Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686

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Resources, Conservation & Recycling

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Full length article

Making the circular economy work for human development T

Patrick Schröder*, Alexandre Lemille, Peter Desmond

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: This paper aims to re-conceptualise and advance the existing frameworks and practical applications of the
Circular economy circular economy (CE) towards a broader approach to development in general and, more particularly, to com-
Human development bine it with the approach for Human Development (HD). The CE is an alternative to the current "take, make,
SDGs waste” extractive industrial model and offers a practical solution to address global and local environmental
challenges, such as resource depletion, marine plastic pollution, and for staying within planetary system
boundaries. Although the CE and related concepts such as cradle to cradle provide a most promising alternative
to the traditional linear economy model and its impacts on the planets eco-systems, some of the CE key elements
have raised debate both in the academic community and among policy makers. One of the debates concerns the
missing social or human dimensions of the CE. Likewise, the HD approach lacks considerations of environmental
sustainability. Drawing on both academic and grey literature and the authorsö research observations and pro-
fessional experiences in the fields of promoting the CE and international development cooperation for HD, we
attempt to develop an integrative conceptual framework of the CE and HD. This framework includes social-
economic elements of the transformation from linear to circular economic models, combined with HD from the
social sciences and development studies. We thereby complement the technological-material focused CE model
that is primarily based on principles of industrial ecology and engineering. We utilize the existing ‘circular
humansphereö concept to articulate the incorporation of HD into the discussion of CE. By bringing in explicit
links with HD, we pursue a double aim: First, to raise awareness and understanding among the CE research
community of the missing human dimension in current CE discourse, and second, to familiarise the international
development community with the approaches of CE. This will advance the options for adopting CE practices in
international development programmes and for the process of implementing the social SDGs concerning HD such
as SDG 1, 3, 4, 5, and 10. Finally, we hope that this CE and HD framework can contribute to the resolution of
environmental and developmental issues.

1. Introduction increase the provision of nature’s contributions and the conservation

What is the reasoning behind this attempt of putting two very dif-
ferent concepts and approaches like the Circular Economy (CE) and
Human Development (HD) together into one framework?
First of all, traditional approaches to reduce poverty and improve
human well-being through economic growth and industrialisation with
high levels of resource consumption, pollution and waste generation are
pushing against critical planetary boundaries (Rockström et al., 2009).
Furthermore, current negative trends in biodiversity and ecosystems
will undermine progress towards many HD objectives. The Global As-
sessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES, 2019) high-
lights important positive synergies between preserving nature and
achieving HD goals related to education, gender equality, reducing
inequalities and promoting peace and justice. Therefore, new ap-
proaches that combine poverty reduction and HD with measures to
and sustainable use of nature are needed.
Secondly, there are similarities in the origins of the CE and the HD
approach. The CE emerged as a consequence of defects in linear ap-
proaches to sustainable economic systems. The HD approach emerged
in part as a result of fundamental dissatisfactions with the consequence
of neo-liberal economic policy, especially as applied in developing
countries over the 1980s and before. The first CE concept emerged in
the 1970s and 1980s when increasing waste generation became an issue
and new ideas emerged such as the 3Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle). The
next phase of the CE was from 1990 to 2010 and focused on strategies
for eco-efficiency. Since then, the focus shifted again to maximising
value from resources and reuse of waste Reike et al. (2018).
HD started with Amartya Sen’s capability approach conceptualised
in the 1970s and 1980s as an alternative to orthodox welfare eco-
nomics. In 1990 the Human Development Report (HDR) was created by

⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: pschroeder@chathamhouse.org (P. Schröder).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2020.104686
Received 15 November 2018; Received in revised form 20 September 2019; Accepted 3 January 2020
0921-3449/ © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
P. Schröder, et al.
Mahbub ul Haq and was published by the United Nations Development
Programme. The HDR also pioneered the Human Development Index
(HDI), directly combining three fundamental measures of human well-
being: life expectancy (as a measure of length of life), education (as a
measure of access to knowledge) and a tapering measure of income per
capita (as a measure of people having sufficient income for basic con-
sumer choices). The three were chosen in part because they were
available for most countries of the world. The combination of the three
into the HDI was explicitly intended to shift attention from the domi-
nant pre-occupation with economic growth measured by Gross National
Product (GNP) increases.
Issues of unsustainable resource consumption and production are
not new topics for HD. Already in 1998 the HDR discussed and issued a
“critique of consumption patterns that are inimical to human development,
and an agenda for action to create an enabling environment for sustainable
consumption
for human development” (UNDP, 1998, iii). From around 2010
Human Development and sustainability concepts have become more
closely connected (e.g. Neumayer, 2010). Both paradigms have built on
the concerns generated by the 1972 Stockholm conference on the En-
vironment, which first endorsed commitments to an ecologically intact
planet without waste and emphasised that sustainability and human
well-being are both matters too important to be treated as bi-products
of simple-minded economic growth, however rapid. The HD approach
still has its shortcomings. The critical importance of environmental
sustainability and human carrying capacity (Rees, 2013) for HD have
not been widely recognised. They were insufficiently considered in the
initial HD approach and when the HDI was developed. There is in-
creasing realisation that the HD approach also requires taking into
account well-being of future generations and long-term environmental
sustainability (Stewart et al., 2018). Bringing the HD approach and the
CE together could address this shortcoming of the current HD approach.
