Circular transition will always be secondary when the survival of the firm in a linear market is primary.

 

What I have gleaned from the CE literature and practitioner content over the last couple of years.

The biggest barrier to CE implementation is that companies have immediate tasks that are very important to immediate life concerns. I also read that the ideal CE situation becomes secondary when survival is primary. One example: A company that is worried about the next balance sheet and its responsibilities to its shareholders. Also, the competition and "life" that prevents the company from stopping to address CE's triple bottom line concerns. 

 If CE principles do not provide more recognition and a competitive position, then CE is not a priority or a direct concern to most companies that are always in a competitive race. Managers tend to do small activities like eco-efficiency to keep the CSR tab on their website updated with some sustainable activities.

Similar findings were found in the CE literature on the lack of collaboration from consumers. Consumers are busy and concerned with life, that unfortunately,  at its core has no equity and stability whether economic or social for the consumer to change their day-to-day behaviour or go an extra mile in returning, recycling, sharing, or choosing the pricier sustainable products over the cheaper more convenient competition.

All these problems make companies forced to tick the requirement box. This is a system that does not forgive, it is a do or dies. Therefore, a concept called “sincere”  or genuine is missing from the CE application. In a red ocean, an unforgiving world, actors have no option but to do whatever floats their boat sustainable or not.

This is where I personally believe that there are organisations that try to promote CE in the hope of only gaining economical benefit. Even the CE and sustainability organizations cherry-pick a few companies that are born circular. They also emphasise activities that have no scalable implications to tick their own boxes to keep their funding alive.

Ideal CE models are plenty, yet the application is dependent on humans who will have to make a trade-off on every level. Managers, who will sacrifice the traditional way of doing business to stop and apply CE principles.

However, some companies cannot apply CE, because they lack the resources, support, and knowledge. They must survive just another day with the inertia of the linear business model. In a society that has systems that only worry about meeting the marginal requirements in everything. One example of meeting requirement is from the education "industries" Schools do not bring out the best in each child, but makes sure that all can read and write. 

Far from the  Greta Thunberg approach and motivation for a sustainable planet.  These underlying issues in the way of doing business are often ignored in the literature and research. There is a huge emphasis on economic growth in the CE literature, with the least on the social (Human benefit). This is why in a gladiator fight, the opponent never spares or gives a chance to for the other to stop and change business models. They strike, market share is lost, and shareholders withdraw their investment. 

Much like all emulate the most selfish fittest, in the race for the top. This can also be seen as the Nash equilibrium in the Game theory. A socially optimal solution cannot happen so long as there are few selfish people trying to step on others. This pushes everyone to maximize their own benefit and try to survive in a selfish society.

Most New Zealand companies are SMEs. These companies fear disruption since CE is costly, CE has a big learning and application curve, and customers don't reward the CE companies. Then there is this ceaseless ideology in the race to the top. The success and measurement of achievement by economic gain and ownership of products that humans have not abandoned, it goes back thousands of years to the days humans lived in small constantly fighting other tribes and wild animals to survive just another day. 

The top-down (Institutional setting bodies) are adamant to solve the underlying problems of society. They are concerned with their own immediate concerns. Healthcare, as an industry, for instance, is never concerned about the rising number of cancer victims. They are concerned about dealing with symptoms, or lucrative cancer treatment therapies. How to prevent cancer is the least funded research, on the other hand how to target cancer with chemotherapy or a billion-dollar Pfizer drugs receive the most attention. Especially that unaware tumour-free people that are exposed to toxins, mass-produced, highly processed food, and environmental arsenic do not become interested in their health until there is a visible sinister lump. Then they leave everything that is secondary and focus on the first and foremost concern to live just another day. To say to their loved ones how much they loved them, to spend time with them. Also, to be forced to give all they have saved on the expensive multi-billion dollar cancer industry therapies that involved stripping the human of their savings, hair, dignity and most importantly time. Since most aggressive cancer treatments take more of the person's life span than doing nothing a study shows. 

There is a proverb that states “That which is lacking, cannot be given”. A small company or consumers that are busy surviving cannot take a break and worry about the future and the environment. This issue will then be addressed by a lever switch top-down legislation which of course ticks some boxes but brings no genuine change. 

Even if we look at it from Maslow’s model. We see that most people are trying to survive. The average person is not a billionaire CEO practising altruism by giving away a 3B company like Patagonia. Many SMEs are unable to disrupt their way of doing business, unless and until CE adds value to them their brand and income.  Not all companies have amassed wealth to magnify and change their systems like Unilever. Even to fund research hailing their good deeds.

This is where a creative CE practitioner can find ways against all odds to have companies adopt CE practices and persuade managers and owners to think outside the traditional dog-eat-dog business world and apply CE principles incrementally or drastically to their companies.

In conclusion:

Unless and until there is a moral solution and equity, there will never be real solutions, especially preemptive ones that solve problems before major catastrophes. In other words when there are two apes fighting for bananas while one on the top is hoarding all the farms. These two apes will not have the tiniest concern about the health of the labour working on the farm, nor the negative effects of hoarding and mono farming on the planet or future humans. They will also not be worried at all about injustice or inequity, they are busy fighting for that banana and who will get it first. Who is the no.1 ape? Who has more bananas? 

The question remains, will the apes stop and sacrifice immediate gains for the good of the whole and under what conditions will the homo-economocus monkey think beyond material financial gain, greed and ego to care for good of others?