%L theses_frw3341
%A Ana Blanca Coco Martin
%T Collecting and Sorting Second Hand Clothes: The Practice of Circularity and Social Inclusiveness in Textile Waste Management in Dutch Municipalities
%D 2020
%X The fast disposal nature of fashion and throwaway culture is resulting in serious environmental, social and economic problems. The awareness that something is wrong in the textile waste policy in the Netherlands, has only recently been given a voice. The EU and the Dutch government have set goals towards a more circular textile waste management of which Dutch municipalities are responsible. Recently, often their goal is to be both circular and social inclusive. This research investigates the conditions to make a municipalities’ textile waste management work, both in terms of circularity and social inclusiveness. In order to determine what these conditions are, an intensive explorative research design was chosen. A multiple case study was conducted in which the municipalities of Groningen and Leeuwarden were examined. Qualitative data was generated from policy documents, including information from a WOB request. In addition, seven semi-structured interviews were conducted with several parties along the domestic part of the supply chain and experts in the field of textile waste management. The interviews have been coded and analysed using ATLAS.ti. The data revealed that, in both municipalities, several problems need to be resolved in order to be able to comply as a circular and social inclusive textile waste management. First of all, the conceivable indication emerges that the combination of circularity and social inclusiveness is not self-evident. However, if this combination is still to be pursued, a main condition to be met is that the staff continuity of executing social enterprises should not be under constant pressure. Likewise, if the social benefits of collecting and sorting with people with a distance to the labour market exceed the social costs, these social enterprises should not suffer from a deteriorated financial situation caused by poor and dirty textiles. At the same time, better legislation and regulations should be imposed on the international textile waste flow. Better legislation could lead to the counteraction of both the surplus of primary and secondary textile and its poor quality. Moreover, cooperation must take place between different actors on different scales and there must be transparency throughout the chain. The findings of this study give cause to investigate how the conditions found could be met and which research to prioritize, since subsidies for research seem to be provided arbitrarily. Lastly, research could be devoted to whether the combination of being both circular and social inclusive in a municipalities’ textile waste management is desirable.