The global environmental crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and land degradation and pollution and waste, undermine current and future socio-economic development and stability of natural systems. With the seventh edition of its flagship assessment Global Environment Outlook (GEO-7), the United Nations Environment Programme has presented a solutions-oriented assessment to address the global environmental crises through the intertwined transformations of five key systems, namely the economic and financial, materials/waste, energy, food and environment systems. Embracing the concept of circularity achieves impactful synergies across the systems and contributes to overcoming inefficient and wasteful use of resources. While circularity as a key principle is integrated in the whole report, one of the chapters looks explicitly at solution pathways for transformation towards circularity and proposes 36 actions, structured into five solution pathways. Most importantly, a focus on the following is needed to make the solution pathways actionable: (1) Designing out waste from production and consumption (e.g. in energy, food and water systems); (2) shifting investments to deliver circularity in the economy, production and consumption; (3) developing effective markets for secondary materials; (4) creating a transparent global trade system for circular goods and services; (5) inclusive societal transformation towards sustainable lifestyles.

Semiconductor chips are the foundational hardware driving the capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI) systems. This paper explores the potential of circular economy strategies to address key challenges in semiconductor chip value chains, including environmental impacts, resource constraints, and geopolitical risks. The study fills a gap in existing literature by focusing on an industry that remains largely underexplored in circular economy research. The key research questions the paper explores are: 1. How can circular economy practices transform the semiconductor value chain to reduce environmental impact and improve resource security? 2. How can these circular practices strengthen the value chain against geopolitical risks and supply chain disruptions? Using a value chain approach and complex systems perspective, informed by a narrative literature review of academic and grey literature, the paper examines how circular practices across five key stages of the semiconductor value chain can mitigate environmental pressures, reduce dependency on critical raw materials like silicon and gallium, and enhance supply chain resilience against geopolitical disruptions. Existing initiatives by leading companies such as TSMC, ASML, and Intel are reviewed, alongside emerging technological innovations in semiconductor chip materials and manufacturing processes. The paper concludes by identifying critical future research questions and providing actionable insights for policymakers, industry and researchers.

Abstract The United Nations’ Summit of the Future, held in September 2024, convened against a backdrop of intensifying geopolitical tensions, lack of progress on achieving the 2030 Agenda, and critical discussions about the UN’s relevance in global affairs. As part of the United Nations 79th General Assembly, the Summit aimed to galvanize international cohesion and momentum on critical global challenges. In the last moments, a small group of countries led by Russia delayed the process and attempted preventing the adoption of the already negotiated document—the Pact for the Future—by proposing amendments that would have weakened the commitments and key messages. Countering this attempt, Congo, on behalf of the Africa Group, used the procedural mechanism of ‘No Action Motion’ that can be used by any member state to prevent an item on the agenda from being submitted to the vote. The final outcome document is striking in its open admission of how multilateralism is currently failing to address the world’s multiple crises and long-term challenges. At the same time, the Pact for the Future contains 56 actions and specific recommendations that offer a framework for both immediate action and long-term global multilateral reform. The Pact and attendant government commitments are not legally binding but include direct action points on what needs to be achieved in other multilateral forums including the IMF and World Bank, at the Conference of Parties climate negotiations, and at the G20. Many of these can be progressed, even in the absence of full engagement by one or two powerful states. Above all, the Pact situates strategic foresight to address 21st century challenges at the centre of the UN’s approach in the face of short-termism and political caprice.

The fifth negotiation round for a legally binding instrument to end plastic pollution concluded without an agreed text and will resume at INC-5.2 in August 2025. Scientific evidence and inputs remain vital in informing the final stage of negotiations and ensuring the final treaty is robust and effective.