Likewise, it would also address the shortcomings of the current CE
approaches, as discussed in the following sections.
This paper is a conceptual contribution to advance the CE concept,
not an empirical analysis of existing CE models or testing of how cur-
rent conceptualisations of the CE are practised. The methods used to
inform this conceptual contribution to the HD and CE discussions in-
clude a narrative literature review covering a wide range of academic
sources and grey literature. The academic literature and online sources
were found and accessed through searches in academic databases
Scopus and ScienceDirect and through Google. In addition to the lit-
erature review, the development of this conceptual framework has been
informed by the combined professional experiences of the authors in
international development, environmental protection and sustainable
business development. The main author has worked extensively in in-
ternational development programmes with governments on CE policies
and promoting the uptake of CE practices in industry and communities
in Asian developing countries. The two other co-authors are founders of
the African Circular Economy Network and actively involved in pro-
moting and testing CE business models on local and national levels in
Europe and Africa.
2. Overview of current circular economy definitions, narratives
and frameworks: where are the social gaps?
The CE is a visionary and practical alternative to the current "take,
make and dispose” extractive industrial model. It is restorative and
regenerative by design (EMF, 2015a) and offers the promise of an al-
ternative sustainability paradigm (Geissdoerfer et al., 2017). Over the
last decade, it has gained significant traction among policymakers, the
business community and sustainability researchers. The CE has sig-
nificant potentials to address climate change by reducing up to 3.6
billion tonnes of global CO2 emissions per year (Enkvist and Klevnäs,
2018). It is recommended by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy
Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES, 2019) as a
2
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
way to achieve sustainable consumption and production and improve
sustainability of economic and financial systems. Its application is
considered as crucial in efforts to address current challenges to the
global environment, such as marine plastic pollution (Mendenhall,
2018). Specific approaches of the CE include recycling of electric and
electronic waste (Golsteijn and Martinez, 2017), management of mu-
nicipal waste and plastics especially in developing countries (Williams
et al., 2019), food waste recovery and anaerobic digestion (Ingrao et al.,
2018) and supporting sustainable resource management of production
and consumption systems. CE practices have been identified as having
the potential of creating ‘toolbox’ solutions for achieving a number of
the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (Schröder, et al.,
2018a,b), yet more research is required into the practical application of
such approaches.
The CE concept offers a fundamental alternative to the traditional
linear economy model to reduce waste, pollution and resource con-
sumption. Building on recent technological advances, it provides new
business opportunities to generate value from waste. However, the
current CE concept in academic discourse and its real-world applica-
tions in practice are still contested (Korhonen et al., 2018). The main
focus of many CE concepts is on uniting economic development and
environmental sustainability for sustainable green growth. In this
context, there are concerns that the CE, if presented and analysed un-
critically, could reinforce the beliefs in absolute decoupling and un-
limited economic growth (Kopnina, 2019).
Increasing human consumption choices is to some degree part of the
existing CE narrative in which CE solution aims to addresses the social
side through lowering costs of access and ownership releasing addi-
tional consumer spending which will lead to increased demand and
thus jobs (EMF, 2015a). The wider issues of the social pillar of sus-
tainability and HD objectives are, however, largely neglected: in-
equality and poverty, human rights and international justice.
A recent systematic literature review explored state-of-the-art aca-
demic research on CE, identifying 601 academic papers and finding that
these social dimensions were only marginally considered in the aca-
demic CE discourse (Merli et al., 2018). The limited research that has
focused explicitly on the social dimension notes that CE entails “crea-
tion of social value (minimization of social value destruction
throughout the entire system, such as the prevention of unhealthy
working conditions in the extraction of raw materials and reuse).” (van
Buren et al. (2016v), p.3). There is also increasing recognition by major
stakeholders working in the field of international development, such as
the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO), that
CE strategies need to undergo additional efforts towards taking into
account social equity and inclusiveness (UNIDO, 2017).
The mainstream discourse on CE is situated within the neoliberal
growth paradigm. The rhetoric is linked to economic gains and ensuring
resource security in the face of rapid resource depletion. Business ac-
tivities are at the centre of the CE debates and the corporate initiatives
taking place. The interest among large multinational businesses has
been stirred by the realisation that the circular economy offers sig-
nificant potentials to increase resource security, manage price fluctua-
tions and give a competitive advantage in increasingly competitive
business environments. A main focus is to make supply chains more
resource efficient, close leakage points and implement reverse logistics
models to create circular value chains for new value creation (Mishra
et al., 2018).
