ABSTRACT
This chapter is not in any way a summary of the book. Instead I have composed seven separate provocations, on the aspects of waste that I find most interesting and important. My approach is conditioned by a long-ago career as an archaeologist, and a more recent fascination with anthropological approaches to consumer culture as a historical and global phenomenon. In my view, the topic of waste is the most important connection between population, consumption and climate change, a key we desperately need in order to unlock the problem of sustainability. 1 To this end, I have chosen to write about the aspects of waste with which we most need to grapple. My approach is therefore more practical than it is overtly theoretical, though it is often hard to separate the two.
