Environmental Movements and Waste Infrastructure

As rates of consumption grow, the problem of waste management has increased significantly. National and local waste authorities seek to manage such problems through the implementation of state regulation and construction of waste infrastructure, including landfills and incinerators. These, however, are undertaken in a context of increasing supra-state regulatory frameworks and directives on waste management, and of increasing activity by multi-national corporations, and are increasingly contested by activists in the affected communities. Environmental Movements and Waste Infrastructure sheds new light on the structures of political opportunity that confront environmental movements and challenge the state or corporate sector. A series of case studies on collective action campaigns from the EU, US and Asia illuminate the similarities and differences between anti-incinerator protests within different states. Several contributions share a concern about cross-border or transnational waste flows. Each case study looks beyond its initial local frame of reference and goes on to interrogate assumptions about NIMBYism or localism, demonstrating the wider linkages and networks established by both grassroots campaigns and state and multinational agencies

This book was previously published as a special issue of Environmental Politics

Christopher Rootes is Professor of Environmental Politics and Political Sociology as well as Director of the Centre for the Study of Social and Political Movements at the University of Kent, Canterbury.
Liam Leonard is Lecturer in Sociology, Criminology and Human Rights at the Institute of Technology, Sligo

Dr. Liam Leonard (BA; M. Phil; PhD) Researcher and International Academic Consultant, based in California, USA. Previously, Liam has been Chair of the Criminology Association of Ireland and former President of the Sociology Association of Ireland. He lectures Sociology, Criminology, Politics, Human Rights, Penology/Prison Studies, Sustainability and Environmental Issues, Social Movements, Social Capital, Professional Development and Equality & Diversity. The author/editor of over ten books and numerous journal articles, he is Senior Editor of the Ecopolitics Books Series, the Advances in Sustainability and Environmental Justice Book Series (both with Emerald UK) and Founding Editor of the CRIMSOC Journal of Social Criminology.
Dr. Leonard has edited the 2011 Irish issue of the Prison Journal, as well as special issues of Environmental Politics and the Irish Journal of Sociology. Dr. Leonard was awarded the Sage Publishing Research Excellence Award in New York as well as the NAIRTL Research & Teaching Award in 2012, and has over twelve years experience as an academic and lecturer in the National University of Ireland and the Irish Institute of Technology sectors.
He has given papers at the European Sociology Association, European Criminology Association, the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, the European Group for Crime & Deviance and the Irish Sociology and Irish Criminology Conferences. Dr. Leonard sits on the editorial boards of several academic journals, including the Prison Journal and the Journal of Criminal Psychology. Since June 2013, Dr. Leonard has lived in Orange County, California, where he edits the SOC: Sociology in Orange County resource page.