Circular economy and the city: an urban political economy agenda

ABSTRACT

The circular economy (CE) has become a matter of urban development. A literature review shows that the CE debate is biased toward technology-driven industrial change, while bracketing broader socio-political interests. We address this gap by exploring the political economy of scale of the CE. Looking into the case of Brussels (Belgium), a city that has recently adopted the CE as part of its socio-economic strategy, we explore how the anticipated transition to a ‘circular city’ chimes with long-standing urban development agendas. While there is little evidence of stable growth coalitions between corporate and political elites, we argue that the CE provides an ‘urban sustainability fix’ by selectively incorporating ecological goals in urban governance strategies. We further scrutinise the landscape of diverse and heterogenous CE practices in food and transport, highlighting how they are regulated and organised, what labour conditions they offer, and how they are anchored in urban space.

KEYWORDS:

• Circular economy
• urban political economy
• scale
• embeddedness
• Brussels

Acknowledgements

This paper has benefited from critical conversations with a great deal of fellow researchers and friends – none of whom, needless to say, bears any responsibility for the arguments presented above. We would like to thank the editors of the special issue as well as the reviewers for the patience and attention with which they approached our work. Some of the points made above were presented at a session we convened at the RGS-IBG conference in London in August 2019, and at the Foundational Economy Colloquium in Brussels in September 2019 – the questions raised by their participants have greatly inspired our writing. Additionally, we want to thank Mathieu Van Criekingen and our colleagues at Cosmopolis for providing their trust and interest in our work. Wojciech sends a special salute to Laura Martinez Alonso, with whom many of the arguments made in this paper were discussed and refined.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Wojciech Kębłowski http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2376-8357

David Bassens http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5368-7884

Notes

1 https://www.amsterdam.nl/en/policy/policy-innovation/policy-circular-city, accessed on 26 November 2019.

2 https://www.circle-economy.com/glasgow-takes-50-steps-closer-to-future-proofing-the-citys-smes/#.W-K5dC2ZOi4, accessed on 26 November 2019.

3 For instance, between 2014 and 2017, the CE was the most awarded topic in environmental research. Source: https://ec.europa.eu/easme/en/news/22-new-circular-economy-nature-based-solutions-raw-material-and-cultural-heritage-projects, accessed on 26 November 2019.

4 A similar trend has been observed in the case of urban strategies for ‘sustainable development’, whose presence correlates with the number of EU-funded local projects (Santonen et al. 2017). The circular ‘vision and rhetoric’ may well be expected to gain popularity due to its incorporation in the EU funding programmes, and by consequence complement and even replace the thus far dominant agendas of urban ‘sustainability’ and ‘smartness’.

5 Semi-structured interview (1), 2018.

6 Semi-structured interview (2), 2019.

7 Notably, this paper has been written within the framework of an Innoviris-funded four-year research project titled 'Circular economy and the city: identifying socio-spatial conditions and opportunities for a transition towards a circular paradigm in Brussels', involving all three authors.

8 We would like to thank an anonymous reviewer for raising this point.

9 Within PREC’s €13m budget only 200,000€ are allocated to training, and 400,000€ to governance. All remaining funds are allocated to business promotion and research.

10 Semi-structured interview (1), 2018.

11 Semi-structured interview (2), 2019.

12 Semi-structured interview (2), 2019.

13 Social economy is mentioned in only 6 out of 111 measures delineated by PREC.

14 Semi-structured interview (2), 2019.

15 https://inspironslequartier.brussels

16 Semi-structured interview (1), 2018.

17 https://besustainable.brussels/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/CSC_20180622_Annexe9_ExigencesDurabilite_PetiteIle_FINAL_FQD.pdf, accessed on 26 November 2019.

18 https://bruxelles-city-news.be/3-contrats-de-quartier-durable-sur-les-communes-de-saint-gilles-anderlecht-et-schaerbeek/, accessed on 8 December 2019.

19 Semi-structured interview (4) with a local food expert, 2019.

20 Semi-structured interview (6) with a co-founder of Beescoop, 2018.

21 Semi-structured interview (7) with a member of Collect’Met, 2019.

22 https://goodmove.brussels/fr/plan-regional-de-mobilite/, accessed on 26 November 2019.

23 Semi-structured interview (8), 2014.

24 Semi-structured interview (9), 2014.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Innoviris: [grant number 2017-PRFB-17].