If each firm either took its own dishes home, there would be much less
trouble. First, the dishes would sort themselves out into matched sets --
rather than the *yucky* assortment of dishes that get *commingled* in the
municipal solid waste *stream*.
Second, the host/ess of the dinner party could put attention to candles and
centrepieces and soft music rather than scullery work.
At 07:30 AM 1/26/99 +1100, Ian Reeve wrote:
>Bill Sheehan wrote:
>
>>Maybe things are different in North America than in Australia, but this
>>characterization of waste politics does not make sense to me. The
perception
>>of waste as a health hazard liability led to localization of waste
management
>>through local government control a century ago. The recognition that
waste is
>>a profitable liability has led to massive centralization of wasting and
>>attempted marginalization of resource conservation in the past decade.
>>
>>I'd like to think that "the pendulum" is swinging in a new direction as the
>>connection between unsustainable resource extraction and wasting is becoming
>>more evident: from waste as liability to waste as resource. This can
lead to
>>centralization (as in industry take-back systems) or to localization (as in
>>discard malls -- or recycling estates as they are called in Canberra).
>>
>>NIMBY is a response to waste facilities, whether centralized or localized,
>>large or small, in one's neighborhood. NIMBYism is usually justified and is
>>one of the primary levers moving the pendulum towards 'waste as resources.'
>
>Bill, the centralisation - local responsibility axis I was referring to is
>really only applicable to the site of decision-making about waste disposal,
>and particularly long term planning, which I would call waste management
>politics. Of course, many in the sanitary engineering - waste engineering
>profession might prefer that these decisions were made on rational
>scientific principles without the intrusion of messy politics, but one has
>only to examine the deliberations of the legislatures at local, State and
>Federal level to see that waste disposal decisions are political decisions.
>
>The concentration of market power in the waste collection, transport and
>disposal industries, or the concentration of industry recycling
>responsibility in the Duales System Deutschland, or the addiction of modern
>industrial economies to resource wasting, also involve centralisation of a
>sort. But the processes involved are different to what it is that makes
>politicians decide it might be a good idea to put responsibility for waste
>disposal in the hands of a single government authority, or take that
>responsibility away from such an authority and disperse it among a number
>of local authorities, or to hand it all over to the private sector.
>
>>From what I have looked at, it seems that these political decisions are
>almost never based on a 'rational' assessment of options, but rather are
>the outcome of the interplay between ideas about waste that go back to the
>Dark Ages, selective scientific assessments, experts' favoured solutions,
>simplistic notions of governance (like carrots and sticks) and, probably
>most importantly, political expedience and self-interest.
>
>Of course, nimbyism looms large in politicians' assessments of whether
>voters are going to keep them in power or not. As you rightly say, much
>nimbyism is justified, but nimbyism is just one side of a coin, the other
>side being the acceptance of collective responsbility for the disposal of
>waste. Social animals that we are, and given the practicalities of
>achieving political consensus, collective responsibility is easier to
>obtain amongst a small group of people who feel some sense of community
>than among three million inhabitants of a large city. To a certain extent,
>this is what drives the pendulum I referred to. On the one hand
>centralisation of government responsibility for waste has the appeal of
>economies of scale, rationalist long term planning, coordination of effort
>and uniform standards. But on the other, if centralisation also means
>establishing new centralised landfills, then its political appeal
>evaporates. Local responsibility becomes an attractive principle.
>
>Much of this would change and the pendulum would take a new direction if
>waste was viewed as a resource, as you rightly point out. But as a fan of
>Mary Douglas's "Purity and Danger", I prefer to think that people will
>always find something to identify as "waste", something ambiguous in its
>properties, something yucky, something that won't stay where it is put but
>returns to threaten you. I think there is a reasonable amount of evidence
>to suggest that the plastic bag and the emissions from burning it has
>become the miasma of the late 20th century and the industrial wastes in
>landfills (the media's toxic time bombs) are like the 'filth and
>corruption' that was the focus of late 19th century sanitary zeal. From
>Douglas's ethnographic point of view, little has changed in the individual
>understandings of waste that structure collective behaviour. So, yes,
>waste is and should be seen as a resource, but I suspect it will be a long
>time before people see a landfill in their backyard as no more of a
>nuisance than a quarry.
>
>Regards
>
>Ian Reeve
>
>
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