Josh Lepawsky
Biographic Data
| ID | 3754431 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Josh Lepawsky |
| GIVEN NAMES | Josh |
| FAMILY NAME | Lepawsky |
| SIGNATURE | LEPAWSKY J |
| AFFILIATIONS | Memorial University of Newfoundland |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-7022-1568 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 30 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 227 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 30 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2005 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
Carbon and water conservation value of independent, place‐based repair in Lima, Peru
To what extent do repair and maintenance of consumer electronics conserve the materials and energy they embody? In this paper we examine the conservation value of a cluster of independent third‐party electronics repair businesses in Lima, Peru. Drawing on a combination of methods that include fieldwork, digital methods for online sociology, and life cycle assessment (LCA) of phones and tablets we quantify the conservation value of typical repairs…
Thinking with waste to know the economic
I argue that thinking with `waste' to know the `economic' necessitates making some important conceptual distinctions. Drawing on empirical examples from my research on pollution and waste arising from electronics I first address distinctions between waste, dirt, and discard. Next, I argue that thinking with waste and pollution from electronics justifies a need to carefully distinguish between scale and magnitude. This claim is examined through ex…
Discard Studies: Wasting, Systems, and Power
An argument that social, political, and economic systems maintain power by discarding certain people, places, and things. Discard studies is an emerging field that looks at waste and wasting broadly construed. Rather than focusing on waste and trash as the primary objects of study, discard studies looks at wider systems of waste and wasting to explore how some materials, practices, regions, and people are valued or devalued, becoming dominant or …
Mapping chemical discardscapes of electronics production
This paper offers both empirical and conceptual interventions toward an environmentally grounded sectoral analysis of the electronics sector and against the pernicious myth of the digital-as-ethereal. Empirically, it maps pollution emitted from electronics manufacturing facilities in the NAFTA region (Canada, the United States, and Mexico) over the decade of 2006–2017 using publicly available facility level data from the Commission for Environmen…
Introduction to the special section: Geographies of the digital
Sources and Streams of Electronic Waste
Planet of fixers? Mapping the middle grounds of independent and do‐it‐yourself information and communication technology maintenance and repair
This paper explores the geographical distribution of independent and do‐it‐yourself information and communication technology maintenance and repair (INDIY ICT M&R) activity around the world. It examines a large set of Google Analytics data pertaining to users of free, open‐source online repair manuals provided by iFixit, a US‐based organisation that develops the free manuals, sells tools and components, and also engages in technical education and…
Viscous Objects. The Uneven Resistances of Repair
The MV Veteran, a seagoing car ferry constructed by the Dutch industrial conglomerate Damen Shipyards Group, connects the two small, rural outport communities of Fogo Island and Change Islands to the larger island of Newfoundland, Canada. Our paper examines the breakdowns of this new ferry and the repairs facilitated through its manufacturer’s warranty. In our analysis, we treat the warranty as a ‘script’ as something that both constrains and ena…
Viscous objects
Image d’ouverture Le ferry MV Veteran non loin de l’île Fogo. Creative Commons BY Paul Asman & Jill Lenoble. L’île de Terre-Neuve, située sur la côte atlantique du Canada, est affectueusement appelée « The Rock ». Les petites communautés rurales réparties le long de cette côte accidentée sont reliées au continent par des services de traversiers exploités par le gouvernement. Ces traversiers sont plus que des moyens de transport : ils constituent …
Waste and Waste Management
Waste is usually defined as something to be discarded as unwanted, unusable, or as a byproduct. There are several broad categories of waste generally recognized: industrial waste, municipal (or household) waste, and hazardous or special wastes such as radioactive and biohazardous waste. Waste management refers to the governance and handling of solid, liquid, and gaseous materials externalized by some actor, using one or a combination of strategie…
Best of two worlds? Towards ethical electronics repair, reuse, repurposing and recycling
