Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
thing ontologically different, a new understanding of Figure 22.1 develops: we are
seeing habitus, positions, dispositions and fields. Recycling is a technology which
is habitus. Whose habitus is it? The technology, as sedimented history, is shared.
Recycling is an artefact of the social technology at which practices crystallise. The
practices which crystallise are distributed over various fields, which we can ana-
lytically differentiate, i.e., the work field of Julian, the field of the recycling busi-
ness and politics, the field of capitalism in general. If we look at what, according
to ANT, is the common obstacle-problem, glass waste, then the Bourdieusian ap-
proach opens novel perspectives: What is 'glass waste'? How can we break with
the substantialist, sticky idea of the everyday that 'glass waste' is simply glass
waste? By applying the notion of habitus to it, we can construct glass waste as part
of habitus. The habitus refers to embodied schemes of perceptions and practices.
'Glass waste' (of a night club) is part of our practices of drinking. Agents drink
and produce 'glass waste'; in the night club agents are disposed to drink. The
habitus generates drinking and putting the bottle somewhere. 'Glass waste' is
something we habitually deal with. It is sedimented history, a cultural product of
how one normally deals with empty bottles. Around the artefact 'glass waste'
practices crystallise which are attuned to the game of drinking, to the position of
drinking in the social field 'night club'.
What is Julian faced with and what is he doing? He is organising a recycling
technology. By organising recycling he works on the symptom, i.e., an instance of
the habitus of the drinking folk. He can 'carry away' as much glass as he wants
(by using the shared recycling practices which are taken-for-granted in his field)
and, yet, 'glass waste' will not change. To change 'glass waste', one needs to ap-
proach its cause, the habitus which generates practices which produce 'glass
waste'. Of course, these practices are distributed. 'Glass waste' is not only part of
the drinking folk's habitus but also of Julian's, the re-sellers', sellers', producers'
and of all the other intermediaries' habitus. Herewith it comes into view that 'glass
waste' was part of relations which extended from, in this case, the night club to
Julian's office to the global sources of silicon dioxide molecules which were
needed for producing glass and to firms which encompassed world-wide cultures
of drinking as well as to all those who shared and reproduced the culture of drink-
ing. Julian was situated amongst all these relations. To approach one of them and
their relations, i.e. those who drink and put the bottle somewhere, we must not
substantialise them. Also, the everyday idea of 'drinking folk' is tenacious. To
tackle the 'glass waste' problem one would need to consider changing the fields
which stabilise a kind of habitus, which generates practices of producing 'glass
waste'. The Bourdieusian take presents the case as a relational issue: a focus on
changing symptoms of multiple relations, as in 'glass waste', does not promise
changing the relations themselves.
Are then, Julian's management practices determined through the structure of
the social field? We find that Julian creates constrains for himself and his organi-
sation through an organisational policy document on 'environmental conduct'. By
co-designing such a document he aimed to bring about objective products at which
his desired practices would legitimately crystallise. Thus, Julian had some agency
and his practices were not totally determined. Nevertheless, whilst he designed
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