Negotiating Place and Value: Geographies of Waste and Scavenging in Buenos Aires Risa Whitson Department of Geography and Program of Women’s and Gender Studies, Ohio University, USA; whitson@ohio.edu Abstract: This article focuses on debates over the place and value of waste and waste scavengers in Buenos Aires during and following the economic crisis of 2002 in order to consider how waste functions as a fundamental category for organizing social space. I argue that conceptualizations of waste as both zero value and “matter out of place” need to be combined with a recognition of the commodity potential of waste in order to better understand how waste works to constitute social structures and space. I demonstrate that while the displacement of waste and waste scavengers associated with the crisis opened a space for the transformation of established social relations, in ongoing negotiations, waste continues to be defined as that which belongs elsewhere and is of no value, reinforcing the marginalization of garbage scavengers. Keywords: waste, garbage, scavengers, Argentina, crisis Introduction One of the most visible manifestations of Argentina’s political and economic crisis, which peaked in 2002, was the increased presence of informal garbage scavengers—or cartoneros—working on the streets of the country’s capital city, Buenos Aires. Estimates suggest that whereas before the crisis there were approximately 10,000 cartoneros working in Buenos Aires, by the end of 2002 over 40,000 men, women, and children were working as informal garbage scavengers (Anguita 2003). Like garbage scavengers elsewhere, cartoneros in Argentina earn a living by sorting through household and commercial waste in order to find recyclable material. Deriving their name from the most commonly collected material—cart´ on, or cardboard—the cartoneros also collect paper, metal, glass, and plastic, all items that are sold to recycling centers for processing and resale for use in the formal manufacturing sector. However, while cartoneros in Argentina represent a critical first link in a very lucrative economy of recycled trash, as in other parts of the world, they continue to be socially stigmatized and marginalized. Their work is both precarious and dangerous: not only is the work of Antipode Vol. 43 No. 4 2011 ISSN 0066-4812, pp 1404–1433 doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2010.00791.x C  2011 The Author Antipode C  2011 Editorial Board of Antipode.