Futures of the social metabolism: Degrowth, circular economy and the value of waste

Abstract

Circular economy and degrowth offer two different imaginaries for a future social metabolism: both seek to downscale waste and the demand for raw materials. Yet whereas degrowth proposes a circular metabolism to reduce consumption and production, mainstream circular economy sees waste as an opportunity for sustainable growth. This paper puts these two visions of circular futures into dialog. It unpacks the institutional dimensions of these two approaches, focusing on how they produce relations with and responsibilities to the future. It argues that the extent to which circularity can deliver its promise of reduction depends on the value that is ascribed to both present and future waste. This value is defined by the institutional conditions that regulate the responsibilities, geographies and conceptions of value mobilized in dealing with waste. The paper dissects three institutional shifts necessary for a degrowth circularity: from individual consumers to collective responsibilities in waste reduction, from global regional waste markets to bio-regional waste economies and from monetary to socio-ecological value of waste.