EXTRACTIVE ROOTS, DIVIDED FUTURES: ETHNICITY, RESOURCE WEALTH, AND THE POLITICS OF FISCAL POLICY IN GUYANA

Abstract

This thesis examines how the legacies of colonialism and Cold War geopolitics have shaped Guyana’s fiscal policy, institutional architecture, and enduring patterns of ethnic inequality. Through a historically grounded analysis, it traces how British colonial governance fostered extractive institutions and racialized labor divisions, while Cold War interventions entrenched authoritarianism and ethnic clientelism within the state apparatus. The result was a political economy in which fiscal policy became a tool not of redistribution or development, but of patronage and division. With the discovery of vast offshore oil reserves and the influx of petroleum revenues, Guyana now stands at a pivotal juncture: oil wealth offers the unprecedented potential to reverse historical inequalities—or to deepen them under new conditions of resource dependency. Employing a multidisciplinary framework that draws on Dependency Theory, Rentier State Theory, and Participatory Democracy, this thesis interrogates whether Guyana’s emerging oil regime has thus far fostered inclusion or exacerbated existing divides. Ultimately, it argues that without radical institutional reform and meaningful civic engagement, the country risks reproducing its past under the guise of petro-futurism.