Geographies of E-waste: Towards a political ecology approach to e-waste and digital technologies

Geography Compass

Volumn 8, Issue 2, 2014, Pages 111-124

  Pickren, Graham ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT; HAZARDOUS WASTE; RECYCLING; WASTE MANAGEMENT;

EID: 84893484455     PISSN: None     EISSN: 17498198     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/gec3.12115     Document Type: Article

References (80)

1. Adhikari, R. (2010). UN: tidal wave of e-waste poisoning developing nations. 22 February Tech News World. Available at http://www.technewsworld.com/story/69393.html
2. Amoyaw-Osei, Y., Agyekum, O. O., Pwamang, J., Mueller, E., Fasko, R., & Schleup, M. (2011). Ghana e-waste country assessment. Prepared for the Secretariat of the Basel Convention http://ewasteguide.info/Amoyaw-Osei_2011_GreenAd-Empa
3. Baird, I. G., & Quastel, N. (2011). Dolphin-safe tuna from California to Thailand: localisms in environmental certification of global commodity networks. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 101 (2), pp. 337-355.
4. Bakker, K. (2005). Neoliberalizing nature? Market environmentalism in water supply in England and Wales. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 95 (3), pp. 542-565.
5. Bennett, J. (2009). Vibrant matter: a political ecology of things. Durham: Duke University Press.
6. Bi, X., Thomas, G. O., Jones, K. C., Qu, W., Sheng, G., Martin, F. L., & Fu, J. (2007). Exposure of electronics dismantling workers to polybrominated diphenyl ethers, polychlorinated biphenyls, and organochlorine pesticides in South China. Environmental Science & Technology 41 (16), pp. 5647-5653.
7. Braun, B. (2002). The intemperate rainforest: nature, culture, and power on Canada's west coast. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
8. Bridge, G., & Jonas, A. (2002). Governing nature: the reregulation of resource access, production, and consumption. Environment and Planning A 34 (5), pp. 759-766.
9. Brigden, K., Labunska, I., Santillo, D., & Allsopp, M. (2005). Recycling of electronic wastes in China and India: workplace & environmental contamination. Report by Greenpeace International. Available at http://www.greenpeace.org/international/PageFiles/25134/recycling-of-electronic-waste.pdf
10. Coe, N. M., Dicken, P., & Hess, M. (2008). Global production networks: realizing the potential. Journal of Economic Geography 8 (3), pp. 271-295.
11. Crang, M., Hughes, A., Gregson, N., Norris, L., & Ahamed, F. (2013). Rethinking governance and value in commodity chains through global recycling networks. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 38 (1), pp. 12-24.
12. Davies, A. R. (2011). Geography and the matter of waste mobilities. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 36 (4), pp. 1475-5661.
13. Environmental Protection Agency. (2011). Electronics waste management in the United States through 2009. Office of Resource Conservation and Recovery. Available at http://www.epa.gov/osw/conserve/materials/ecycling/docs/fullbaselinereport2011.pdf
14. Grant, R., & Oteng-Ababio, M. (2012). Mapping the invisible and real "African" economy: urban e-waste circuitry. Urban Geography 33 (1), pp. 1-21.
15. Gregson, N., Crang, M., Ahamed, F., Akhter, N., & Ferdous, R. (2010). Following things of rubbish value: End-of-life ships, 'chock-chocky' furniture and the Bangladeshi middle class consumer. Geoforum 41 (6), pp. 846-854.
16. Gregson, N., Crang, M., Ahamed, F. U., Akter, N., Ferdous, R., Foisal, S., & Hudson, R. (2012). Territorial Agglomeration and Industrial Symbiosis: Sitakunda-Bhatiary, Bangladesh, as a Secondary Processing Complex. Economic Geography 88 (1), pp. 37-58.
