Mobilising information systems scholarship for a circular economy: Review, synthesis, and directions for future research

Abstract

One of today's grand societal challenges is to replace the current 'take-make-waste' economic model with a circular economic model that allows a gradual decoupling of economic activities from the consumption of finite virgin resources. While circular economy (CE) scholars have long lauded digital technologies such as sensors, distributed ledgers, or platforms as key enablers, our own community has not fully explored the potentials of information systems (IS) for a CE. Considering recent technological advances in software and hardware and our history of helping address wicked challenges, we believe the time is ripe to mobilise IS scholarship for a CE. Our findings from an interdisciplinary literature review show that research has primarily examined IS potentials for increasing efficiency of isolated intra-organisational processes while neglecting the larger sustainability potential of IS to establish circular material flows-that is, slow down and close material loops across entire product lifecycles. In response, we propose directions for IS research that develop our knowledge of how IS can help understand and enact circular material flows to intensify and extend use of products and components and recycle waste materials. Our directions offer pathways to building and evaluating the problem-solution pairing that could characterise a prolific CE-IS relationship.

Extended Data Pipeline for Circular Economy Monitoring

“…A review of the IS and eGovernment literature reveals that so far limited attention has been paid to the topic of CE. A recent paper by [1] in one of the top IS journals calls for mobilizing IS scholars for CE research. In the eGovernment literature the topic gained initial attention in a stream of CE-related research, predominantly linked to the ICEE conference in 2010 and 2011.…”

“…However, in the last decade limited follow-up research has been published on this topic. We do see an emerging interest in the general topic of sustainability in the eGovernment community 1 , but monitoring CE is a largely unexplored area.…”

“…While the model helps to understand the CE processes, it does not go into aspects of how to ensure visibility of CE flows in order to enable governments to monitor these flows. As positioned by [1] digital technologies and data analytics hold potential to enable CE visibility but limited IS research has focused on CE so far. There is even less research focusing on CE monitoring by governments.…”

Data for Sustainable Platform Economy: Connections between Platform Models and Sustainable Development Goals

“…Indeed, some studies recently pointed out that digital technologies are considered essential enablers of the circular economy, which contributes to the 12th SDG (sustainable consumption and production) [16]. In any case, while circular economy scholars have long lauded digital technologies such as platforms as key enablers, they have not fully explored the potentials of information systems for a circular economy and its connection with SDGs [17].…”

From ignorance to familiarity: Contextual knowledge and the field researcher

“…In the sixth article, Zeiss, Ixmeier, Recker, and Kranz (2021) draw attention to a circular economy (CE), an economic model for sustainable production and consumption that promises a gradual decoupling of economic activities from the consumption of finite virgin resources. While CE proponents have long lauded digital technologies, such as sensors or online platforms, as key enablers for a CE, the authors argue that the IS community has not yet explored the potential of IS for a CE.…”