PurposeThis paper aims to provide insights into the environment needed for advancing a digitally enabled circular plastic economy in Africa. It explores important technical and social paradigms for the transition.Design/methodology/approachThis study adopted an interpretivist paradigm, drawing on thematic analysis on qualitative data from an inter-sectoral engagement with 69 circular economy stakeholders across the continent.FindingsThe results shows that, while substantial progress has been made with regard to the development and deployment of niche innovations in Africa, the overall progress of circular plastic economy is slowed due to relatively minimal changes at the regime levels as well as pressures from the exogenous landscape. The study highlights that regime changes are crucial for disrupting the entrenched linear plastic economy in developing countries, which is supported by significant sunk investment and corporate state capture.Research limitations/implicationsThe main limitation of this study is with the sample as it uses data collected from five countries. Therefore, while it offers a panoramic view of multi-level synergy of actors and sectors across African countries, it is limited in its scope and ability to illuminate country-specific nuances and peculiarities.Practical implicationsThe study underlines the importance of policy innovations and regulatory changes in order for technologies to have a meaningful contribution to the transition to a circular plastic economy.Originality/valueThe study makes an important theoretical contribution by using empirical evidence from various African regions to articulate the critical importance of the regime dimension in accelerating the circular economy transition in general, and the circular plastic economy in particular, in Africa.

With progress on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) badly off track, international policymakers are scrambling for solutions that can both revitalize the current SDG agenda and drive more effective action on humanity’s big challenges in the future. The ‘circular economy’ offers clear potential in this area. This wide-ranging concept, which involves making economies less wasteful and less resource-intensive while contributing to human development and well-being, could hold the key to accelerating SDG delivery. A more formal role within the SDGs and any emerging post-2030 successor regime would also provide a catalyst for expansion of the circular economy itself. This paper explores how the circular economy could support each of the 17 SDGs, and argues for the concept to be put at the heart of emerging plans to drive sustainable development towards 2050. Doing so could help to foster resilient economies, reduce environmental impacts and ensure equitable resource distribution. The paper identifies five priorities for action: embedding principles of justice and inclusivity into the circular transition; increasing international policy coordination; reforming the financial architecture to ensure the circular economy gets the investment it needs; rewiring the global system of trade to make it easier to trade circular products and services; and developing common standards and metrics.

Plastic waste poses a significant challenge to achieving sustainable production and consumption of resources, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa where effective governance and waste management systems are lacking. In this paper, we develop an empirical understanding of the influence of public governance system on promoting circular economy (CE) for plastic actions among individuals. Through a survey of 1475 participants across five sub-Saharan African countries, we tested five hypotheses drawing on New Governance Theory and CE Action Recipe to explore the relationship between governance and individual’s actions supporting CE for plastic. We found that a governance system that supports CE practices and exhibits governance efficiency is positively associated with individuals’ actions supporting CE for plastic. The awareness of government policies, laws and regulations, institutions, processes, and programmes have a significant impact on individuals’ engagement in plastic circularity practices. The paper’s theoretical and governance implications highlight the relevance of public governance in shaping action towards a CE for plastic at the individual level.

This paper looks at the potential opportunities and challenges for Bangladesh’s textile industry brought about by the EU’s strategy for sustainable and circular textiles, specifically: (i) changes to upstream trade patterns (i.e. changing policy requirements for products; changing demands from brands and consumers); and (ii) future Bangladesh textile exports to the EU. The authors also provide recommendations to the EU textiles policy community designing future policy, with the aims of mitigating the challenges and amplifying the opportunities for upstream trading partners in a circular textiles value-chain (particularly developing or least-developed countries), and of recognizing the strategic benefits of such trade partners in supporting the EU’s vision of achieving a circular and sustainable global textiles sector.

Socio-technical niche innovations offer significant opportunities to accelerate Africa's transition to a circular plastic economy. However, information on how these opportunities can be operationalised is fragmented, and stakeholder networks appear to be significantly under-developed on the continent. This paper applies the multi-level perspective of socio-technical transitions theory to analyse the shift from a linear plastics system to a circular plastics economy enabled by digital innovations. Drawing from an inter-sectoral engagement with 151 circular economy stakeholders and a cross-sectional survey of 1475 households across five (5) African countries, along with a critical synthesis of the extant literature, this study illuminates the multi-stakeholder dynamics that underpin the technology-society interactions in advancing a digitally enabled circular plastic economy in Africa. It identifies the emerging technologies for niche innovations that could hasten Africa's embrace of the circular plastic economy with a cross-section of stakeholders playing an important role. It provides new insight into the seven regime dimensions and further explores some of the pressing external pressures from the exogenous landscape.