17. Gross, T. (2012). After dump, what happens to electronic waste? Fresh Air. National Public Radio broadcast December 21
18. Foster, J. B. (2000). Marx's Ecology: materialism and nature. New York: Monthly Review Press.
19. Harvey, D. (1982). The limits to capital. Oxford: Blackwell.
20. Herod, A., Pickren, G., Rainnie, A., & McGrath-Champ, S. (2013a). Waste, commodity fetishism and the ongoingness of economic life. Area 45 (3), pp. 376-382.
21. th, 2013. DOI: 10.1093/jeg/lbt015
22. Hicks, C., Dietmar, R., & Eugster, M. (2005). The recycling and disposal of electrical and electronic waste in China - legislative and market responses. Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (5), pp. 459-471.
23. Hudson, R. (2008). Cultural political economy meets global production networks: a productive meeting?. Journal of Economic Geography 8, pp. 421-440.
24. Huo, X., Peng, L., Xu, X., Zheng, L., Qiu, B., Qi, Z., Zhang, B., Han, D., & Piao, Z. (2007). Elevated blood lead levels of children in Guiyu, an electronic waste recycling town in China. Environmental Health Perspectives 115 (7), pp. 1113-1117.
25. IBM. No date. A mandate for change is a mandate for smart. Available at http://www.ibm.com/smarterplanet/global/files/us__en_us__overview__68655_08_522_11092012.pdf
26. Kahhat, R., & Williams, E. (2009). Product or Waste? Importation and End-of-Life Processing of Computers in Peru. Environmental Science and Technology 43, pp. 6010-6016.
27. Kahhat, R., Kim, J., Xu, M., Allenby, B., Williams, E., & Zhang, P. (2008). Exploring e-waste management systems in the United States. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 52 (7), pp. 955-964.
28. Khetriwal, D. S., Kraeuchi, P., & Widmer, R. (2009). Producer responsibility for e-waste management: key issues for consideration - learning from the Swiss experience. Journal of Environmental Management 90 (1), pp. 153-165.
29. Klein, P. (2009). Ghana: digital dumping ground. PBS Frontline 23 June. Available at http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/ghana804/video/video_index.html
30. Lane, R., & Watson, M. (2012). Stewardship of things: the radical potential of product stewardship for re-framing responsibilities and relationships to products and materials. Geoforum 43 (6), pp. 1254-1265.
31. Lepawsky, J. (2012). Legal geographies of e-waste legislation in Canada and the US: jurisdiction, responsibility and the taboo of production. Geoforum 43 (6), pp. 1194-1206.
32. Lepawsky, J., & Billah, M. (2011). Making chains that (un)make things: waste-value relations and the Bangladeshi rubbish electronics industry. Geografiska Annaler Series B-Human Geography 93B (2), pp. 121-139.
33. Lepawsky, J., & Mather, C. (2011). From beginnings and endings to boundaries and edges: rethinking circulation and exchange through electronic waste. Area 43 (3), pp. 242-249.
34. Lepawsky, J., & Mcnabb, C. (2010). Mapping international flows of electronic waste. Canadian Geographer-Geographe Canadien 54 (2), pp. 177-195.
35. Leslie, D., & Reimer, S. (1999). Spatializing commodity chains. Progress in Human Geography 23 (3), pp. 401-420.
36. Leung, A. O. W., Luksemburg, W. J., Wong, A. S., & Wong, M. H. (2007). Spatial distribution of polybrominated diphenyl ethers and polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans in soil and combusted residue at Guiyu, an electronic waste recycling site in southeast China. Environmental Science & Technology 41 (8), pp. 2730-2737.
37. Lewis, A. (2010). Europe breaking electronic waste export ban. BBC News 4 August. Available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-10846395.
38. MacBride, S. (2012). Recycling Reconsidered: The Present Failure and Future Promise of Environmental Action in the United States. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
39. Mann, G. (2009). Should political ecology be Marxist? A case for Gramsci's historical materialism. Geoforum 40, pp. 335-344.
40. Manomaivibool, P. (2009). Extended producer responsibility in a non-OECD context: the management of waste electrical and electronic equipment in India. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 53 (3), pp. 136-144.
