'An interesting and important account.'
Daily Telegraph

Have you ever stopped and wondered where your jeans came from? Who made them and where? Ever wondered where they end up after you donate them for recycling?

Following a pair of jeans, Clothing Poverty takes the reader on a vivid around-the-world tour to reveal how clothes are manufactured and retailed, bringing to light how fast fashion and clothing recycling are interconnected. Andrew Brooks shows how recycled clothes are traded across continents, uncovers how retailers and international charities are embroiled in commodity chains which perpetuate poverty, and exposes the hidden trade networks which transect the globe.

Stitching together rich narratives, from Mozambican markets, Nigerian smugglers and Chinese factories to London's vintage clothing scene, TOMS shoes and Vivienne Westwood's ethical fashion lines, Brooks uncovers the many hidden sides of fashion.

Andrew Brooks is a lecturer in development geography at King's College London. His research examines connections between spaces of production and places of consumption, and particularly the geographies of economic and social change in Africa. Fieldwork has taken him to India, Papua New Guinea and across Africa. Research in Africa has included extensive investigations of markets and politics in Malawi and Mozambique as well as Chinese investment in Zambia.

Preface to the second edition

Introduction

1. A biography of jeans

2. Clothes and capital

3. The shadow world of used clothing

4. Cotton is the mother of poverty

5. Made in China and Africa

6. Second-hand Africa

7. Persistent poverty

8. Old clothes and new looks

9. Ethical clothing myths and realities

10. Fast-fashion