The unit of analysis is often at the ‘product level’ or company level,
where some researchers address products as a generalised term, while
others analyse specific product value-creating categories, produced by a
specific company in its specific value chain (e.g. Weetman, 2016). In
this context research focuses on consumer behaviour and consumer
acceptance of new business models such as product-service systems
(PSS) - people are regarded as either consumers or users of products,
but not as humans and social beings in a social context, which might
explain why currently most PSS only result in marginal environmental
P. Schröder, et al.
Table 1
Social Dimensions of CE to be explored.
Underexplored and unaddressed social dimensions in the Links to SDGs
CE
Poverty reduction, elimination of extreme poverty, SDG 1 (No Poverty)
rights to economic resources including access to
land and technology, social protection systems.
Health, well-being (material, bodily and mental well- SDG 3 (Good Health and
being), quality of life. Well-being)
Gender perspectives, intersectionality, gender inequality SDG 5 (Gender Equality)
and discrimination, distribution of resources.
Education, skills and working conditions, including SDG 4 (Quality Education)
safety, quality of employment and level of pay. and SDG 8 (Decent Work)
Issues of social inequality, the role of the individual and SDG 10 (Reduced
society, social cohesion, social solidarity Inequalities)
CE cooperation for developing countries and SDG 17 (Partnerships for
opportunities for collaboration between diverse the Goals)
stakeholders
improvements (Tukker, 2004). As PSS and related CE business models,
such as on-demand ridesharing services, increasingly apply digital ap-
plications and are relying on behavioural predictions generated by
surveillance, algorithms and machine learning (Zuboff, 2019) ethical
questions about ownership of resources, data and privacy also are
emerging concerns for the CE.
There is also an emerging link of the CE to the Industry 4.0 and
automation which aim for sustainable industrial networks with matrix-
like structures of big data-driven industrial symbiosis (Tseng et al.,
2018). Furthermore, additive manufacturing practices with closed loop
supply chains have potentially negative outcome on employment and
workers in low and middle income countries. Textile take-back and
recycling schemes, 3D textile printing, re-shoring and automation
(Andersson et al., 2018) are likely to have impacts on textile manu-
facturing in low income countries which heavily depend on the garment
and apparel sectors for achieving socio-economic development objec-
tives.
In summary, the framing of the CE in recent academic discourse is
often paradoxical (Reike et al. (2018). Fundamental paradigmatic
questions of CE conceptualization still remain unsolved and require
further conceptual development. So far, no consensus has emerged
among academics, practitioners and policymakers on the aims and
scope of the CE, which provides the opportunity to shape and advance
the current concept and approaches. The lack of linkages between CE
and sustainable development was highlighted by Kirchherr et al. (2017)
in their analysis of 114 definitions of CE; they found little evidence of
the impact on social equity and much greater emphasis was placed on
economic prosperity and environmental impact.
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
Considerations Literature references
Without “embedding” humans in the CE, the outcomes Jackson (2009); DiFrancesco
might not lead to building safe and just societal (2019); Lemille (2017b)
foundations. A “Growth Within” model keeps economic
matters within the economic sphere, instead of building a
model across all three dimensions. A “Prosperity Within”
model would be more appropriate to address SDG1.
Furthermore, current narratives about decoupling
economic growth from resource needs are based on the
economic versus environmental nexus and do not address
issues such as rights to economic resources, land and
technology, which are crucial for poverty reduction.
Concerns about health and well-being of informal sector Annamalai (2015); Gutberlet
workers (e.g. in plastic collection and recycling, e-waste and Baeder (2008);
processing and textile waste sorting and recovery) are
currently not sufficiently addressed by CE initiatives.
Gender perspectives are lacking from CE frameworks and Pla-Julián and Guevara
toolkits. Consumer attitudes and preferences, CE (2019); Bebasari (2019);
innovations, institutions or are not gender neutral. The Graham (2018)
contributions of women to the CE are not explicitly
acknowledged, challenges and hardships are not
sufficiently understood and addressed.
CE frameworks emphasis is on job creation, but do not Pla-Julián and Guevara
address issues like prevailing working conditions, labour (2019)
practices or gender pay gaps. Lack of attention in CE
frameworks and discourse on informal sector workers
(e.g. waste pickers, e-waste recyclers)
Reducing inequality is focus of the 2019 HD reports. UNDP (2019); Moreau et al.
Reducing social inequality has been identified as a (2017); Motesharrei, S. et al.
condition, next to circularity, to avoid collapse of (2014)
humanity. The current CE model does not address
inequality at the same level of urgency as circularity or
materials.
Often considered a “Western” view of economics, CE Preston and Lehne (2017);
frameworks are not addressing the opportunities for non- Schröder et al. (2019)
mechanised markets where technologies might not be the
answer in highly populated geographies. Different
narratives of CE need to be taken into account to enable
international cooperation and scaling-up of CE globally.
To date, most of the CE literature has focused on industrialised
countries and consumer societies while neglecting issues and priorities
of developing countries (Schröder et al., 2019). That said, some studies
have given an indication of the potential for CE to provide new and
varied employment opportunities in developing countries (Burger,
2019) In fact, developing countries have the greatest need for in-
novative approaches that reduce pollution and waste, improve health
and well-being, and contribute to new approaches to economic growth
and decent job creation. All of these are severely under-researched.
