Presentation by

Dr Linh Duong
Responding to the social
issues of Circular
Economy
Background
 Circular Economy (CE) has been a fast-growing topic
and brings benefits to
 Environment
 Economy
 Society
Example: CE and food
 The food system has been described as “the mother of all complex
systems”
 The industrial food system contributes to environmental
degradation
 The system is wasteful
 The system is not resilient and does not produce healthy
outcomes
 Four levers towards a circular economy of food
 Close loops of nutrients and other materials, e.g., regenerating
soil
 Cascading value from by-products, e.g., recovering energy
 Diversity of production, e.g., shorter supply chains
 The power of digital and other enablers, e.g., digitalisation
CE and food

 Zhang, Q., Dhir, A., & Kaur, P. (2022). Circular economy and the food sector: A systematic literature review. Sustainable Production
and Consumption.
Critiques of CE
 The lack of critical analysis of the social dimensions of
CE
 The future labour intensities in the sector due to
automation
 The lack of stakeholder engagement
 Allow companies to take small extensions
 Limited theoretical and empirical studies. Recent
studies focus on:
 Measurement indicators for social dimensions
 Developed governance frameworks
Social dimension tensions
 It is essential to have a more balanced integration of
environmental, economic, and social dimensions
 It leads to conflict or tension among CE’s promised
outcomes
 Managerial tensions have become more serious
recently with the high frequency of disruptive events
 There are calls for research to delve more into these
managerial tensions in addressing social problems
(Carmine and De Marchi, 2022; Van der Byl and
Slawinski, 2015)

 Carmine, S., & De Marchi, V. (2022). Reviewing Paradox Theory in Corporate Sustainability Toward a Systems
Perspective. Journal of Business Ethics. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-022-05112-2
 Van der Byl, C. A., & Slawinski, N. (2015). Embracing Tensions in Corporate Sustainability: A Review of
Research From Win-Wins and Trade-Offs to Paradoxes and Beyond. Organization & Environment, 28(1), 54–
79. https://doi.org/10.1177/1086026615575047
Question
• How do firms acknowledge and address the social
dimension together with economic and environmental
dimensions to drive CE implementation?
Steps for the assignment
• Have a good read on circular economy and circular supply chain
• Summarise critiques in terms of the social dimension of circular
economy and/or circular supply chain
• Identify one company that is implementing or planning to
implement circular economy
• List up to 5 interview questions to answer the question in slide 7
• Send these questions to Linh.Duong@uwe.ac.uk prior to the
interview
• Interview 1-2 (more is better) participants working in the selected
company
• Summarise key findings

• Any questions or queries for documents, feel free to contact

Linh.Duong@uwe.ac.uk
Thank you