This article looks at well documented processes of urban regeneration and community displacement in the inner-city through an innovative anthropological perspective focused on concepts of waste and value. Using the notion of symbolic devaluation of the working classes developed by Skeggs (1997;2004), it traces their exclusion from recycling practices while at the same time the estates they live on are being regenerated. Raising questions about the parallels and contradictions between regeneration and recycling, it shows how symbolic devaluation of specific areas and their inhabitants are necessary precursors of the physical demolition and removal that characterize regeneration processes. Through an ethnographic approach, the deep connections between people and their waste, and people as waste, are exposed and questioned, showing how valuable middle class selves are produced through appropriate waste management procedures, i.e. individualized recycling, while inner-city, estate dwellers are remade into uncaring, unworthy citizens who cannot take part in this value-producing circuit.Key words: regeneration; recycling; waste; class; value; inner-city; gentrification "We was regenerated out." What a strange expression, I thought, and yet there it was, this was how Mary explained being moved out of her home, against her will, off of her estate, which was then demolished, and onto another one, luckily still in her area, she said. The most interesting thing is that, at the time, I was asking her about her recycling habits, what she did with her rubbish, and how did she take
In the resurgence of interest in inheritance flows following the publication of Piketty’s work, little attention has been paid to the affective practices that ensure the success of inheritance processes as wealth moves down generations of dynastic families. This article explores these practices, drawing on research among wealth managers, philanthropy advisors, family offices and their clients, to show how philanthropy is promoted by advisors to the wealthy as a tool to support inheritance and family business succession planning. In this process, advisors draw on the philanthropic imagination to style wealthy families as custodians of both private capital and the common good, thus mirroring the narratives used by philanthrocapitalists to legitimise their wealth in the public sphere. Here, however, the discourse of philanthrocapitalism is turned inwards to the private realm of the family, to persuade younger generations to rally around the collective project of the custodianship of wealth. By bringing together research on philanthropy and inheritance, this article contributes to the growing sociological literature on elites and the global inequalities driven by their accumulation of wealth. It shows how wealth accumulation is increasingly dependent not only on the mechanics of financial markets and inheritance flows, but also on affective wealth management strategies framed around ethical notions of kinship and social responsibility.
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