Exploratory research in the international development context has
shown that CE practices can create jobs, reduce pollution and save lives
in low and middle income countries (Gower and Schröder, 2016).
Issues of political economy are almost entirely absent from current
academic discourse on CE. As Iacovidou et al. (2017) point out, options
for sustainable resource management and material recovery from waste
cannot realistically be analysed, forecasted and evaluated without un-
derstanding the socio-political institutions and contemporary globalised
political economy. In relation to global value chains, successful CE
approaches need to take account of power relations between large
multinationals and smaller suppliers which are often located in devel-
oping countries (Schröder et al., 2018a,b). As the OECD points out, the
competitiveness of material intensive sectors such as natural resource
extraction, mining and certain types of manufacturing, will probably
decline (OECD, 2017). This could mean a range of low and middle in-
come countries where industries and workers specialise in these activ-
ities and are dependent on exports of primary resources may be made
worse off in a CE transition.
These issues are an indication that notions of the social and
3
P. Schröder, et al.
solidarity economy need to be applied which can lead to more robust
CE strategies toward environmental and social aims (Moreau et al.,
2017), Pla-Julián and Guevara (2019) argue that the CE offers the
potential to put economic activities into loops of care for people, the
environment and the consequential impact on ecosystems. For this to
happen, the existing CE frameworks, methodologies and tools need to
strengthen its social dimension. Furthermore, appropriate institutional
arrangements and strategic leadership are necessary to make this
paradigm shift contribute towards sustainable development. Other gaps
and issues relating to the social dimensions, which require further ex-
ploration and attention, are summarised in Table 1.
3. Setting circular economy in a broader economic, social and
political context, guided by the human development methodology
Emerging research on the CE in developing country contexts shows
that CE solutions are essential to the implementation of a range of SDG
targets (Schröder et al., 2018a,b; Preston and Lehne, 2017). As well as
being highly relevant for achieving SDG 12 (Sustainable Consumption
and Production) and SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities),
they are also relevant for SDG 13 (Climate Action) and 14 (Life Below
Water and Life on Land). And if implemented in a socially inclusive
way, CE practices also can contribute positively, albeit in an indirect
way, to SDG 1 (No Poverty) and Goal 3 (Good Health). However, we
currently do not have a suitable framework to analyse and understand
the links and potential contributions of CE solutions to issues such as
SDG 5 (Gender), SDG 8 (Decent work) or SDG 10 (Inequality). Parti-
cularly the issue of growing inequality has been identified as key con-
cern and needs to be address with the same level of urgency as en-
vironmental sustainability to preserve human civilization (Motesharrei
et al., 2014). Hence, combining CE with the HD approach offers a way
forward.
HD relates closely to the social SDGs, but builds on a broader and
more general methodology, focussing on people and the human situa-
tion and explicitly bringing fulfilment of human rights as a necessary
objective as well as including explicit concerns with social equity on
national as well as international levels (Sen, 1999)1 . HD also uses
multi-disciplinary analysis, bringing social and political issues into the
examination of each situation and into the policy conclusions it pre-
sents. Such an approach inevitably leads to a more pragmatic set of
conclusions, with decision-making emerging as part of a political-con-
sultative process, as opposed to a more technical-managerial one.
Proponents of such a process, and most political scientists, would argue
that this matches political realities and is therefore an argument for
such a process rather than against it.2
HD is recognised as an overriding goal of development, but is
challenged by growing iequality and macro-economic instability (Jolly,
2008; Cornia and Stewart, 2014). The key objectives of HD are to ex-
pand human choices and strengthen human capabilities. Human
choices are to a large degree constrained by distributional decisions
about resources. Social equity considerations are important to fairly
distribute goods and services across society and for holding the state
accountable for its influence over how benefits and costs of develop-
ment are distributed in society (Jones, 2009). This is the essential
starting point – to focus on how to expand the choices of the population
in the geographic area under review, both in terms of their abilities to
1
Amartya Sen would also identify the failure to take account of “adaptation
and mental conditioning” as a fundamental weakness of the neo-liberal eco-
nomic analysis and policy making. See Sen, A., 1999. Development as Freedom
(New York, Alfred Knopf) 1999, p 62
2
Amartya Sen has written much on these issues. In Development as Freedom op
cit, he takes on the limitations of the utilitarian approach for evaluation and
brilliantly elaborates the case for democratic participation in decision making
especially on environmental issues.
4
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
engage in production, income-generating activities and consumption.
Strengthening peoples’ capabilities through CE approaches that pro-
mote social equity and inclusive and diverse societies is important for
enabling low-income groups to take ownership of their own futures.
This almost always will involve a process of participation, consultation,
briefing, discussion and interaction in relation to the specifics of CE in
the area involved. Learning and understanding complexity in HD
through the processes of participating and engagement (Burns and
Worsley, 2015) is likely to be an important part of the process, and a
reminder that the issues are not just technical and the preserve of ex-
perts but closely related to the lives and experiences of the people most
affected. This reality of everyone having skills and knowledge and
being something of an expert needs to be brought into the briefing
about the technical CE solutions – of waste disposal and recycling, new
building codes, organic food production or changes in industrial pro-
duction processes.
