Risky Business: Neoliberalism and Workplace Safety in Wyoming Coal Mines

This article traces how miners in Wyoming's Powder River Basin, a region that currently produces a majority of the coal mined in the United States, were able to constrain and counter the individualization of workplace risk, a troubling and key technology of neoliberal governance. Onsite research at four surface mines suggests that miners affirm the crew's collective responsibility for mitigating risk by reframing official safety programs in terms of kinship, specifically the ties of relatedness crew members create with each other over the course of everyday work practices. Management eventually adopted this framing as well in order to distance themselves from an industry blighted by conflict, encourage employees to stay in the midst of a labor shortage, and maintain enviable safety records. The article concludes by evaluating the performance of the new safety programs and pointing to the larger lessons to be learned form this fieldsite about neoliberalism, workplace safety and risk.