IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/ijurrs/v47y2023i5p861-875.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

GEOGRAPHIES OF EXCLUSION: Reproducing Dispossession and Erasure within a Waste Picker Organization in Mumbai

Author

Listed:
  • Sneha Sharma

Abstract

A rich seam of waste scholarship already addresses the exclusion faced by informal waste workers as cities in the global South undergo spatial transformations to become ‘world class’. However, less attention has been paid to how state practices have reproduced inequalities within and across waste picker communities. Drawing upon eleven months of ethnographic research at Mumbai's Deonar dump site, this article maps the practices through which waste workers have responded to their exclusion following a massive fire in 2016. It demonstrates that social exclusion is experienced differently by different members of the community and calls for a greater focus on heterogeneity amongst waste workers. Multi‐dimensional vulnerabilities manifest through these workers’ deal‐making strategies, while simultaneously mirroring the conditions of marginality produced by the state. The article contributes to debates on marginality by employing the lens of erasure to show how exclusion relies on the optics of visibility and invisibility. By unpicking the hierarchical structure within one waste worker organization, the article argues that the state‐led mandate for garbage‐free cities in India disproportionately affects those located at the margins of marginalized groups.

Suggested Citation

  • Sneha Sharma, 2023. "GEOGRAPHIES OF EXCLUSION: Reproducing Dispossession and Erasure within a Waste Picker Organization in Mumbai," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(5), pages 861-875, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ijurrs:v:47:y:2023:i:5:p:861-875
    DOI: 10.1111/1468-2427.13204
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-2427.13204
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/1468-2427.13204?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peter Nas & Rivke Jaffe, 2004. "Informal Waste Management," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 6(3), pages 337-353, September.
    2. Tatiana A. Thieme, 2020. "Rethinking the Affirmative Value, Politics and Materiality of Waste on the Urban Periphery," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 51(6), pages 1613-1627, November.
    3. Gill, Kaveri, 2009. "Of Poverty and Plastic: Scavenging and Scrap Trading Entrepreneurs in India's Urban Informal Economy," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198060864, Decembrie.
    4. Nicola Banks & Melanie Lombard & Diana Mitlin, 2020. "Urban Informality as a Site of Critical Analysis," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 56(2), pages 223-238, February.
    5. Tatiana Thieme, 2017. "Navigating and negotiating ethnographies of urban hustle in Nairobi slums," City, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 219-231, March.
    6. Do Carmo, Maria Scarlet & Puppim de Oliveira, Jose Antonio, 2010. "The Semantics of Garbage and the organization of the recyclers: Implementation challenges for establishing recycling cooperatives in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 54(12), pages 1261-1268.
    7. Manuel Rosaldo, 2022. "The Antinomies of Successful Mobilization: Colombian Recyclers Manoeuvre between Dispossession and Exploitation," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 53(2), pages 251-278, March.
    8. Catherina J Schenck & Phillip F Blaauw & Elizabeth C Swart & Jacoba M M Viljoen & Naome Mudavanhu, 2019. "The management of South Africa’s landfills and waste pickers on them: Impacting lives and livelihoods," Development Southern Africa, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 36(1), pages 80-98, January.
    9. Solomon Benjamin, 2008. "Occupancy Urbanism: Radicalizing Politics and Economy beyond Policy and Programs," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 32(3), pages 719-729, September.
    10. Yujiro Hayami & A. K. Dikshit & S. N. Mishra, 2006. "Waste pickers and collectors in Delhi: Poverty and environment in an urban informal sector," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(1), pages 41-69.
    11. Nate Millington & Kathleen Stokes & Mary Lawhon, 2022. "Whose Value Lies in the Urban Mine? Reconfiguring Permissions, Work, and the Benefits of Waste in South Africa," Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 112(7), pages 1942-1957, October.
    12. Jutta Gutberlet & Bruno de Oliveira Jayme, 2010. "The Story of My Face : How Environmental Stewards Perceive Stigmatization (Re)produced By Discourse," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 2(11), pages 1-15, October.
    13. Tatiana Thieme & Michele Lancione & Elisabetta Rosa, 2017. "The city and its margins," City, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 127-134, March.