A crack in the facade? Situating Singapore in global flows of electronic waste
Singapore is alleged to be a key node in global flows of e‐waste prohibited under the Basel Convention. We combine a close reading of the Convention and related documents with findings from nonparticipant observation of and interviews with Singapore‐based traders of discarded electronics. The case offers both important conceptual and empirical findings for future studies of territory in market‐making activity. Conceptually, our research suggests …
La traîne de l'anthropocène: Version Courte Présente Dans l'Édition Papier
Soyuz TMA-15M au-dessus de l’ItalieImage prise par la station spatiale internationale© NASA 2015, voir Flickr – Photo Sharing !, « Photo NASA Johnson » : www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/18246720569/ (iss043e271162).Au cours de ces soixante dernières années, des déchets et rebuts de l’activité technologique humaine ont été accumulés hors de la planète. À l’heure actuelle, on dénombre plus de 100 millions de débris de tailles variées en orbite a…
The Wake of the Anthropocene
Discards and remainders of human forays into extraterrestrial space have been accumulating for almost 60 years in orbit around the Earth, on the surfaces of the Moon and other celestial bodies in the Solar System. What is it to be a member of a species for whom the discards and remainders of their technological capacities are not only populating territory beyond the planet that species inhabits but doing so to such an extent that they are acciden…
Electronic Waste
Are we living in a post‐ B asel world
The B asel C onvention (the C onvention) is a key piece of law governing the international waste trade. The spirit of the C onvention is to prohibit the dumping of hazardous waste from ‘developed’ countries to ‘developing’ countries. Yet, a careful consideration of the C onvention suggests a problematic geographical imaginary at work in it. It imagines a bi‐modal world comprised of what it calls A nnex VII countries ( O rganization for E conomic …
The changing geography of global trade in electronic discards: Time to Rethink the E-Waste Problem
This paper provides a synopsis of the changing geography of global trade in electronic waste over time using data available from theUnitedNationsCOMTRADEdatabase. It quantifies the magnitude and direction of this trade between 206 territories in over 9400 reported trade transactions between 1996 and 2012. The results demonstrate two key findings. First, at its peak in 1996, trade from territories designated asAnnexVIIunder the Basel Convention ('…
Composing Urban Orders from Rubbish Electronics: Cityness and the Site Multiple
What do cities look like when rubbish electronics are the vehicle with which they are explored? This article is an experiment designed to offer a response to that question, and in doing so to productively intervene in the conversation about 'cityness', 'metrocentricity' and 'subaltern urbanism'. We intervene by following flows of rubbish electronics and the action that enacts them as waste and value, drawing on fieldwork in Dhaka, Singapore, Accr…
Checking in with reality: A response to Herod et al
Legal geographies of e-waste legislation in Canada and the US: Jurisdiction, responsibility and the taboo of production
Electronic waste (e-waste) is thought to be the fastest growing segment of the overall solid waste stream in many countries. Between 2003 and 2010 more than half of all Canadian provinces and US states passed legislation specifically to govern the disposition of e-waste. The purpose of this research is to investigate the legal geographies of this legislation. The principle findings are that the work of jurisdiction around e-waste in Canada and th…
Making chains that (un)make things: Waste–value relations and the bangladeshi rubbish electronics industry
There is growing empirical and theoretical interest in post‐consumption activity that results in the capture and creation of value from waste in the global economy. This article engages with two dominant approaches to tracing the capture and creation of value, global value chains (GVCs) and global production networks (GPNs), and their shared call to examine waste disposal and recycling. Using non‐participant observation, semi‐structured interview…
From beginnings and endings to boundaries and edges: Rethinking circulation and exchange through electronic waste
This paper discusses research on electronic waste in Canada and Bangladesh. We engage with ongoing debates in geography and the broader social sciences on the need to move beyond linearity in the analysis of commodity/value chains and global production networks. Our analysis suggests that the problem of linearity may be an artefact of theoretical and methodological presuppositions, which explains its longevity as an issue in methodological approa…
