Economies of recycling : the global transformation of materials, values and social relations

"In the first decade of the twenty-first century, the largest export from the US to China was scrap. But despite the sheer scale of this global trade in used materials, it has yet to be clearly identified and examined. Combining fine-grained ethnographic analysis with an overview of the international flow of materials, Economies of Recycling reveals the astonishing new social relations and identities created by recycling. It shows how marginal economies are producing social collectives and projects around local and global decay, often with waste labour bringing high monetary reward, as well as danger. This timely collection debunks the common linear understanding of production, exchange and consumption and argues for a complete re-evaluation of North-South economic relationships"--Provided by publisher Following global material chains, this groundbreaking book reveals astonishing connections between persons, households, cities and global regions as objects are reworked, taken to pieces and traded