Megaprojects: Two Voices on Earth and Metal

Megaprojects are not merely constructions. They are operations that enact a particular relationship to the earth. Two voices, two ways of articulating what is at stake when technical systems transform soil, rivers, forests. One speaks of modernization, the other of profanation. Neither names megaprojects directly, yet each illuminates an aspect: the earth as an object to be dominated, or as a space where spirits move.

The Earth as a Stakes of the End Times

In his sixth lecture, Bruno Latour questions what it means not to bring the end times to a close. He does not describe megaprojects, but he outlines their framework. Modernization, as he analyzes it, is a process that turns the earth into an object of technical concern. It is no longer a backdrop, nor a reservoir of resources, but a place where something essential is decided: the survival of a certain relationship to the world.

6th Lecture – How (Not) to Bring the End Times to a Close?

This lecture does not mention dams, mines, or roads. It speaks of how modernity confronts its own limits. Megaprojects, though unnamed, emerge as devices that extend this confrontation. They are not solutions, but symptoms: attempts to master an earth that resists domination. Latour does not say the earth is disappearing. He says the question of its disappearance has become central. It is no longer a background, but an actor.

Omama’s Metal and the Vanishing Earth

Davi Kopenawa speaks of another kind of disappearance. In The Falling Sky, he does not describe construction sites, but a cosmology in which metal is tied to Omama, a figure who sustains the world’s balance. Without this metal, the earth no longer holds. It is not an object to be exploited, but a space inhabited by spirits. Megaprojects, though not designated as such, appear as operations that break this equilibrium.

In ours, which is the world of spirits, we speak of Omama’s metal, for without it, the earth would vanish, and its inhabitants with it.

Kopenawa does not say the metal is sacred. He says that without it, the earth would disappear—not as a landscape, but as a world where humans and spirits coexist. Extraction is not a neutral operation. It entails a rupture with what holds the earth together. Megaprojects, though unnamed, are acts that tear away this metal, and with it, a certain way of dwelling in the world.

Two Ways of Speaking of the Earth

Latour and Kopenawa do not speak of the same things. One analyzes a process of modernization that turns the earth into a technical stakes. The other describes a cosmology where the earth is a living space, where metal is an element that keeps it in place. Megaprojects, though not at the center of their words, emerge as operations that engage these two visions.

For Latour, they are devices that extend a certain idea of modernity. For Kopenawa, they are acts that break with the spirits. In both cases, the earth is not a mere object. It is what is at stake.

Neither offers a solution. Latour does not say how to bring the end times to a close. Kopenawa does not say how to preserve Omama’s metal. They simply propose observing what happens when megaprojects transform the earth: a technical domination, or a rupture with the spirits.

What Remains

The two voices do not converge. Nor do they oppose each other. They describe two ways of thinking about what megaprojects entail. Latour speaks of an earth that has become a stakes of survival for modernity. Kopenawa speaks of an earth that vanishes if what holds it together is removed.

Megaprojects are not the main subject of these texts. But they are an illustration. They show that the earth is never a mere backdrop. It is what is transformed, or what is broken. Without judgment, without conclusion, these two fragments invite us to distinguish before seeking common ground.