Resumen de Municipal waste, environmental justice, right to the city and the irregular economy: valuing the work of informal waste pickers in the catalan recycling sector
Over the last 50 years, the implementation of municipally-run integrated waste management systems in Europe has led to the professionalization of the sector, leaving little room for the informal recycling sector. However, since the last decade, new social groups have emerged, usually immigrants, who have found in this sector a new way of life. In many Catalan cities, the informal collection of waste is an increasingly present activity, providing economic income to people who cannot work in the formal labor sector, either because of their citizenship status, or due to situations of social exclusion.
Though the presence of informal recyclers is noticed through-out Catalonia, there is little understanding, especially in the academic world, of their prevalence, the contributions that their work is making towards environmental goals, and how their work is affecting the formal waste system. Furthermore, though they are performing an environmental benefit to society, they are receiving little to no recognition for the work that they are doing, and it is unclear why. This investigation attempts to answer the question, how is informality valued with regard to the environmental goals of a society? In order to answer this question, while at the same time recognizing the socio-environmental disadvantages the informal recycling sector has within the larger societal structure, an environmental justice perspective is employed as a theoretical framework. Within the environmental justice framework, two other frameworks from the French writer Henri Lefebvre are also employed. The first is Lefebvre’s (1991) three views of space that exist within the urban core: perceived (physical), conceived (mental), and lived, to help understand how space shapes the informal recyclers’ work. The second is Lefebvre’s (1968) views of the commons that help consider who can access and benefit from materials perceived as waste.
For this investigation, a mixed-method approach is used to try and answer the main question using interviews, participatory observation, questionnaires, and comparative research methods. This approach provides quantitative data to understand the impact of the informal waste sector, along with qualitative data to understand the social reality where they exist. For this investigation, a case study was performed in the Catalan city of Granollers to collect empirical data, along with additional interviews with other municipalities throughout Catalonia in order to answer the main question.
The results show that though there has always been an informal recycling sector in Catalonia, the current members are not given the same level of respect since they are made up of immigrants and ethnic groups that come from abroad, and who have their own divisions and ethnic identities. As well, analysis shows that the spaces that the informal recycling sector operate dictate ownership and access of material, as well as the lived experience of the recyclers. The relationship between the formal and informal recycling sector is somewhat symbiotic. Though the formal recycling sector does not view the informal as a part of the waste management system and uses its power to limit access of the resources, they still operate in a co-dependent relationship, where each is affected by the other, and adjusts according to global market prices. Finally, although the lived experience of the informal recycling sector best exemplifies the unequal distribution of environmental risks and toxic burdens coupled with environmental and social injustices that exist within the waste management system, the informal recycling sector are inhabitants of the city, and therefore have a right to it.