Ross King, Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya: Negotiating Urban Space in Malaysia
Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya: Negotiating Urban Space in Malaysia Ross King . National University of Singapore Press , Singapore , 2008 , 321 pages (ISBN : 978-87-7694-046-1 ) ( pbk ). King's book focuses on three major arguments: first, that the Kuala Lumpur Metropolitan Region is an urban space of contradictions, inconsistencies and resentments; second, that its fabric has been instrumental in masking interracial tension; and third, that it is in…
Mapping international flows of electronic waste
In this paper, we map the international trade in electronic waste (e‐waste). We quantify the directions and magnitude of this trade at the global scale and examine the utility of the pollution haven hypothesis for explaining the observed trade patterns. Our results demonstrate four key findings: the international trade in e‐waste is a more complex story than being one about ‘rich’ countries dumping waste in ‘poor’ countries; the trade in e‐waste …
Metropolis on the margins: Talent attraction and retention to the St. John's city‐region
The objective of this research is to examine the factors that influence the attraction and retention of creative and highly educated workers in a small‐sized Canadian city. The study examines two hypotheses: that the social dynamics of city‐regions constitute the foundations of economic success in the global economy; and, that talented, highly educated individuals will be attracted to those city‐regions that offer a richness of employment opportu…
From beginnings and endings to boundaries and edges: Rethinking circulation and exchange through electronic waste
This paper discusses research on electronic waste in Canada and Bangladesh. We engage with ongoing debates in geography and the broader social sciences on the need to move beyond linearity in the analysis of commodity/value chains and global production networks. Our analysis suggests that the problem of linearity may be an artefact of theoretical and methodological presuppositions, which explains its longevity as an issue in methodological approa…
The changing geography of global trade in electronic discards: Time to Rethink the E-Waste Problem
This paper provides a synopsis of the changing geography of global trade in electronic waste over time using data available from theUnitedNationsCOMTRADEdatabase. It quantifies the magnitude and direction of this trade between 206 territories in over 9400 reported trade transactions between 1996 and 2012. The results demonstrate two key findings. First, at its peak in 1996, trade from territories designated asAnnexVIIunder the Basel Convention ('…
Mapping international flows of electronic waste
In this paper, we map the international trade in electronic waste (e‐waste). We quantify the directions and magnitude of this trade at the global scale and examine the utility of the pollution haven hypothesis for explaining the observed trade patterns. Our results demonstrate four key findings: the international trade in e‐waste is a more complex story than being one about ‘rich’ countries dumping waste in ‘poor’ countries; the trade in e‐waste …
Making chains that (un)make things: Waste–value relations and the bangladeshi rubbish electronics industry
There is growing empirical and theoretical interest in post‐consumption activity that results in the capture and creation of value from waste in the global economy. This article engages with two dominant approaches to tracing the capture and creation of value, global value chains (GVCs) and global production networks (GPNs), and their shared call to examine waste disposal and recycling. Using non‐participant observation, semi‐structured interview…
Legal geographies of e-waste legislation in Canada and the US: Jurisdiction, responsibility and the taboo of production
Electronic waste (e-waste) is thought to be the fastest growing segment of the overall solid waste stream in many countries. Between 2003 and 2010 more than half of all Canadian provinces and US states passed legislation specifically to govern the disposition of e-waste. The purpose of this research is to investigate the legal geographies of this legislation. The principle findings are that the work of jurisdiction around e-waste in Canada and th…
Best of two worlds? Towards ethical electronics repair, reuse, repurposing and recycling
A museum, the city, and a nation
The purpose of this article is to understand how a corporate museum in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia works to create proleptic myths of nationhood to under-gird a broader state-centric project of nationalist-capitalist modernization. The article examines how these myths are expressed in the museum's design plans and are manifested in the museum's displays and spatial layout. From this analysis it becomes apparent that, first, the museum's designers inte…
