An equitable, Inclusive, and Environmentally Sound CE Open Forum, May 13, 2020
Cindy Isenhour, Department of Anthropology, Climate Change Institute, University of Maine | CRITIQUE I: CE cannot be just about efficiency and technological improvement alone within the confines of a global economic system (…) in fact, success of CE has been hindered in part by carbon leakage to developing countries, off-shorial waste or by other means of shifting environmental burdens and market externalities (…) for some critics, high levels of total material throughput emissions and consumption have cannibalised a great deal of the gains (…) evidence that CE has helped us to decouple growth from environmental degradation is sadly hard to come by still (…) critics claim that despite CE success is not solely dependent on regenerative design (new packaging materials, industrial symbiosis, nutrient cycling technologies or recyclable polymers), but it is also about a fundamental shift, in global societal organisation and cultural frameworks (…) these have the power to renegotiate the meaning of ownership-property-economic value on materials and how we measure the successor our economic system (…) Can CE be capable of cultural change?| CRITIQUE II: CE scholarship is focused on rational choice theory and ecological modernisation and based on cost-benefit analyses (…) however, economic decision-making is highly contextual and social (…) consumers don’t want to alienate themselves from their peer groups and their neighbours (…) there is a necessity of coordinated approaches and collective action between social actors, so as to build trust and possibility of collaboration (…) How do we implement a CE that recognises the sociality of the economy? | CRITIQUE III: CE represents a new commodity frontier (…) sustainability programming can often capture the resources for those segments of society that are already more fortunate leading to economic exclusion (…) How can we broaden participation in CE as well as its conceptualisation and operationalisation to ensure equity and justice?