Journal Article The big con: how the consulting industry weakens our businesses, infantilizes our governments and warps our economies Get access The big con: how the consulting industry weakens our businesses, infantilizes our governments and warps our economies. By Mariana Mazzucato and Rosie Collington. London: Allen Lane. 2023. 368pp. £25.00. Isbn978 0 24157 308 2. Available as e-book. Hilde Rapp, Hilde Rapp Centre for International Peacebuilding Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Patrick Schröder Patrick Schröder Chatham House, UK Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 99, Issue 6, November 2023, Pages 2524–2525, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiad260 Published: 06 November 2023

Journal Article Limits and beyond: 50 years on from The limits to growth, what did we learn and what's next? Get access Limits and beyond: 50 years on from The limits to growth, what did we learn and what's next? Edited by Ugo Bardi and Carlos Alvarez Pereira. London: Exapt Press. 2022. 304pp. Pb.: £12.24. Isbn978 1 91454 903 8. Available as e-book. Patrick Schröder Patrick Schröder Chatham House, UK Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar International Affairs, Volume 99, Issue 3, May 2023, Pages 1342–1343, https://doi.org/10.1093/ia/iiad085 Published: 02 May 2023

The increasing use of plastics, mostly as packaging materials, has created a significant environmental threat that continues to escalate yearly. The challenges in the management of plastic waste have thereby created a worldwide crisis which has birthed a new planetary boundary menace. Plastic recycling has, however, been recognised as the most sustainable way of managing waste, with centralised systems primarily adopted in the Global West and locally decentralised approaches with digitally enabled small-scale enterprises emerging in Africa. Digital technologies such as mobile applications, geographic information systems and artificial intelligence, among others, have been integrated in common circular plastic economy models that focus on subscriptions, collections and processing of plastic waste. This chapter demonstrates that decentralised plastic waste management solutions offer significant social, environmental and economic benefits to stakeholders and therefore need to be supported by sensitisation and awareness of the use of digital technologies for localised recycling in communities.

Circular economy initiatives face a significant gap in the availability of finance. Annual worldwide circular economy spending by the corporate sector is estimated at around $850 billion, compared with $35 trillion spent on existing ‘linear’ economic models. Awareness of the circular economy among investors and in the financial sector generally is still low, and there is a lack of tools available with which to define and measure those activities that substantially contribute to the circular economy transition, as well as the investment opportunities and risks associated with those activities. Sustainable finance taxonomies – i.e. shared classification systems for defining environmentally sustainable investments – could help unlock the additional investment needed. The EU’s Sustainable Finance Taxonomy is the most ambitious and comprehensive existing taxonomy, and includes the transition to a circular economy as one of its key objectives. This research paper presents a detailed case study of the EU Taxonomy and identifies the unique challenges associated with embedding the circular economy, with the aim of informing the development of similar taxonomies elsewhere.

Policy making is entering a phase of more transformative strategies targeting the full life cycle of plastics, argues Patrick Schröder.

Plastic waste poses a significant challenge to achieving sustainable production and consumption of resources, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa where effective governance and waste management systems are lacking. In this paper, we develop an empirical understanding of the influence of governance on promoting plastic CE actions among individuals. Through a survey of 1471 participants across five sub-Saharan African countries, we tested five hypotheses drawing on Michel Foucault’s theoretical conception of governmentality to explore the relationship between governance and individual’s plastic CE actions. We found that a governance system that supports CE practices and exhibits efficiency is positively associated with individuals' adoption of plastic CE. The awareness of plastic CE government policies, laws and regulations, institutions, processes, and programs have a significant impact on individuals' engagement in circularity practices. The paper’s theoretical and governance implications highlight the downstream relevance of public governance in shaping behaviours towards plastic CE at the individual level.

