Knitting Circular Ties: Empowering Networks for the Social Enterprise-led Local Development of an Integrative Circular Economy

Circular economy (CE) discourse primarily focuses on business-as-usual and resource-related economic processes whilst overlooking relational-spatial aspects, especially networking for local development. There are, however, many mission-driven social enterprises (SEs) engaging in short-loop activities at the neighbourhood and city scales (e.g., reuse, upcycling, refurbishing or repair). Such localised activities are often overlooked by mainstream policies, yet they could be vital to the local development of the CE into a more socio-environmentally integrated set of localised social structures and relations. This paper examines the role of SEs, their networks and structures in building a more socially integrated CE in the City of Hull (UK). Drawing upon the Social Network Analysis approach and semi-structured interviews with 31 case study SEs representing variegated sectors (e.g., food, wood/furniture, textiles, arts and crafts, hygiene, construction/housing, women, elderly, ethnic minorities, homeless, prisoners, mentally struggling), it maps SEs’ cross-sector relationships with private, public and social sector organizations. It then considers how these network constellations could be ‘woven’ into symbiotic relationships between SEs whilst fostering knowledge spillovers and resource flows for the local development of a more socially integrative CE. We contend that integrating considerations of SEs’ organizational attributes and their socio-spatial positioning within networks and social structures offers new insights into the underlying power-relations and variegated levels of trust within the emergent social-circular enterprise ecosystem. These aspects are presented in the form of a comprehensive heuristic framework, which reveals how respective organizational and network characteristics may impact SEs’ performance outcomes and, ultimately, a more integrated approach to local CE development.