Composing Urban Orders from Rubbish Electronics: Cityness and the Site Multiple
What do cities look like when rubbish electronics are the vehicle with which they are explored? This article is an experiment designed to offer a response to that question, and in doing so to productively intervene in the conversation about 'cityness', 'metrocentricity' and 'subaltern urbanism'. We intervene by following flows of rubbish electronics and the action that enacts them as waste and value, drawing on fieldwork in Dhaka, Singapore, Accr…
Stories of space and subjectivity in planning the Multimedia Super Corridor
Are we living in a post‐ B asel world
The B asel C onvention (the C onvention) is a key piece of law governing the international waste trade. The spirit of the C onvention is to prohibit the dumping of hazardous waste from ‘developed’ countries to ‘developing’ countries. Yet, a careful consideration of the C onvention suggests a problematic geographical imaginary at work in it. It imagines a bi‐modal world comprised of what it calls A nnex VII countries ( O rganization for E conomic …
Clustering as Anti-politics Machine? Situating the Politics of Regional Economic Development and Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor
Lepawsky J. Clustering as anti-politics machine? Situating the politics of regional economic development and Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor, Regional Studies. This paper addresses the formation of an ‘intentional cluster’ in Malaysia called the Multimedia Super Corridor. In this context, ‘clustering’ is a spatial fix and a development discourse that is as much about political expediency as it is about economic development. This paper sugges…
The Wake of the Anthropocene
Discards and remainders of human forays into extraterrestrial space have been accumulating for almost 60 years in orbit around the Earth, on the surfaces of the Moon and other celestial bodies in the Solar System. What is it to be a member of a species for whom the discards and remainders of their technological capacities are not only populating territory beyond the planet that species inhabits but doing so to such an extent that they are acciden…
Metropolis on the margins: Talent attraction and retention to the St. John's city‐region
The objective of this research is to examine the factors that influence the attraction and retention of creative and highly educated workers in a small‐sized Canadian city. The study examines two hypotheses: that the social dynamics of city‐regions constitute the foundations of economic success in the global economy; and, that talented, highly educated individuals will be attracted to those city‐regions that offer a richness of employment opportu…
Foregrounding technology over politics? Media framings of federal elections in Malaysia
Mainstream and alternative media play an important role in circulating powerful narratives within and often beyond a country's borders. This article specifically examines how Malaysia's media have framed the relationship between information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the country's electoral process. To this end, the authors conducted a content analysis of selected domestic mainstream and alternative media sources for two weeks befo…
Thinking with waste to know the economic
I argue that thinking with `waste' to know the `economic' necessitates making some important conceptual distinctions. Drawing on empirical examples from my research on pollution and waste arising from electronics I first address distinctions between waste, dirt, and discard. Next, I argue that thinking with waste and pollution from electronics justifies a need to carefully distinguish between scale and magnitude. This claim is examined through ex…
Mapping chemical discardscapes of electronics production
This paper offers both empirical and conceptual interventions toward an environmentally grounded sectoral analysis of the electronics sector and against the pernicious myth of the digital-as-ethereal. Empirically, it maps pollution emitted from electronics manufacturing facilities in the NAFTA region (Canada, the United States, and Mexico) over the decade of 2006–2017 using publicly available facility level data from the Commission for Environmen…
Stories of space and subjectivity in planning the Multimedia Super Corridor
Recently completed doctorates in social and cultural geography
Digital Aspirations: The Multimedia Super Corridor and Malaysian National Development Completed at University of Kentucky, 2005. The Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) is a multi-billion dollar urban ...