Unsustainable production, consumption and disposal of the world’s resources are primary causes of the triple threat of pollution, climate change and biodiversity loss. This linear model is also a significant cause of social injustice, with most resource consumption and wealth accumulation occurring in the Global North and the worst environmental impacts and threats to human health in the Global South. Increasing geopolitical tension and the likelihood of further global supply-chain shocks and disruptions exacerbate these issues. A transition to an inclusive circular economy is essential to help address these challenges. An inclusive circular economy seeks to achieve absolute decoupling of resource use and environmental impact from equitable economic prosperity and human development. It does this by slowing, narrowing and looping the flow of materials through the economic system, while regenerating natural systems and designing out toxicity. By focusing equally on environmental issues, human needs, sustainable livelihoods, decent work and social justice, an inclusive circular economy can make important contributions to human development, to poverty reduction and to improved well-being around the world. International trade will play a key role in delivering an inclusive circular economy. Circular trade encompasses any international trade transaction that contributes to realizing a circular economy at the local, national and global levels. This includes trade in circular economy-enabling goods, services and intellectual property (IP); second-hand goods for reuse, repair, remanufacturing or recycling; refurbished and remanufactured goods; secondary raw materials (biotic and abiotic); and non-hazardous waste, scrap and residues (biotic and abiotic) that can be safely recovered or valorized. Circular trade offers many economic, environmental and social benefits. Trade in circular economy-enabling goods, services and IP allows countries and companies to access the necessary skills and equipment to implement new circular business models (such as leasing and renting), or to conduct reuse, repair, remanufacturing and recycling activities. Trade in used goods for reuse, repair or remanufacturing enables affordable access to essential goods and services for those in secondary markets, and generates local demand for industry and employment. Trade in secondary raw materials and waste destined for recovery enables the aggregation of materials in areas of highest demand to maximize economies of scale, making it economically attractive to transform waste into resources for new production. However, poorly regulated circular trade can have negative impacts. Many grey areas and loopholes currently exist in the global trading system – enabling high levels of illicit waste shipments, causing pollution and increasing human exposure to toxic chemicals. Meanwhile, high volumes of used goods can also flood secondary markets – threatening local industries and overwhelming local waste management systems. Under certain circumstances, overdependence on circular trade flows may also increase exposure to supply-chain risks and shocks. The distribution of value captured from circular trade flows is currently highly uneven, with most of the value remaining in the Global North. Growing geopolitical trends – such as economic nationalism and deglobalization – will likely lead to countries pursuing resource security in their circular strategies, rather than collective sustainability objectives. The resulting actions will inevitably create ripple effects along global value chains, potentially having a negative impact on other countries and exacerbating existing inequities. Any solution to overcome circular trade barriers will therefore require a collaborative and coordinated global response to ensure that all countries and territories benefit equally from the transition. This research paper presents an alternative pathway for the circular transition – towards a global trade regime that enables fair, inclusive and circular societies worldwide. The paper identifies five areas where collective action is necessary. First, the development of a shared language on circularity, starting with the definition and classification of goods. Second, the lowering or removal of technical barriers to trade. These include regulatory divergence and contradictory trade requirements among different jurisdictions. Third, the improvement of trade facilitation measures to address the complexities of product classification and cumbersome permitting processes, particularly for those products classified as hazardous. Fourth, dedicated capacity-building support from the international community to mitigate the impacts of increasing circular trade barriers and changing patterns of demand through targeted assistance programmes. Finally, a concerted effort by governments to embed circularity and inclusivity within trade and economic cooperation agreements.

Circular trade is a key enabler of a global circular economy, but inequities in power relations, digital trade capabilities, trade infrastructure, access to finance, and industrial and innovation capabilities mean that countries in the Global North are better positioned to reap the benefits than are those in the Global South. Critically, too, countries in the Global South are often the final destination for internationally traded low-value or illegal waste. Lack of capacity in these countries to properly manage and treat such waste brings greater environmental risks and social burdens. If an explicit goal to reduce inequality is not built into the global circular economy transition, the gains to be made from circular trade are likely to be highly unevenly distributed between developed and least developed countries. This paper sets out a framework for inclusive circular trade, intended to enable a pathway in which circular trade helps to promote fair, inclusive and circular societies. The framework was developed through the work of an alliance of organizations spanning Africa, Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Europe.