"Henancun, as one of the migrant enclaves in Beijing, emerged in the late 1980s with the development of the informal recycling business. Although rural-to-urban migrants and their recycling business play essential roles in providing the recycling service to the local residents and promoting the environmental protection, their existence is nearly invisible in the city. Focusing on the development history of Henancun, the structural and institutional barriers faced by both migrants and recycling businesses, and their coping strategies in Beijing, this dissertation research uses a combined qualitative and quantitative research method to examine the role of Henancun and the nature of the informal recycling business in recycling migrants' livelihood, and to understand the structural and institutional barriers faced by migrants and recycling as well as their coping strategies in Beijing. Based on questionnaires, interviews, observations and government documentation examinations, this study reveals that Henancun is both a migrant and a business enclave that emerged to cope with the socially and politically marginalized circumstances migrants have been facing in the city. Besides, the space of Henancun, with full-fledged services to accommodate migrants' livelihood and businesses, has gradually become a permanent 'outside' space that exists in between the city and migrants' hometowns. The informal nature of the recycling business also emerged as a strategy to cope with local regulations and uncoordinated governmental policies."--Page ii.
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