Abstract
Currently, there are 3,900 small municipalities in Brazil - here characterized as those with up to 20,000 inhabitants – in a universe of 5,570, whose responsibilities are becoming more extensive, which demands increasing competencies in the management as federated entities. According to Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics Data, about 57% of Brazilian municipal units are on the sidelines of any basic planning process, a fact that is aggravated when small municipalities become the target of large economic enterprises, such as mining projects. In this context, they might have their scenarios modified by the impacts (environmental, social, economic, etc.) generated by these projects, largely due to the deficiency of the basic planning process in safeguarding these spaces. In order to analyze and reflect the impact of the implementation of these enterprises in small municipalities, this research presents references on the processes of reproduction of preexisting geographic and historical scenarios arising from mining activities, their consequences in the life of the affected communities and in the management of municipal powers of three cities in the countryside of the State of Minas Gerais, Brazil: Riacho dos Machados, Conceição do Mato Dentro and Serra do Salitre. For this, a bibliographical and field research was carried out, whose analysis of these realities was based on the participation of the researcher as subject. The data collection was carried out through two different means of investigation: (a) theoretical reference on the urban and historical evolution of the municipalities and (b) application of a semi-structured interview with local agents in order to verify the perception of the impacts of the implementation of these projects in the daily life administrative and social aspects of these small municipalities. The results show that the implantation of large mining projects in small municipalities ends up reverberating a discourse imbued with bringing development to these places through voluptuous investments under the justification of the need for jobs and the movement of the local economy as an instrument to guarantee a prosperous future within the capitalist logic. On the other hand, the research indicates, from the analysis, that these voluptuous investments can contribute precisely to the opposite intention, reinforcing the underdevelopment character of these small municipalities through processes of accumulation by spoliation.
