Waste Management – Towards Sustainability

Overview

This is an opportunity for a person from an underrepresented group to undertake a fully funded masters degree followed by a fully funded interdisciplinary PhD under the ‘Sustainable Transitions – Leverhulme Doctoral Training Programme’ at the University of Essex.

Only UK domiciled applicants who do not already have a Master’s degree and who meet the following criteria may apply:

• Be from a low-income household background as evidenced by, for example, being in receipt of a full maintenance loan or Special Support loan during their undergraduate studies.

and/or

Be one of the following categories of ethnicity:

• Black African
• Black Caribbean
• Black Other
• Mixed – White and Black Caribbean
• Mixed – White and Black African
• Other mixed background (including Black African, Black Caribbean and Black Other)

The successful applicant would study an appropriate masters degree, such as:

• LLM in Law, Environment and Sustainability 
• LLM in International Law 

The research project would focus on an aspect of waste management. The project should try to focus on one or few specific themes against the broader backdrop of waste. These may include sustainable waste management in sensitive ecosystems, the role of  state and non-state actors in managing waste and promoting sustainability, the relationship with waste management and the violation of human rights to health or water, mapping technological innovations in waste management. In-keeping with the Sustainable Transitions programme, the project must link waste management with sustainable development, sustainability challenges and/or the role/responsibility of state and private actors. 

Interdisciplinary focus

This interdisciplinary project will be jointly supervised by faculty members of the Law and Life Sciences departments. The project can integrate environmental science public health and sociology into the legal analysis. Methods may include doctrinal and socio-legal analysis, comparative legal analysis, policy evaluation, law and policy mapping, stakeholder interviews, and integrating systematic review, meta-analyses and bioinformatics approaches commonly applied within the Life Sciences. 

Training and support

You will be supported through the Sustainable Transitions training programme which provides initial training in interdisciplinary research methods, training in the secondary discipline within the project area and ongoing training throughout the duration of the programme. All doctoral scholars benefit from the support of Proficio which entitles you to £2,500 that can be used to purchase training courses either within or external to the University. Additionally Sustainable Transitions scholars are entitled to £10,000 that can be used to cover research costs and further training. Scholars are encouraged to audit masters and degree level course where appropriate. You will also have the support of the Sustainable Transitions management team, as well as your own supervisory team.  All Sustainable Transitions scholars will become part of the University of Essex’s Centre for Environment and Society, through which ongoing events and networking opportunities are available.  

Person specification

This opportunity would suit a candidate with a degree/ background law, with an interest in in life sciences and environmental sciences. An interest in South Asia or another region of the Global South is desirable. Candidates must have a demonstrable commitment to research, a strong academic record, excellent writing and presentation skills, and a willingness to carry out independent fieldwork. It is not necessary for the candidate to have prior training in the hard sciences.

Research proposal

The project area is broadly defined, leaving scope for the applicant to develop their own specific research proposal as part of the application.  The successful candidate will further develop their proposal in close consultation with the supervisory team. 

Supervision

The primary discipline supervisor takes the lead responsibility for supervising the project. For further detail relating to supervision see the Guidance for Applicants (.docx) document.

Additional background information

The premise of this call is that waste management is an important area of study across disciplines. A significant quantum of academic research has been devoted to solid waste, plastics, and the transnational dumping of wastes; and more. More recently, advocacy around shifting towards a circular economy that must replace the ‘take, make, dispose’ model with the ‘reuse, repair, and recycle’ model, has gained prominence. 

Rapid urbanisation and consumerism have been on an exponential rise in South Asian countries. This has generated large and often unsustainable volumes of waste. One of the most widely used methods of waste management in these countries, is landfilling . Owing to a lack of available land for landfilling/dumping in varied contexts, such as in agricultural areas that border growing urban and peri-urban spaces, hilly or mountainous terrains, or geographically unstable or flood-prone land, waste is often burnt openly, dumped in water bodies, or buried without adequate treatment. This leads to serious health and environmental risks for local resident and wider communities. 

In any given local context, waste management and treatment involve a plethora of actors – government officials, private players who are in the business of waste management, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) etc. With respect to sanitary waste for instance, there are usually no dedicated rules that mandate extended producer’s responsibility (EPR), as they often do for other types of wastes such as plastics, e-wastes, or batteries. Therefore, there is no structured system of take-back, or even advocacy to move in this direction as has been seen with other categories of waste. In South Asia, wherein most local governments lack adequate resources to install and operate waste management units, several private waste organisations/businesses operate with limited or no regulatory oversight by the government. There is a need to take a more holistic view and engage with several intersecting issues including the responsibility of producers, government agencies, private actors, and consumers who are both contributors and victims of waste mismanagement. There is a need to identify different players in this landscape, including those upon which the primary mandate of waste management rests. Sanitary waste data collected and maintained by mandate-holders may need to be visited, including evidence of waste segregation, health and safety considerations being met in practice, and contamination or leakage on any given site.   Such engagement with the socio-legal and life sciences literature can be carried out either in one selected jurisdiction or comparatively, analysing the position in two jurisdictions through a North-South or South-South comparison.   

Such a study may  provide the foundation for future projects amongst researchers in the UK and South Asia  In a world that is desperately looking for ways to become more sustainable, it is vital for Global North and South scholars to gain local perspectives from varied spaces where the socio-legal context of any environmental impact must be fully appreciated before solutions can be proposed. 

How to Apply

Full details available at Sustainable Transitions Leverhulme Doctoral Training Programme.

Supervisory team references

1. Lokhandwala, Z., (2022). Peasants’ Rights as New Human Rights: Promises and Concerns for Agrobiodiversity Conservation. Asian Journal of International Law. 12 (1), 105-120. 
2. Lokhandwala, Z., (2024). Agriculture, Food Systems, and the Environment. In: The Oxford Handbook of Environmental and Natural Resources Law in India. Editors: Cullet, P., Bhullar, L. and Koonan, S., . Oxford University Press (OUP). 
3. Pine, A.C., Marco, A., Brooke, G.N. (2023) A computational approach to identify efficient RNA-cleaving 10 23 DNAzymes. NAR Genomics & Bioinformatics.5, 1. https://doi.org/10.1093/nargab/lqac098  
4. Tejaswini., Kiley, R., Pine, A.C. (In prep) Cervical cancer knowledge among members of the public and healthcare professionals in rural Bihar, India. 
5. Brooke, G.N, Culley, R.C., Leach, D.A., Latonen, L., Rees, E.E.L., Alkheilewi, M.A., Pine, A.C., et al (2025). Disruption of androgen receptor-cofactor interactions by the RNA-binding protein FUS/TLS alters androgen signalling in prostate cancer. Oncogene - Pre-print. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-6609773/v1