This article explores socioenvironmental mining conflicts, from the contradiction between economic growth in Chile, which strongly depends on mineral production for global markets, and the national and international agreements that aim to protect indigenous communities and the environment where they live. One of the main issues centers on water resources located in these territories. In this sense, our research is also focused the elements that shape interactions and conflicts between companies and indigenous communities, such as the importance of the dynamics of the Indigenous Andean population, and the fluid use that they make of urban and rural space, the process of recognition and formalization of the Indigenous people, communities and territories, and the territorialization of the mining industry since the 1980s. These processes are illustrated through the case of the Lagunillas wetlands, located in the foothills of the Tarapaca region.