Doctoral Dissertation Research: Informal Recycling as a Livelihood Strategy Among Recent Rural-Urban Migrants

这个博士论文项目调查了农村移民如何通过非正式的回收和垃圾收集来建立生计和进入城市空间的方式。尽管回收利用通过清除城市垃圾并将材料重新引导到商品生产中来发挥价值，但发展中国家和新兴国家的新农村-城市移民经常被现有的城市居民视为“不文明”。因此，外来回收者被矛盾地客观化为企业家美德的典范和不卫生的城市入侵者。在一些国家，随着国家实体试图控制城市垃圾和农村移民在城市内的流动，紧张局势出现了。该项目认为，获得城市空间和废物是移民回收者成功的关键决定因素，该项目将流动、公民身份和身份的不断变化的经历和概念与影响他们生计的结构联系起来。这个项目建立在这样的假设之上，即非正式回收创造的社会和经济价值代表着一种城市公民战略，并揭示了现代城市发展的国家和公众愿景背后的矛盾。本研究以上海城市回收为例，综合运用调查法、统计与话语分析法、访谈法、焦点小组法、流动人种志等研究方法，将中国的城市发展、移民与区域地理研究结合起来。该项目希望回答两个研究问题：(1)上海大都市的非正式回收是如何构建的？(2)从事回收的新城市居民获得城市空间和资源的途径是如何受到这些结构的限制、限制和支持的？这项研究通过展示非正式回收网络的好处和价值，促进了中国和美国科学家和政策制定者之间的跨文化和跨学科研究，在这些网络中，这些网络具有稳定新城市人口的潜力。它主张积极承认边缘化群体对可持续城市发展的贡献。由此产生的论文将以普通话和英语出版，并分发给当地大学部门和上海社会科学院(SASS)。这项研究产生的学术论文将提交给美国学术期刊，并在发展、移民和中国研究会议上发表。作为博士论文研究改进奖，这个项目为有前途的学生提供支持，帮助他们建立社会科学研究事业。

This doctoral dissertation project investigates the ways in which rural migrants establish livelihoods and gain access to urban space via informal recycling and trash collecting. Although recycling contributes value by removing waste from cities and channeling materials back into commodity production, new rural-urban migrants in developing and emerging countries are often viewed as 'uncivilized' by established urban residents. Thus, migrant recyclers are paradoxically objectified as both paragons of entrepreneurial virtue and unsanitary urban interlopers. In some countries tensions arise as state entities seek to control flows of both urban waste and rural migrants within the city. Arguing that access to urban space and waste is a crucial determinant for the success of migrant recyclers, this project connects the shifting experiences and conceptions of mobility, citizenship and identity with the structures impacting their livelihoods. This project builds on the hypothesis that informal recycling's creation of social and economic value represents a strategy of urban citizenship, and reveals the contradictions underlying state and public visions of modern urban development. By considering the case of urban recycling in Shanghai, this research uses a mixed methodology of surveys, statistical and discourse analysis, interviews, focus groups, and mobile ethnography, uniting studies in urban development, migration, and the regional geography of China. There are two research questions the project hopes to answer are: (1) how is informal recycling structured in metropolitan Shanghai? (2) How is access to urban space and resources for newly urban residents engaged in recycling as a livelihood conditioned, limited, and enabled by these structures?This research promotes cross-cultural and interdisciplinary research among China and US scientists and policy-makers by demonstrating the benefits and values of informal recycling networks and they in which these have the potential for stabilizing newly urban populations. It argues for positive recognition of the contributions of marginalized groups to sustainable urban development. The resulting dissertation will be published in Mandarin Chinese and English, and disseminated to local university departments and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences (SASS). Scholarly articles produced from this research will be submitted to US academic journals and presented at conferences of development, migration, and China studies. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this project provides support to a promising student working towards establishing a social science research career.