We are pleased to inform you that we are starting a 3 year project “Exploring Plausible Circular Futures” (ExPliCit) , funded by the EU under the Horizon Europe program, Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions Staff Exchanges.
The aim of the project:
Circular Economy (CE) represents a new paradigm that is capable of pushing the frontiers of sustainable development by transforming the relationships between ecological systems and economic activities. Such a new paradigm is expected to repair economy-society-nature interactions, replacing the current linear economic model with a new one that is restorative and regenerative by intention and design. However, there is a lack of discussion about how a truly circular economic system should be organised. Most of the current literature on CE fails to recognise this, presenting the transition towards a CE as a straightforward, neutral, and apolitical process, implicitly characterised by a techno-optimistic and eco-modernist stance.
Within this context, this project calls for opening up a debate to deconstruct the increasingly hegemonic discourse of CE based on a technocratic approach and reconstruct it by:
- embedding normative and political dimensions,
- looking at a plurality of plausible CE futures, and
- discussing their implications in terms of the organization of production and distribution networks, also involving a wide set of stakeholders.
As such, the project will involve a plurality of disciplinary perspectives, in order to devise future supply chain configurations that could be implemented in specific industrial sectors under specific CE scenarios.
A wide array of non-academic beneficiaries ensures that the project will be capable of realizing relevant knowledge transfer through secondment mechanisms.
The project includes 10 partners:
- academic partners the coordinator: Universita Degli Studi di Napoli Parthenope (coordinator), University of Vigo, Universita Degli Studi di Catania, University of Sevilla, University of Scheffield and
- non-academic partners: FAEL (Federación Andaluza de Electrodomésticos y Otros Equipamientos del Hogar), CNA Campania Nord, Federconsumatori, , Revertia and ABIS.
For an overview of the activities and tasks managed and delivered by ABIS during the first secondments at the University of Vigo (UVIGO)'s Post-Growth Innovation Lab, you can read more here.