In 2019, the Human Development Report focusses on understanding
the different dimensions of inequalities which are fundamental to
people’s well-being, and what is driving them (UNDP, 2019).
In the 2010 Report UNDP provided, for the first time, an inequality-
adjusted HDI for a large number of countries, based on work by Alkire
and Foster (2010). The UNDP and associated research organisation are
in the process of sharpening the analytical framework and measure-
ments to better describe what inequality looks like and to have a deeper
understanding of how inequality will change over time. This is highly
relevant, given the economic, social and environmental transformations
that are unfolding worldwide. The HD reports have frequently analysed
the contrasts in HD performance among countries at different levels of
GNP per capita and the ways in which advances in HD indicators have
substantively ahead or fallen substantively behind long-term trends in
GNP growth. The 2019 comprehensive global analysis of inequality
uses a new framework that looks at inequality ‘Beyond income’ – to also
consider inequalities in other dimensions – from health and education
to access to technologies and exposure to shocks; ‘Beyond averages’ – to
move away from an analysis purely dominated by summary measures
like the Gini coefficient; and ‘Beyond today’ – taking a long-term view
of inequality, by identifying trends and making projections, to look to
2030 and beyond (Conceição, 2019).
With this as background, we turn to our central question: how can
the specifics of HD be brought into the frameworks of CE, and vice
versa?
4. Combining circular economy and human development
indicators to measure national progress of countries
Moving from this abstract CE and HD discussion to a practical
quantitative method for assessing development progress, it might be-
come possible to make direct links between the CE and the Human
Development Index (HDI), pioneered by the Human Development
Reports of the UN. The HDI combines three fundamental measures of
human well-being – life expectancy (as a measure of length of life),
education (as a measure of access to knowledge) and a tapering mea-
sure of income per capita (as a measure of people having sufficient
income for basic consumer choices). The combination of the three into
the HDI was explicitly intended to shift attention from the dominant
pre-occupation with economic growth measured by GNP increases.
An acknowledged limitation of the HD approach is a lack of atten-
tion to environmental sustainability and lack of concern about the well-
being, capabilities and choices of future generations (Stewart et al.,
2018). We propose that an indicator framework combining the HDI
with CE indicators might be used to measure progress towards both
reduction of environmental impacts through increasing circularity and
progress towards HD objectives.3 While there is no indicator that can be
3
The focus and objectives of the proposed HD and CE framework are to
P. Schröder, et al.
Fig. 1. Combined Human Development and Circular Economy Index (Authors’ work based on HDI indicators by UNDP (2018), EMF (2015b) and EC (2018).
a single measurement for the CE, a number of existing indicators can
help to measure circular performance in several areas that directly or
indirectly contribute to the Circular Economy and Human Develop-
ment. For example, a circularity indicator and methodology, called the
Material Circularity Indicator (MCI), has been developed by the Ellen
MacArthur Foundation (EMF, 2015b), which gauges properties in a
product, components, materials, and potential waste generation on the
micro level. The European Union has started applying a macro-level
monitoring framework to measure Member States progress towards
becoming circular (EC, 2018). Geng et al. (2012) developed a CE in-
dicator system for China which provides metrics for policy and deci-
sion-makers and can help achieve CE goals and outcomes. However,
none of these circularity indicator systems measures social aspects. We
propose using the following sets of circular economy indicators which
correlate with the three main components of HDI. 1. Material circu-
larity as a measure for environmental quality improvements through
reduced waste and pollution (correlating to the long and healthy life
component of the HDI) 2. Mean years of training and business profit-
ability of CE business models and related skills and employment (cor-
relating to the knowledge component of the HDI) 3. Quality and af-
fordability of goods and services delivered by the CE as an indicator for
the ability of the CE to provide for human consumption needs and
improve well-being (correlating to the decent standard of living com-
ponent of the HDI) (see Fig. 1). We acknowledge that this combined
index will require further refinement and new statistical information to
measure each component in relation to countries' actual economies.
5. A new conceptual framework for a Human Development-
focused Circular Economy
In this section we expand the discussion to develop a new con-
ceptual framework which combines HD and CE. Although the academic
CE discourse is awash with multiple definitions (Kirchherr et al., 2017),
in the light of the discussion above, we attempt a first definition of a
HD-focused, inclusive CE that supports social equity. It would be “a
(footnote continued)
improve human well-being and increase human capabilities. By including en-
vironmental sustainability concerns into the HD framework, impacts on eco-
systems and biodiversity are expected to be reduced, therefore non-human
species stand to benefit from this approach, compared to the conventional HD
approaches.
5
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
human-centred regenerative and restorative socio-economic system
which increases human choices and builds human capabilities by re-
capturing value of materials and waste for people through slowing,
closing, and narrowing material and energy loops that minimise re-
source inputs and waste, emissions, and energy leakage. This can be
achieved by empowering workers, enabling social inclusion and fos-
tering sustainable lifestyles through applying practices and policies for
long-lasting human-centred design, maintenance, ensuring rights to
repair, reusing and sharing, remanufacturing, refurbishing, and re-
cycling” (based on Geissdoerfer et al., 2017).
