Abstract
Mineral development decisions require complex trade-offs for countless rightsholders and stakeholders. Generally, these rightsholders and stakeholders interact under cooperation or conflict to find the best outcome for their respective group. Game theory, which is an extremely broad field with applications across numerous industries, can provide a structured approach to understanding how mining stakeholders and rightsholders interact and make trade-offs. Unfortunately, there is a considerable lack of examples that show how useful game theory applications could be for the mining industry. This poster presents how game theory can be applied to the mining industry to continue to push mining to prioritize the long-term sustainability of their operations in terms of environmental health, thriving local communities, and economic strength. Topics explored include impact and benefit agreements, social license to operate, company-community relationships, cumulative impacts, and sustainability trade-offs. Findings suggest that bargaining game theory specifically has potential for many applications. In addition, game theory can be used to analyze interactions among many users of a region and help with cumulative impact studies. Trade-offs of players can be modelled and implemented when assumptions or value-functions are developed.