Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of injuries, violence, and death.

“I take one final look toward the child. I can see his face now, locked in a terminal expression of dread. That is the lasting image I take from the Congo—the heart of Africa reduced to the bloodstained corpse of a child, who died solely because he was digging for cobalt.”

This quote establishes the key image that Kara details throughout Cobalt Red, immediately introducing The Exploitation in Artisanal Mines. He argues throughout the book that the cobalt mining industry results in the injury and death of Congolese cobalt miners, some of whom are children. He uses vivid details like “a terminal expression of dread” to invite empathy for those suffering under this system.

“The ongoing exploitation of the poorest people of the Congo by the rich and powerful invalidates the purported moral foundation of contemporary civilization and drags humanity back to a time when the people of Africa were valued only by their replacement cost. The implications of this moral reversion, which is itself a form of violence, stretch far beyond central Africa across the entire global south, where a vast subclass of humanity continues to eke out a subhuman existence in slave-like conditions at the bottom of the global economic order. Less has changed since colonial times than we might care to admit.”

Kara details The Persistence of Colonialist Practices in this quote and throughout the text. He connects colonial history to the contemporary conditions in which the Congolese people work, arguing that these conditions are “slave-like” and that little has really changed since Western colonialism ended as a political system.

“As of 2022, there is no such thing as a clean supply chain of cobalt from the Congo. All cobalt sourced from the DRC is tainted by various degrees of abuse, including slavery, child labor, forced labor, debt bondage, human trafficking, hazardous and toxic working conditions, pathetic wages, injury and death, and incalculable environmental harm.”

In this quote, Kara contests claims of companies like Apple that the cobalt used in their manufactured consumer products, like laptops and cell phones, is safely and ethically sourced. Here, he details the results of his research into The Exploitation in Artisanal Mines. He lists his findings that are detailed throughout the book.