We further draw on the concept of the ‘circular humansphere’, also
called a human-embedded circular economy (Lemille, 2017a) which
encompasses the elimination of waste, but goes a step further towards
eliminating poverty and tackling inequalities at the same time. Going
beyond a techno-centric CE narrative, the circular humansphere sees
humans and human concerns as an integral part of the circular system:
humans here are at the centre of inputs and outputs as well as inflows
and outflows of the circulation of resources and energies on planet
Earth. By embedding humans in the circular perspective, we account for
all stocks and flows in a complete symbiotic perspective as in nature.
Embedding humans leads to two new dimensions: adaptation to nature
and inclusiveness within economic decisions. As the current linear
model is redesigned, the circular humansphere offers the opportunity
for a paradigm shift. It also offers a change of values from profit-max-
imization driven businesses to an inclusive value creation model. The
circular humanshpere aims at expanding the notion of ‘circular
thinking’ into the social dimension: where waste is considered a
wrongly designed concept in the economic sphere, poverty is also seen
as a wrongly designed notion in the social sphere. Addressing the social
dimensions of social equity, inclusiveness and diversity by applying this
new thinking is considered to be a fundamental condition to achieve
alignment with natural cycles (Lemille, 2017b).
Our conceptual outline of the CE and HD framework combines the
Ellen MacArthur Foundation’s ‘butterfly diagram’ (EMF, 2015a) with
the HD objectives. It also draws on the concept of the circular hu-
mansphere, as introduced above, to address the missing social dimen-
sion (Lemille, 2017a). The CE butterfly diagram provides a view the
technological sphere and its interaction with the biological sphere. All
resources entering and leaving the economic sphere are either biolo-
gical (biotic) or technical (abiotic) nutrients (McDonough and
Braungart, 2002). The drawback of this diagram is the limited role of
people as solely being either consumers or users. The circular human-
sphere concept introduces humans as an integral part of our circular
P. Schröder, et al.
Fig. 2. Framework for a Human Development-focused Circular Economy.
systems i.e. we are flows of energies and stock of abundant resources.
Coupled with this human-embedded circular thinking, HD would en-
sure that the process of enlarging people’s choices is being preserved at
each stage of these strategies, leading to improved living standards
under the defined decent HD objectives: long and healthy lives, be
knowledgeable and strengthened capabilities through access to re-
sources, social services, education and healthcare. By embedding them,
each human being would be valued as a critical actor and decision
maker. The humansphere interacts with the biological cycles (the bio-
sphere) and the economic (the technosphere) sphere in four points.
These approaches and interactions are illustrated in the diagram below
(Fig. 2).
In this integrative framework we identified four loops and cascades
in the humansphere that will strengthen HD objectives such as cap-
abilities and choices within a CE framework that addresses reduction of
waste and pollution and restoration of natural resources. The frame-
work gives emphasis to top-down policy measures such as mission-or-
iented policy roadmaps (Miedzinski et al., 2019) that have the potential
to provide long-term orientation and provide the right institutional
framework conditions. These top-down policy measures need to be
designed and implemented so that they do not inhibit self-organization
and building of autonomous efforts to develop local solutions (Nogueira
et al., 2019) and ensure that bottom-up CE initiatives, experimentation
and business models, with positive HD outcomes empowering com-
munities and consumers, can emerge.
1. Macro-economic policies and roadmaps for sustainable resource
use: The outer loops aim at adapting policies and frameworks to the
new paradigm, not only aiming at resource efficiency and waste mini-
misation, but at sustainable consumption and production systems
(Bengtsson et al., 2018). These would be more equitable in terms of
energy to start with, then in terms of resource distribution more gen-
erally. The resources available to support CE locally or nationally will
depend to a considerable extent on national and international macro-
economic policies including energy and resource subsidies and mone-
tary policy (Ramón and Toman, 2006). Policies of government ex-
penditure and government revenue are crucial for maintaining and
expanding CE-HD programmes and, in turn, overall macro-policy in
relation to taxation, borrowing and debt. Special emphasis would be on
shifting the tax burden from taxing labour to taxing non-renewable
resources, as proposed by CE pioneer Walter Stahel (2010). This
strategy would incentivise and accelerate innovation to a CE and of-
fering a solution to structural unemployment. Sweden was the first
country to pass a law that would give preference to human-based ac-
tivities of fixing and repairing consumer goods. In 2016, the VAT for
repair dropped from 25 % to 12 %, to incentivise shifts to repair ser-
vices for a wide range of products in Sweden so that they last longer
6
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
(Orange, 2016). The recent policies of many European and developing
country governments that have been framed by austerity have had
negative impacts on CE, especially waste management and recycling
performance (Perchard, 2016). The austerity measures implemented by
governments in the years following the 2008-9 crisis have shown a
disproportionately negative impact on children and women (Ortiz and
Cummins, 2012), slowing progress on HD in many countries. If such
policies for shrinking the state continue, there will be few public re-
sources, for maintaining HD and CE programmes, let alone for ex-
panding them in size or coverage. Thus there is a need for making more
resources available from government for support of both CE and HD
programmes.
