Exploring the Enablers of Circular Economy Practices: The case of businesses and business schools

We are pleased to share with you the report "Exploring the Enablers of Circular Economy Practices: The case of businesses and business schools". This report investigates what motivates decision-makers to adopt circular practices within the context of businesses, business networks and business schools. With this research, this report aims to provide new insights to understand how circular practices are adopted and how this transition can be further boosted from the perspective of businesses and business schools. This report is based on a set of 20 interviews to key stakeholders who are involved in the adoption and development of CE strategies of businesses, or of research groups and teaching programs within business schools.

The lead researcher of this report is Josep Pinyol, Early Stage Researcher at ABIS and PhD student at University of Exeter within the ReTraCE project (H2020 MSCA). The report was published with the support of the ABIS team: Katarina Haluskova, Karolina Sobczak, Jason Chang and Ivo Matser.

The report is structured as follows:

• the existing literature on the drivers for the adoption of CE practices 
• the research aim, methods and data used to build this report
• the results are presented and discussed in comparison to the existing
  research
• opportunities for business schools and suggestions for further research

From the interviews, we identified that the CE adoption can be primarily motivated by two enablers:

1. the realignment of pre-existing sustainable or social responsibility practices with CE practices
2. the explicit action of a decision-maker within a business or a business school, such as a CEO or a dean.

This report also identifies four factors that encourage decisionmakers
to adopt the CE:

• the need to adapt to global challenges,
• the influence of business networks
• the influence of the market and social dynamics
• governmental pressure

CLICK HERE to access the report. 

For any research related questions please contact josep.pinyol@abis-global.org. All other questions can be directed to katarina.haluskova@abis-global.org