Everyday International Relations: Garbage, Grand Designs, and Mundane Matters

Garbage is stuff that matters: the generation, disposal, and management of waste represent some of the most visceral flows in our society. Yet most international scholars continue to regard it as trivial to focus on the mundane practices and menial materiality associated with managing rubbish. Contra this dissociation, and through an analytics of assemblages, I argue that international theory can (and nowadays must) encompass both the grand designs of diplomacy and the mundane cosmopolitics of everyday life. In the everyday, the international is embodied, performed, and domesticated. I chart these multi-scalar connections as they unfold in Sydney, Australia, demonstrating how a focus on a global challenge such as climate change has been redefining the mundane realities of waste management.