2. Inclusive CE business models – value creation for people and
planet: The second outer loop in the diagram is about business models
which embed the circularity concept as well as its inclusiveness. The CE
is increasingly being considered a potential model for businesses to
move away from the flaws of current linear economic model towards
one that operates and thrives within ecological limits (De Angelis,
2018). The literature on CE business models has identified a wide range
of different types of CE business models(Lacy and Rutqvist, 2015;
Lewandowski, 2016; Weetman, 2016 as well as enablers and barriers to
their implementation (Rizos et al., 2016). However, so far, the market
share held by circular business models is still limited and typically only
in restricted economic niches (OECD, 2018). Furthermore, it is less
clear which of these business models are viable for developing country
contexts. Which CE business models promote social inclusion and de-
cent work and reduce their impacts on local communities? A key fea-
ture of inclusive circular economy business models that contribute to
sustainable development objectives will require a change in values to
explicitly include social, environmental and economic values (Wilson
et al., 2009), within the businesses but also within local markets and
communities. Inclusive business models are commercially viable ven-
tures that embrace shared-value principles by aligning business values
with social impact that engage Bottom of Pyramid (BoP) populations
(Ghosh and Rajan, 2019). The role of SMEs in developing countries
local economies will need to be included as well as start-ups, many of
which are already practicing CE principles. Other issues to be con-
sidered include the role of female entrepreneurs and businesses that
promote gender equity, e.g. linked to access to sanitation (Graham,
2018) and training and capacity building for the workforce, CE busi-
nesses and youth employment programmes.
Market-based activities and the corporate sector have been re-
cognised by governments and development agencies around the world
as potential solutions to major sustainable development challenges –
including the implementation of the SDGs. This leads to setting up new
targets such as integrating more people within our economies given the
P. Schröder, et al.
versatility of a service-based economy for instance. CE is an important
strategy for business innovation and growth and that business is an
important actor in international development. But to make CE business
models work for HD will require new business approaches focusing on
more inclusive growth and benefitting BoP consumers. Such business
models will require changes from a narrow focus on profit- making
objectives – from not just doing business, doing less harm to the en-
vironment, to also doing good for society.
3. Circular economy community initiatives - strengthening com-
munity resilience and belonging: Communities are increasingly being
seen as key to realising the CE (Gulland, 2017). These bottom-up ex-
amples include re-use hubs and repair café initiatives entirely led by
communities. In many cases these initiatives build on community par-
ticipation and action by individual citizens and can empower the wider
community. Different stakeholders coming together to collaborate to-
wards CE interventions requires bringing together different experi-
ences, including worldviews and different types of knowledge about the
same system, which requires appropriate methods to be successful
(Nogueira et al., 2019). The principles for success are engagement,
investments of time and effort, and creation of local value and benefits.
Often CE community initiatives are linked to pursuing zero waste goals.
Furthermore, the right to repair movement and the maker/hacker
community have some points of confluence with the CE (Ede, 2018) For
example, both are seeking to tackle planned obsolescence, a major issue
to be resolved for realising the CE. In urban communities in developing
country cities which are struggling with increasing amounts of muni-
cipal waste, community-based recycling initiatives are providing mul-
tiple benefits to communities. An example from Pakistan shows these
approaches reduce air pollution from open burning of waste, provide
improved sanitation with associated reductions in diarrhoeal disease,
and create jobs and improve working conditions of waste-pickers
(Gower and Schröder, 2018). Through including the HD perspective
there are many potentials to ensure we develop a CE which prioritises
maximising community benefit and empowerment, making CE intrinsic
part of the way our society operates.
4. Sustainable lifestyles and livelihoods for increased well-being:
The CE also calls on people and individuals themselves to adapt their
own consumer behaviour by being actors of change. The CE will depend
on changing linear consumer habits and a set of new values need to be
perceived, acknowledged and adopted. This will require strategies
calling for behavioural changes towards sustainable lifestyles and al-
ternative measurements of well-being and value (Seyfang, 2009). Cir-
cular behaviours of consumers will also be relevant for the success of
circular business models (Wastling et al., 2018). Furthermore, the linear
economy is characterised by a wide range of goods and services with
large ecological footprints and which in many cases do not contribute to
improved well-being of people. To make the CE work for HD it will
need to provide the products and services that contribute to health and
well-being and enable sustainable lifestyles choices and enhanced
capabilities while reducing environmental impacts. The transformation
of lifestyles will be influenced by a shift from a linear economy of scale
to an’ economy of choice’: driven by flexible production and new
business models, consumers having more options (Whitney, 2015), in-
cluding sustainable consumption choices for emerging consumers in
developing countries that would enable ‘lifestyle leapfrogging’ to avoid
lock-in into linear consumption patterns (Schröder and Anantharaman,
2016). Thriving CE and inclusive and diverse societies would therefore
be characterised by their ability to meet societal needs, namely, that the
ultimate goal of the CE would be to ensure the well-being, reduced
inequality and prosperity of all its citizens, rather than simply a model
allowing for economic growth, decoupled from material consumption
(DiFrancesco, 2019). Based on the concept of the circular humansphere,
the interconnections between CE and HD emerge as a new paradigm
with the social and individual sphere at its core, where individuals are
an integrated element in Earth’s biophysical environment.
