This paper is a case study of a Canadian-owned gold mineoriginally planned for a periglacial region straddling the Chilean-Argentinean border. Downstream water rights in Chile affect the Diaguitas, an indigenous peoples with a subsistence lifestyle.This study reveals this ill-defined population exists as an ideology of the unknown that corporate interests and Chilean environmental regulators have been unable to acknowledge in the existing regulatory culture. Barrick's resultant approach is a two-fold failure: firstly, from the denial of any non-compliance according to its environmental permits; secondly, in practice, from the inability to articulate a comprehensive voice for the interests of the Diaguitas as the very peoples that would be the most immediate subjects of a right to water. In 2013, a Chilean court's injunction against further development culminated both indigenous and environmental disputes. As a direct result, Barrick has suffered a credit downgrade, billions in cost overruns, and an almost complete turnover in upper management including its founder, Peter Munk. Barrick is now a textbook case for governance failure due to social/environmental concerns. In our understanding of a right to water, I conclude with the need for theorists to construe development objectives through mutually supporting lenses: indigenous rights to free, prior and informed consent, as well as environmental protections enabling the enjoyment of human dignity.

Keywords: Water rights, Mining, Social/environment risk management, Social license to operate.