41. Mansfield, B. (2004). Rules of privatization: contradictions in neoliberal regulation of North Pacific fisheries. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 94 (3), pp. 565-584.
42. Massey, D. (1994). A global sense of place. In: Massey, D. (ed.) Space, place, and gender Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, pp. 146-156.
43. Mitchell, D. (1996). The life of the land: migrant workers and the California landscape. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
44. McCarthy, J. (2005). Devolution in the woods: community forestry as hybrid neoliberalism. Environment and Planning A 37 (6), pp. 995-1014.
45. McCarthy, J. (2002). First World political ecology: lessons from the Wise Use movement. Environment and Planning A 34 (7), pp. 1281-1302.
46. Peet, R., & Watt, M. (1996 [2004]). Liberation ecologies: environment, development, social movements. 2nd ed. New York: Routledge.
47. Pelley, S. (2008). Following the trail of toxic e-waste. CBS 60 Minutes Retrieved 10/13/2011, 2011, from http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/11/06/60minutes/main4579229.shtml?tag=currentVideoInfo;videoMetaInfo
48. Pellow, D., & Park, L. S. (2002). The Silicon Valley of dreams: environmental justice, immigrant workers, and the high-tech global economy. New York: New York University Press.
49. Pellow, D. (2007). Resisting global toxics: transnational movements for environmental justice. Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press.
50. Pickren, G. (forthcoming). Political ecologies of electronic waste: uncertainty and legitimacy in the governance of e-waste geographies. Environment and Planning A.
51. Prudham, S. (2003). Taming trees: capital, science, and nature in Pacific slope tree improvement. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 93 (3), pp. 636-656.
52. Puckett, J., Byster, L., Westervelt, S., Gutierrez, R., Davis, S., Hussain, A., & Dutta, M. (2002). Exporting Harm: The High-Tech Trashing of Asia. Report by the Basel Action Network. Available at http://www.ban.org/E-waste/technotrashfinalcomp.pdf
53. Puckett, J., Westervelt, S., Gutierrez, R., & Takamiya, Y. (2005). The Digital Dump: Exporting Re-Use and Abuse to Africa. Report by the Basel Action Network. Available at http://ban.org/library/TheDigitalDump.pdf
54. Reddy, R. N. (2013). Revitalising economies of disassembly: informal recyclers, development experts and e-waste reforms in Bangalore. Economic and Political Weekly. XLVIII (13), pp. 62-70.
55. Robbins, P. (2012). Political ecology: a critical introduction. New York: Wiley-Blackwell.
56. Robinson, B. H. (2009). E-waste: an assessment of global production and environmental impacts. Science of the Total Environment 408 (2), pp. 183-191.
57. Rocheleau, D., Thomas-Slayter, B., & Wangari, E. (1996). Feminist political ecology: global issues and local experience. New York: Routledge.
58. Rossem, C. van, Tojo, N., & Lindhqvist, T. (2006). Extended producer responsibility - an examination of its impact on innovation and greening of products. Report commissioned by Greenpeace International, Friends of the Earth and the European Environmental Bureau (EEB. Available at http://www.greenpeace.org/international/PageFiles/24472/epr.pdf
59. Sachs, N. (2006). Planning the funeral at the birth: extended producer responsibility in the European Union and the United States. Harvard Environmental Law Review 30 (1), pp. 51-98.
60. Schluep, M., Hagelueken, C., Kuehr, R., Magalini, F., Maurer, C., Meskers, C., Mueller, E., & Wang, F. (2009). Sustainable Innovation and Technology Transfer Industrial Sector Studies: Recycling From E-Waste to Resources. Prepared for the United Nations Environment Programme. Available at http://ewasteguide.info/UNEP_2009_eW2R
61. Smith, N. (2008). Uneven development: Nature, capital, and the production of space. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press.
62. Soderberg, J. (2008). Hacking capitalism: the free and open source software movement. New York and London: Routledge.
63. Spicer, A., & Johnson, M. (2004). Third-party demanufacturing as a solution for extended producer responsibility. Journal of Cleaner Production 12 (1), pp. 37-45.
