1.2 Research Questions, Scope and Contribution 3
3
for themselves and the environment. One framework that supports organizations to
successfully incorporate environmental concerns is the circular economy (Gregson
et al. 2015). The circular economy allows business leaders to integrate economic,
environmental and social concerns into the vision of their organizations. It is a
promising concept which provides several possibilities for firms and practitioners
on how the threat of resource scarcity can be turned into business opportunities,
e.g. through the upcycling of old products or repurposing of production wastes.
But it is not only practitioners who have shown a growing interest in the concept,policy makers have also demonstrated increased attention. A number of policies
have been introduced to support the implementation of the circular economy. As
a result of the growing pressures on natural resources, the European Commission
initiated the European Resource Efficiency Platform (EREP) in 2012. The aim is to
work towards a transition towards a resource-efficient and ultimately regenerative
circular economy (European Commission 2012). Since its foundation, the platform,
consisting of politicians and practitioners, has provided guidelines to promote the
change towards a circular economy and is implementing an enabling framework
for the circular economy.
From an academic perspective, the topic offers great potential to contributesubstantially to the ongoing sustainable transformation discussion (Gregson et al.
2015). Coming back to the studies mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, the
circular economy can result in a promising strategy for organizations to incorporate
environmental concerns with the effect of achieving competitive advantage or any
other positive effect on organizational performance. Gaining a deeper understand-
ing of the concept, its implementation, and also its resulting benefits as well as the
challenges it presents, contributes to the overall sustainability discussion and the
recent debate on the circular economy.
1.2 Research Questions, Scope and Contribution
1.2 Research Questions, Scope and Contribution
As introduced above, little academic attention has been paid so far to the circular
economy except in China where academic papers on the topic have been written
and first results indicate organizational benefits such as cost savings, increased
revenues, and a positive brand image (Geng et al. 2012; Park et al. 2010).
However, the circular economy is a concept which offers a variety of possiblemodes of implementation. Consequently, there is no one size fits all solution and
implementation differs from company to company depending on the business
model, industry, country, legislation etc.. For that reason, the textile industry has