Many actors see the EU’s circular economy (CE) as a promising narrative which steps outside dominant end-of-pipe solutions towards an encompassing vision for strategies across the supply chain. However, this study finds that the EU CE Action Plan maintains the status quo narrative instead of suggesting radical changes.
By focusing on stakeholder narratives, this analysis shows that the inertia is primarily due to CE proponents’ self-perception of being in a legitimacy crisis and their strategic arguments that have:
concealed social conflict and potential trade-offs
strengthened the agency of ‘status quo’ agents
excluded alternative voices questioning the proposed CE narrative.
The paper discusses how to develop new environmental narratives outside the status quo.
The circular economy (CE) is gaining momentum in cities. To ensure a sustainable CE, it is crucial to measure the environmental performance of CE strategies. However, environmental assessments overlook several strategies that are a key feature of urban CE practice. These include reuse and repair, sustainable built infrastructure and urban land use, green public procurement, smart information and access technology.
To provide insights into the environmental performance and potential of these strategies, industrial ecologists and municipalities should:
collaborate with urban systems experts
quantify the environmental impacts of entire urban systems
combine environmental assessments with social and economic feasibility ones.
Many political, business and civil society stakeholders are disappointed with the German Packaging Act. They feel it makes a comparatively small contribution to the circular economy. This study explains why they are disappointed:
Policy-making became entangled in disputes between proponents of a private and a public system for waste collection. Stakeholder fears of potential radical changes led to a stalemate
Fears allowed only incremental changes in the Packaging Act
The incremental changes could not resolve existing conflicts.
Based on its findings, the paper proposes possible courses of action. To create a shift to a circular economy, dialogue is needed using methods which explicitly address fears and overcome the current stalemate.
The Circulab Academy is an independent design studio and strategy consulting agency that helps organizations worldwide imagine and design regenerative solutions. It provides online courses based on powerful and open source circular design tools, created and enhanced by Circulab since 2014.
Now the Circulab Academy has a new free online course "Activate the Circular Economy".
Circular Cities offers grants for start-ups combined with a tailor-made accelerator programme with circular focus and climate impact. They connect start-ups with the largest climate-focused community in the world powered by EIT Climate-KIC ClimAccelerator as well as investors, partner cities, corporates and ecosystem partners. The programme will be run virtually, free of charge and in English.
The Czech Circular Hotspot will be launched on 12 April with an opening ceremony in the Kampus Hybernská in Prague. The event is organized by the Czech Institute of Circular Economy.
Today the Commission presented a package of European Green Deal proposals to make sustainable products the norm in the EU, boost circular business models and empower consumers for the green transition. The proposed rules are to make almost all physical goods on the EU market more friendly to the environment, circular, and energy efficient throughout their lifecycle.
Under the framework of the INSIGHT project, a Blueprint has been developed to provide specific recommendations on how to promote the application of Industrial Symbiosis and its facilitation to various stakeholders, as well as a roadmap of how the organisations are expected to apply the IS principles, by making use of educational specific inputs and resources.
