Transforming Plastics into Solidarity: Ethical Vertical Integration and Binational Recycling

基于十年来研究拉丁美洲循环经济中材料和社会关系同时转变的经验，我提议的研究将比较乌拉圭和巴西的“社会经济”运作。社会经济是拉丁美洲大部分地区对不同于资本主义规范的各种所有制、管理和分配形式的称呼。对两国团结回收链的研究-涉及将塑料瓶转化为合成纺织品-提供了一个理想的背景，将伦理学和劳动人类学结合在一起，并提供了一个独特的机会来研究同时试图将拾荒者的劳动正规化并创建一个道德供应链，从塑料瓶的处理到最终作为服装回购。通过关注劳动道德，我将研究一种社会经济模式的复原力，这种模式可以在动荡时期带来希望，因为它有能力将参与经济决策与回收和循环利用宝贵资源以及建立基于团结的经济纽带结合起来。从海洋到食物链，塑料垃圾越来越被理解为一个全球性问题，在不同的规模和地理位置上具有局部动态和不公平的影响。在美国，目前只有10%的塑料被回收，而纸张、金属和电子垃圾的回收率要高得多。2018年初，中国宣布将禁止从海外进口未经分类的塑料和废纸（2017年，中国进口了全球一半以上的废旧塑料、纸张和纸板，约3200万吨），这给西方解决塑料废物问题的必要性注入了新的紧迫感。这导致世界各地的回收工厂堆积了大量的材料。欧盟国家受到严格的垃圾填埋法规和税收的限制，而在其他地方，过剩的塑料废物的过度积累与过剩的劳动力供应并存。拉丁美洲试图通过创造体面的“绿色就业机会”同时解决这两个问题，这对该区域以外的发展中国家和发达国家具有启发意义。（两国PET团结链）需要由南里奥格兰德的废物回收合作社大量回收聚对苯二甲酸乙二醇酯（PET）瓶，乌拉圭的一个合作社将其转化为合成纤维，并将其运往巴西的米纳斯吉拉斯州，由纺织合作社加工。该计划于2014年启动，是全球首批循环经济计划之一，其中涉及的每个合作伙伴企业都由其员工管理。它还具有开创性，因为它将南南社会经济发展与促进全球南方的道德消费联系起来。不同的政治和劳动系谱，对比国家回收政策，以及不同程度的政治动荡，确保在这个两国合作的差异和相似性研究的基础。工人的道德和实际承诺往往被忽视，而这是决定生产率和特定举措成败的关键因素。当工人们在道德和政治上深深承诺时，社会经济计划是否会持久？为什么像卡迪亚这样的工人选择留在社会废物经济中，尽管困难和不稳定？社会经济学如何与职业轨迹、政治历史和生活愿望相结合？巴西-乌拉圭边境两边的工人是如何看待和制定社会经济的？密切关注工人的生活经验意味着测试循环，社会和可持续经济的基础，这些经济有可能解决我们这个时代一些最大的社会和环境挑战。

Building on a decade of experience researching the simultaneous transformation of materials and social relations in recycling economies across Latin America, my proposed research will compare the workings of the 'social economy' in Uruguay and Brazil. The social economy is the name given in much of Latin America to various forms of ownership, management and distribution that differ from capitalist norms. The study of a binational solidarity recycling chain - involving the transformation of plastic bottles into synthetic textiles - provides an ideal context in which to bring together the anthropology of ethics and labour and a unique opportunity to study what is simultaneously an attempt to formalise waste-pickers' labour and create an ethical supply chain, from the disposal of plastic bottles, to their eventual repurchase as clothing. Through a focus on the ethics of labour, I will investigate the resilience of a socio-economic model that could provide hope in turbulent times, given its capacity to combine participation in economic decision-making with the recovery and recycling of valuable resources and the creation of solidarity-based economic bonds. From the oceans to the food chain, plastic waste is increasingly understood as a global problem with local dynamics and inequitable impacts at different scales and geographies. In the United States, only 10% of plastics are currently recycled, compared with much higher figures for papers, metals, and e-waste. A new sense of urgency was injected into the need to tackle plastic waste in the West by China's announcement in early 2018 that it would ban the import of unsorted plastics and scrap paper from overseas (China imported over half of the world's used plastic, paper, and cardboard in 2017, some 32m tonnes). This has led to bales of material piling up at recycling plants across the world. EU countries are limited by strict landfilling regulations and taxes, while elsewhere the overaccumulation of surplus plastic waste co-exists with a surplus labour supply. Latin American attempts to solve both these issues simultaneously through the creation of dignified 'green jobs' can be instructive for developing and developed countries beyond the region.The Brazil-Uruguay Cadeia Solidária Binacional do PET (Binational PET Solidarity Chain) entails the bulk recovery of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles by waste-picker (catador) cooperatives in Rio Grande do Sul, their transformation into synthetic fibre by a cooperative in Uruguay, and transportation to the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais to be processed by textile cooperatives. The scheme, inaugurated in 2014, is one of the first circular economy schemes globally in which every partner business involved is managed by its workers. It is also ground-breaking in that it links South-South socio-economic development with the promotion of ethical consumption in the Global South. Differing political and labour genealogies, contrasting state recycling policies, and varying degrees of political upheaval ensure the basis for a study of difference as well as similarity within this binational collaboration. The ethical and practical commitment of workers is often overlooked as a key factor in determining productivity and the success or failure of particular initiatives. Do social economy schemes prove lasting when workers are deeply committed ethically and politically? Why do workers like those in the Cadeia choose to remain in the social waste economy despite hardship and precarity? How does social economy work articulate with career trajectories, political histories, and life aspirations? How is the social economy perceived and enacted by workers on either side of the Brazil-Uruguay border? Attending closely to workers' lived experiences means testing the foundations of circular, social, and sustainable economies that have the potential to tackle some of the greatest social and environmental challenges of our time.