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The efficient and sanitary management of infectious waste is an essential part of the humanitarian response to any disaster, including the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, in many contexts within the Global South, waste management systems are poorly equipped to handle these waste streams during periods of normalcy, let alone during times of crisis. The purpose of this article is draw attention to a number of existing inequalities that define infectious waste management practices globally, with a critical eye to how they constrain poorer nations' ability to respond and manage their own Covid-19 outbreaks. In particular, the work draws on the authors' extensive research, experience, and activism at Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre, Malawi, to understand how waste management practices will inform and react to mitigation efforts and to propose a number of practical steps that can be achieved in the short-term, as well as towards long-term structural transformation. Ultimately, this conversation is meant to contribute to a more inclusive and critical waste management studies discourse.

‘Waste’ is everywhere, a common aspect of daily life in both the West and the Global South. However, the ways in which we as individuals understand it as a problem is far from universal. It does not exist independently from the people it affects, rather, waste, as a problem, is continually made and remade through human practice. The purpose of this article is to explore how and why certain ‘waste’ items are and become understood as problems. We adopt Foucault’s (1984) notion of ‘problematisa-tion’, as an analytical lens for conceptualising processes of problem formation through the eyes of two different groups working within and on the margins of Mzedi Dump Site in Blantyre, Malawi: subsistence maize growers and informal waste pickers. Drawing on extensive qualitative and ethnographic fieldwork, our findings suggests that for those working at Mzedi, waste problematisations are shaped by the tangible: the visible, and often painful impacts that Mzedi’s hazards have on their lives and livelihoods. However, the ultimate problematisation of waste lies in its utility, i.e. ‘good’ waste, is internalised based on its value. ‘Bad’ trash however, is problematised because it has no value, and is therefore considered useless, a problem taking up time and space that could be utilised more profit-ably. Understanding these processes of problem formation, and the degree to which waste problematisations are personal and/or socially constructed, has important ramifications for the adoption of appropriate waste management strategies and should inform a more nuanced and inclusive waste management studies discourse.

In post-apartheid South Africa, the blue economy has been identified as an untapped resource for creating employment and stimulating economic growth. However, in the port city of Durban, subsistence fishing has formed an important component of both the livelihood and identity of individuals living in marginalized communities adjacent to the harbor for over a century. However, since America's 9/11 terrorist attacks a number of new international laws and regulations have shaped local legislation and policies which seek to exclude the public from accessing the harbor area. As a consequence, increased security measures have contributed to an increasingly closed off space, where increased barriers to access have effectively isolated the harbor from the surrounding city, and restricted entry to local fishers. As a result, fisherfolk have been forced to contest their exclusion from the harbor, risking expulsion or arrest to continue practicing their livelihoods. Utilizing a political ecology framework, and integrating perspectives drawn from over a decade of qualitative fieldwork, this article explores how securitization narratives operate as a tool for the neoliberal exclusion of the poor from public space. Analysis suggests that the securitization of Durban's harbor has served to bar entry to the poor towards participating in South Africa's blue economy, while allowing elites exclusive access to marine resources. AbstractIn post-apartheid South Africa, the blue economy has been identified as an untapped resource for creating employment and stimulating economic growth. However, in the port city of Durban, subsistence fishing has formed an important component of both the livelihood and identity of individuals living in marginalized communities adjacent to the harbor for over a century. However, since America's 9/11 terrorist attacks a number of new international laws and regulations have shaped local legislation and policies which seek to exclude the public from accessing the harbor area. As a consequence, increased security measures have contributed to an increasingly closed off space, where increased barriers to access have effectively isolated the harbor from the 1 Dr. Marc Kalina, Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, 364 surrounding city, and restricted entry to local fishers. As a result, fisherfolk have been forced to contest their exclusion from the harbor, risking expulsion or arrest to continue practicing their livelihoods. Utilizing a political ecology framework, and integrating perspectives drawn from over a decade of qualitative fieldwork, this article explores how securitization narratives operate as a tool for the neoliberal exclusion of the poor from public space. Analysis suggests that the securitization of Durban's harbor has served to bar entry to the poor towards participating in South Africa's blue economy, while allowing elites exclusive access to marine resources. ResumenEn Sudáfrica postapatheid, la economía azul ha sido identificada como un recurso desaprovechado por crear empleo y estimular el crecimi...

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In July 2021, large swathes of South Africa experienced several days of intense violence and looting, nominally stemming from political causes, but rooted more deeply in spiraling inequality and growing poverty. As the violence slowed, the "clean-up", began immediately, with South Africa's citizens banding together to sweep away the collected waste and debris left behind. Yet, as South Africa's most populous provinces burned, the detritus of their destruction is another poignant reminder that without addressing growing inequality, both domestically and globally, it will always be one-step forward, two-steps backwards for trying to create cleaner communities and to solving our interconnected waste management and climate change challenges. Written in the aftermath of July's events, the purpose of this viewpoint is to call for a centering of inequality within waste management academic discourse. Inequality, and its causes, must move from the fringe, to the mainstream within our collective body of work. Specifically, we must continuously, and meaningfully, engage with the systemic socioeconomic and socio-political conditions responsible for our waste problems if we are to address them. Moreover, we, as academics should always be mindful of the ways in which our work relates to, or possibly contributes to, inequality, through (in)accessibility within communities or to systemic inequalities between the Global North and the Global South.

Over the past decade, there has been increased awareness and discourse around the inequalities which structure North-South academic collaboration. The purpose of this discussion is to look at the other side of this dynamic: the gatekeeping burden of African scholars in facilitating Northern fieldwork within the African continent. We argue that this burden further exacerbates inherent inequalities within North-South relationships. By way of conclusion, we offer a number of practical steps that Northern researchers can take when engaging African academics which will contribute to more ethical collaboration, and a more positive and lasting impact within African institutions. KEYWORDSgatekeeping; Africa; fieldwork; research Imagine this: a young woman, a Tanzanian researcher, arriving in the UK for a 2 month long fieldwork, to write the definitive study on the sexual practices of academics in North Oxford. Demanding access, expecting intimacy, being invited into homes. Welcomed.The satire is obviously thinly veiled, as few academics from the Global South, and Africa in particular, enjoy opportunities for fieldwork within Northern communities, or get opportunities to establish expertise on Northern subjects or within Northern contexts. Meanwhile numerous Northern academics prominently make careers out of their "African" expertise, often to the exclusion of their African colleagues, while the continent seasonally abounds with Northern researchers on their summer sabbaticals: scholars, graduate students, study abroad programmes, all treating the lived realities of 1.2 billion individuals as part of their personal and career development. The unidirectional nature of this exchange speaks to the lingering colonialism and racism inherent within global academia, a topic that has drawn considerably scholarly attention within recent years (see for example

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