    14. Seth Schindler & J. Miguel Kanai, 2018. "Producing Localized Commodity Frontiers at the End of Cheap Nature: An Analysis of Eco‐scalar Carbon Fixes and their Consequences," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(5), pages 828-844, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Anna Barford & Saffy Rose Ahmad, 2021. "A Call for a Socially Restorative Circular Economy: Waste Pickers in the Recycled Plastics Supply Chain," Circular Economy and Sustainability,, Springer.
    2. Tom Gillespie, 2020. "The Real Estate Frontier," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(4), pages 599-616, July.
    3. Noleen R. Chikowore & John M. Kerr, 2020. "A Qualitative Inquiry into Collecting Recyclable Cans and Bottles as a Livelihood Activity at Football Tailgates in the United States," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(14), pages 1-15, July.
    4. Tatiana A. Thieme, 2020. "Rethinking the Affirmative Value, Politics and Materiality of Waste on the Urban Periphery," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 51(6), pages 1613-1627, November.
    5. Carrie L Mitchell, 2009. "Trading Trash in the Transition: Economic Restructuring, Urban Spatial Transformation, and the Boom and Bust of Hanoi's Informal Waste Trade," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 41(11), pages 2633-2650, November.
    6. Arup Mitra, 2010. "Migration, Livelihood and Well-being: Evidence from Indian City Slums," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 47(7), pages 1371-1390, June.
    7. Chandan Deuskar, 2020. "Informal urbanisation and clientelism: Measuring the global relationship," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 57(12), pages 2473-2490, September.
    8. Monika Streule & Ozan Karaman & Lindsay Sawyer & Christian Schmid, 2020. "Popular Urbanization: Conceptualizing Urbanization Processes Beyond Informality," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(4), pages 652-672, July.
    9. Ernest Kimbugwe & Olurominiyi O. Ibitayo, 2014. "Analysis of characteristics, activities, and exposure to vermin of human landfill scavengers in a developing nation," Environment Systems and Decisions, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 358-365, June.
    10. Azunre, Gideon Abagna & Amponsah, Owusu & Takyi, Stephen Appiah & Mensah, Henry & Braimah, Imoro, 2022. "Urban informalities in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA): A solution for or barrier against sustainable city development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    11. Ligita Gasparėnienė & Rita Remeikienė & Colin C. Williams, 2022. "Unemployment and the Informal Economy," SpringerBriefs in Economics, Springer, number 978-3-030-96687-4, September.
    12. Sasaki, Shunsuke & Araki, Tetsuya & Tambunan, Armansyah Halomoan & Prasadja, Heru, 2014. "Household income, living and working conditions of dumpsite waste pickers in Bantar Gebang: Toward integrated waste management in Indonesia," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 11-21.
    13. Martine El Ouardi & Françoise Montambeault, 2023. "COLLECTIVELY GARDENING THE URBAN PUBLIC SPACE IN MEXICO CITY: When Informal Practices Interact with the State," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(2), pages 201-220, March.
    14. Nikita Sud, 2020. "The Unfixed State of Unfixed Land," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 51(5), pages 1175-1198, September.
    15. Kristian Hoelscher, 2016. "The evolution of the smart cities agenda in India," International Area Studies Review, Center for International Area Studies, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, vol. 19(1), pages 28-44, March.
    16. Seth Schindler & Jonathan Silver, 2019. "Florida in the Global South: How Eurocentrism Obscures Global Urban Challenges—and What We Can Do about It," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(4), pages 794-805, July.
    17. Malini Ranganathan, 2014. "Paying for Pipes, Claiming Citizenship: Political Agency and Water Reforms at the Urban Periphery," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(2), pages 590-608, March.
    18. Begoña Aramayona & Valeria Guarneros-Meza, 2024. "The ‘In/formal Nocturnal City’: Updating a research agenda on nightlife studies from a Southern European perspective," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 61(3), pages 589-603, February.
    19. Richard Kiaka & Shiela Chikulo & Sacha Slootheer & Paul Hebinck, 2021. "“The street is ours”. A comparative analysis of street trading, Covid-19 and new street geographies in Harare, Zimbabwe and Kisumu, Kenya," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 13(5), pages 1263-1281, October.
    20. Dawson, Katherine, 2021. "Under the wire: splintered time and ongoing temporariness in Accra’s electropolis," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 108572, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:ijurrs:v:47:y:2023:i:5:p:861-875. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0309-1317 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.