This special collection seeks to put place at the centre of the debate about waste. If waste is ‘material we failed to use’ (Gille 2018) a dirty place is a space we failed to clean. Development involves losing sight of, and losing touch with, the messy realities of dirt. Wastelands are not only unproductive, but also invisible to the public, uncharted by the police and the tax bureau. A dirty place is something of a moral minefield, contrary to ethics, taste, profit and health. This collection seeks to shed light on the ‘where’ of waste, and to highlight ideology’s extraordinary power to rearrange and redefine waste across physical space.

Guest editor: Dr Jaime Moreno-Tejada, LNU-MSU College of International Business

Image credit: Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Detroit Publishing Company Collection