Reflections: The risks of simply combining CE with current neo-
7
Resources, Conservation & Recycling 156 (2020) 104686
liberal economic model
Before concluding, it may be useful to consider the advantages,
disadvantages and risks of broadening CE by simply integrating it into
the current neo-liberal economic model of economic policy making.
This approach has the advantage of bringing CE into current main-
stream economic analysis, gaining win-win appeal from both the gov-
ernment and corporate world. However, in the international develop-
ment context, this would mean mainly exploiting new market
opportunities and new spaces of accumulation for global capital
(Hansen and Wethal, 2014), rather than promoting HD objectives.
Some of the tools in the neo-liberal tool box can still be used, but in a
way not linked to a broader belief in markets. HD adopts a more
pragmatic and empirical analysis of the role of governments in different
parts of the world, with a broad approach that assumes governments,
public services and markets both have a role, varying by issue and
country. As Anand and Ravallion (1993) have shown, certain compo-
nents of public spending matter greatly in enhancing HD in developing
countries, independently of what they deliver in terms of reduced in-
come poverty. The HD approach focusing on government policy and
public services therefore would complement the more market and in-
come-centred approach of current CE strategies.
Moreover, orthodox economic analysis has a well-tried and widely
used methodology for calculating the costs and benefits and the re-
sultant impact on profit. Broader issues can, in principle, be taken into
account with this approach, including long-run environmental con-
sequences (Hanley, 2013) as “externalities” with “social costs” and
“social benefits” calculated using explicit though inevitably debatable
assumptions about positive and negative effects. The social costs and
social benefits into the future can, also in principle, be included and
estimated, using rates of discount of rate-of-return analysis. The as-
sumptions underlying calculations of these costs and benefits are ne-
cessarily debatable, ultimately depending on how much agreement
there is on what will be the wider consequences and whether these will
have a positive or negative impact on the population concerned. For
long-term environmental issues, the consequences must be assessed
over 50 or 100 years or longer and for this, neo-liberal economic
methodology is on much shakier ground, since market rates of discount
usually imply the neglect of costs and benefits of more than 10 or 15
years into the future. More problematic still if the fact that many of the
present population who would bear much of the costs will have died
while a country’s future population, yet to be born, would comprise
new people who would enjoy the future benefits or suffer environ-
mental consequences while bearing only a small part of the total costs.
Many would conclude that the importance and survival of the planet at
the heart of such long run environmental considerations means that
international decision-making and action must be taken well beyond
current economic orthodoxy to a more multi-disciplinary international
debate.
7. Conclusion
In this paper we attempt to align the HD approach, a commonly
accepted and proven framework for human-centred sustainable devel-
opment, and the CE which is in the process of becoming a new fra-
mework for environmental sustainability as well as frontier for tech-
nological innovation and new business opportunities. We show how the
inclusion of circularity indicators into the Human Development Index
(HDI) can address the shortcomings of the current HD approach,
lacking criteria for long-term environmental sustainability to preserve
nature as the basis for human existence.
By including humans and HD as a critical system element of our
resource stocks and energy flows, we propose a conceptual framework
that can align human activity with the planet’s biosphere and genuinely
release pressure stemming from the technosphere. Should our next
economy be of a circular nature, it will also have to provide us with the
covenant of generating well-being to all humans while addressing the
P. Schröder, et al.
global environmental challenges of climate change and biodiversity
loss. By considering all humans as part of a wider circular system, we
have the opportunity to make the connection between HD, the economy
and the natural environment, building the foundations of circular and
inclusive societies that will help attain the SDGs.
We therefore propose a new conceptual CE-HD framework to open
up discussions and further explorations by the academic community
and practitioners to test, refine and drive the development further. We
also highlight the opportunity to use and validate this framework by
applying it in practice, for example to guide local and national level
implementation of the SDGs. This could provide evidence on whether
existing trade-offs between the environmental, social and economic
targets of the SDGs can be avoided by using this framework and ap-
proach.
We acknowledge that on practical and policy level, applying a
combined CE and HD framework will not be without challenges.
Experimentation and research approaches that are collaborative, par-
ticipatory, and context dependent would be suitable ways forward.
Including the combined indicator framework in practical interventions,
for example through official development assistance and other co-
operation programmes or participatory action research initiatives, can
provide both practical experiences and evidence whether this proposed
approach is working or not. Application and empirical testing of the
framework would provide insights for making further refinements in
the framework and to find out, as we anticipate, if it can deliver better
results than other approaches.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank Sir Richard Jolly for his support, comments
and contributions to the sections on Human Development.
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