Extractive Economy and Institutions? Technology, Labour, and Land in Potosí, the Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century.

The mita is frequently seen as a paradigmatic example of an extractive economic and political institution of the Spanish Empire. This chapter fijirst provides an overview of the complex process to obtain silver, showing it is more than mere extraction. The second part delineates a complex picture of extraction based on unfree (mita) and free labour, at the same time. A close analysis of the mita reveals changes, reminding us that institutions have a transformative history. Behind the continuity of the mita, there were far-reaching changes like the emergence of an important group of self-employed workers (kajchas) who were processing ores. In the third part, labour relations are linked to the institutions of land and mine ownership within the Spanish Empire.