rape people without even talking to them, but if you want to trade and develop deeper relations, mutual understanding is a must.

> English isn't native language anywhere except England (even excluding places like Cornwall that used to speak Celtic languages until the modern era)

I mean, if you really want to play the game, the Angles (along with the Saxons) aren't native to England (i.e. Angle-land); they were a germanic tribe.

Of course, old english is a pretty far cry from the modern incarnation of the language.

How does "presence" translate to "installing state officials"?

Presence uses bribery to corrupt state officials.

What's the cutoff for the whataboutism? That's like 50+ years ago. Chinese have done the same thing and would do it even more if given the chance.

China only installs clandestine police stations, infiltrates companies, telecommunications and creates social media apps that push dangerous challenges that leave people with disabilities.

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