Clustering as Anti-politics Machine? Situating the Politics of Regional Economic Development and Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor
Lepawsky J. Clustering as anti-politics machine? Situating the politics of regional economic development and Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor, Regional Studies. This paper addresses the formation of an ‘intentional cluster’ in Malaysia called the Multimedia Super Corridor. In this context, ‘clustering’ is a spatial fix and a development discourse that is as much about political expediency as it is about economic development. This paper sugges…
A museum, the city, and a nation
The purpose of this article is to understand how a corporate museum in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia works to create proleptic myths of nationhood to under-gird a broader state-centric project of nationalist-capitalist modernization. The article examines how these myths are expressed in the museum's design plans and are manifested in the museum's displays and spatial layout. From this analysis it becomes apparent that, first, the museum's designers inte…
Ross King, Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya: Negotiating Urban Space in Malaysia
Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya: Negotiating Urban Space in Malaysia Ross King . National University of Singapore Press , Singapore , 2008 , 321 pages (ISBN : 978-87-7694-046-1 ) ( pbk ). King's book focuses on three major arguments: first, that the Kuala Lumpur Metropolitan Region is an urban space of contradictions, inconsistencies and resentments; second, that its fabric has been instrumental in masking interracial tension; and third, that it is in…
Mapping international flows of electronic waste
In this paper, we map the international trade in electronic waste (e‐waste). We quantify the directions and magnitude of this trade at the global scale and examine the utility of the pollution haven hypothesis for explaining the observed trade patterns. Our results demonstrate four key findings: the international trade in e‐waste is a more complex story than being one about ‘rich’ countries dumping waste in ‘poor’ countries; the trade in e‐waste …
Metropolis on the margins: Talent attraction and retention to the St. John's city‐region
The objective of this research is to examine the factors that influence the attraction and retention of creative and highly educated workers in a small‐sized Canadian city. The study examines two hypotheses: that the social dynamics of city‐regions constitute the foundations of economic success in the global economy; and, that talented, highly educated individuals will be attracted to those city‐regions that offer a richness of employment opportu…
Foregrounding technology over politics? Media framings of federal elections in Malaysia
Mainstream and alternative media play an important role in circulating powerful narratives within and often beyond a country's borders. This article specifically examines how Malaysia's media have framed the relationship between information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the country's electoral process. To this end, the authors conducted a content analysis of selected domestic mainstream and alternative media sources for two weeks befo…
Making chains that (un)make things: Waste–value relations and the bangladeshi rubbish electronics industry
There is growing empirical and theoretical interest in post‐consumption activity that results in the capture and creation of value from waste in the global economy. This article engages with two dominant approaches to tracing the capture and creation of value, global value chains (GVCs) and global production networks (GPNs), and their shared call to examine waste disposal and recycling. Using non‐participant observation, semi‐structured interview…
From beginnings and endings to boundaries and edges: Rethinking circulation and exchange through electronic waste
This paper discusses research on electronic waste in Canada and Bangladesh. We engage with ongoing debates in geography and the broader social sciences on the need to move beyond linearity in the analysis of commodity/value chains and global production networks. Our analysis suggests that the problem of linearity may be an artefact of theoretical and methodological presuppositions, which explains its longevity as an issue in methodological approa…
Legal geographies of e-waste legislation in Canada and the US: Jurisdiction, responsibility and the taboo of production
Electronic waste (e-waste) is thought to be the fastest growing segment of the overall solid waste stream in many countries. Between 2003 and 2010 more than half of all Canadian provinces and US states passed legislation specifically to govern the disposition of e-waste. The purpose of this research is to investigate the legal geographies of this legislation. The principle findings are that the work of jurisdiction around e-waste in Canada and th…
Checking in with reality: A response to Herod et al
Electronic Waste
Are we living in a post‐ B asel world