64. Streicher-Porte, M., Widmer, R., Jain, A., Bader, H., Scheidegger, R., & Kytzia, S. (2005). Key drivers of the e-waste recycling system: assessing and modelling e-waste processing in the informal sector in Delhi. Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (5), pp. 472-491.
65. Swyngedouw, E., & Heynen, N. (2003). Urban political ecology, justice and the politics of scale. Antipode 35 (5), pp. 898-918.
66. Taylor, A. (2013). North Dakota's oil boom. The Atlantic, 13 March 2013. Available at http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2013/03/north-dakotas-oil-boom/100473/
67. Tong, X., & Wang, J. (2004). Transnational flows of e-waste and spatial patterns of recycling in China. Eurasian Geography and Economics 45 (8), pp. 608-621.
68. United Nations Environment Programme and United Nations University. (2009). Sustainable innovation and technology transfer industrial sector studies: recycling - from e-waste to resources. Solving the E-Waste Problem Initiative. Available at http://www.unep.org/pdf/pressreleases/E-waste_publication_screen_finalversion-sml.pdf
69. United Nations Environment Programme. (2005). E-waste: the hidden side of IT equipment's manufacture and use. http://www.grid.unep.ch/products/3_Reports/ew_ewaste.en.pdf
70. United Nations Environment Programme. (2013). Soaring Demand for Metals Calls for Rethink of Recycling Practices, Says International Resource Panel. UNEP News Centre, April 24. Available at http://www.unep.org/newscentre/default.aspx?DocumentID=2713&ArticleID=9484
71. United Nations University. (2012). E-waste: Annual gold, silver "deposits" in new high-tech goods worth $21B; less than 15% recovered. Press release, 9 July. Available at http://unu.edu/news/releases/step-news-release-6-july-2012-e-waste-precious-metals-recovery.html
72. Vandergeest, P. (2007). Certification and communities: alternatives for regulating the environmental and social impacts of shrimp farming. World Development 35 (7), pp. 1152-1171.
73. Wang, F., Huisman, J., Meskers, C. E. M., Schluep, M., Stevels, A., & Hagelüken, C. (2012). The Best-of-2-Worlds philosophy: Developing local dismantling and global infrastructure network for sustainable e-waste treatment in emerging economies. Waste Management 32, pp. 2134-2146.
74. Widmer, R., Oswald-Krapf, H., Sinha-Khetriwal, D., Schnellmann, M., & Boni, H. (2005). Global perspectives on e-waste. Environmental Impact Assessment Review 25 (5), pp. 436-458.
75. Wiens, K. (2012). Unfixable computers are leading humanity down a perilous path. Wired June 22 Available at http://www.wired.com/opinion/2012/06/apples-unfixable-devices/
76. Williams, E., Kahhat, R., Allenby, B., Kavazanjian, E., Kim, J., & Xu, M. (2008). Environmental, social, and economic implications of global reuse and recycling of personal computers. Environmental Science & Technology 42 (17), pp. 6446-6454.
77. Wong, C. S. C., Duzgoren-Aydin, N. S., Aydin, A., & Wong, M. H. (2007). Evidence of excessive releases of metals from primitive e-waste processing in Guiyu, China. Environmental Pollution 148 (1), pp. 62-72.
78. Yu, J., Williams, E., Ju, M., & Yang, Y. (2010). Forecasting global generation of obsolete personal computers. Environmental Science & Technology 44 (9), pp. 3232-3237.
79. Zheng, L., Wu, K., Li, Y., Qi, Z., Han, D., Zhang, B., Gu, C., Chen, G., Liu, J., Chen, S., Xu, X., & Huo, X. (2008). Blood lead and cadmium levels and relevant factors among children from an e-waste recycling town in China. Environmental Research 108 (1), pp. 15-20.
80. Zimmerer, K., & Basset, T. (2003). Political ecology: an integrative approach to geography and environment-development studies. New York: Guilford.