Local Governance and Co-Creation Towards Circular Transition: A Framework of Critical Governance Drivers Towards Sustainable, Circular Pathways

The circular economy literature under-addresses governance issues even if it is well known that circular transition represents a tremendous governance challenge. This challenge is manifest in most countries as a discrepancy between systemic-change rhetoric at government and policy levels, and incremental, end-of-pipe measures implemented on the ground. This paper aims to identify critical governance factors and sub-factors for circular transition governance, while constructing an analytical framework for exploring collaborative governance and capacity for sustainable, circular change. Mirrored in the empirical data from a survey of 100 business leaders and five case studies of circular transition in the building sector across five cities, the paper identifies four main factors (and a set of sub-factors) constituting the building blocks of the framework: 1) directional institutions, 2) facilitative leadership, 3) transition intermediaries, and 4) collaborative innovation. Within and across them, co-creation between multiple interests has potential to produce collective, democratically legitimate and transformative circular solutions towards an agreed mission. The framework of factors identified is simultaneously holistic and specific, accommodating the circular economy agendas’ need for sensitivity to multiple concepts, scales, and contexts while identifying specific capacities, competences, and roles with potential for creating goal-directed momentum and relational trust-building.