The B asel C onvention (the C onvention) is a key piece of law governing the international waste trade. The spirit of the C onvention is to prohibit the dumping of hazardous waste from ‘developed’ countries to ‘developing’ countries. Yet, a careful consideration of the C onvention suggests a problematic geographical imaginary at work in it. It imagines a bi‐modal world comprised of what it calls A nnex VII countries ( O rganization for E conomic …
The changing geography of global trade in electronic discards: Time to Rethink the E-Waste Problem
This paper provides a synopsis of the changing geography of global trade in electronic waste over time using data available from theUnitedNationsCOMTRADEdatabase. It quantifies the magnitude and direction of this trade between 206 territories in over 9400 reported trade transactions between 1996 and 2012. The results demonstrate two key findings. First, at its peak in 1996, trade from territories designated asAnnexVIIunder the Basel Convention ('…
Composing Urban Orders from Rubbish Electronics: Cityness and the Site Multiple
What do cities look like when rubbish electronics are the vehicle with which they are explored? This article is an experiment designed to offer a response to that question, and in doing so to productively intervene in the conversation about 'cityness', 'metrocentricity' and 'subaltern urbanism'. We intervene by following flows of rubbish electronics and the action that enacts them as waste and value, drawing on fieldwork in Dhaka, Singapore, Accr…
A crack in the facade? Situating Singapore in global flows of electronic waste
Singapore is alleged to be a key node in global flows of e‐waste prohibited under the Basel Convention. We combine a close reading of the Convention and related documents with findings from nonparticipant observation of and interviews with Singapore‐based traders of discarded electronics. The case offers both important conceptual and empirical findings for future studies of territory in market‐making activity. Conceptually, our research suggests …
La traîne de l'anthropocène: Version Courte Présente Dans l'Édition Papier
Soyuz TMA-15M au-dessus de l’ItalieImage prise par la station spatiale internationale© NASA 2015, voir Flickr – Photo Sharing !, « Photo NASA Johnson » : www.flickr.com/photos/nasa2explore/18246720569/ (iss043e271162).Au cours de ces soixante dernières années, des déchets et rebuts de l’activité technologique humaine ont été accumulés hors de la planète. À l’heure actuelle, on dénombre plus de 100 millions de débris de tailles variées en orbite a…
The Wake of the Anthropocene
Discards and remainders of human forays into extraterrestrial space have been accumulating for almost 60 years in orbit around the Earth, on the surfaces of the Moon and other celestial bodies in the Solar System. What is it to be a member of a species for whom the discards and remainders of their technological capacities are not only populating territory beyond the planet that species inhabits but doing so to such an extent that they are acciden…
Waste and Waste Management
Waste is usually defined as something to be discarded as unwanted, unusable, or as a byproduct. There are several broad categories of waste generally recognized: industrial waste, municipal (or household) waste, and hazardous or special wastes such as radioactive and biohazardous waste. Waste management refers to the governance and handling of solid, liquid, and gaseous materials externalized by some actor, using one or a combination of strategie…
Best of two worlds? Towards ethical electronics repair, reuse, repurposing and recycling
Viscous Objects. The Uneven Resistances of Repair
The MV Veteran, a seagoing car ferry constructed by the Dutch industrial conglomerate Damen Shipyards Group, connects the two small, rural outport communities of Fogo Island and Change Islands to the larger island of Newfoundland, Canada. Our paper examines the breakdowns of this new ferry and the repairs facilitated through its manufacturer’s warranty. In our analysis, we treat the warranty as a ‘script’ as something that both constrains and ena…
Viscous objects
Image d’ouverture Le ferry MV Veteran non loin de l’île Fogo. Creative Commons BY Paul Asman & Jill Lenoble. L’île de Terre-Neuve, située sur la côte atlantique du Canada, est affectueusement appelée « The Rock ». Les petites communautés rurales réparties le long de cette côte accidentée sont reliées au continent par des services de traversiers exploités par le gouvernement. Ces traversiers sont plus que des moyens de transport : ils constituent …
Sources and Streams of Electronic Waste
Planet of fixers? Mapping the middle grounds of independent and do‐it‐yourself information and communication technology maintenance and repair
This paper explores the geographical distribution of independent and do‐it‐yourself information and communication technology maintenance and repair (INDIY ICT M&R) activity around the world. It examines a large set of Google Analytics data pertaining to users of free, open‐source online repair manuals provided by iFixit, a US‐based organisation that develops the free manuals, sells tools and components, and also engages in technical education and…
Sociology (16 works) · Business (14 works) · Engineering (14 works) · Computer Science (13 works) · Geography (13 works) · Political science (11 works) · Recycling and Waste Management Techniques (11 works) · Economics (10 works) · Waste management (9 works) · Socioeconomic Development in Asia (8 works)