IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-02877091.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Waste prevention in practice: Confronting public discourses about reusing, reducing, and recycling with consumers' perceptions of wasting material possessions

Author

Listed:
  • Dominique Roux

    (REGARDS - Recherches en Économie Gestion AgroRessources Durabilité Santé- EA 6292 - URCA - Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne - MSH-URCA - Maison des Sciences Humaines de Champagne-Ardenne - URCA - Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne)

  • Marie Schill

    (REGARDS - Recherches en Économie Gestion AgroRessources Durabilité Santé- EA 6292 - URCA - Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne - MSH-URCA - Maison des Sciences Humaines de Champagne-Ardenne - URCA - Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne)

Abstract

This research proposes a consumer perspective on waste prevention by examining how individuals cope with public discourses about reducing, reusing and recycling material possessions. We confront consumers' sayings and doings with three objectives put forward by public authorities about waste prevention: raising awareness, improving material efficacy, and promoting sustainable consumption. A qualitative-based methodology with 25 participants shows that waste is mostly equated with destroying and non-using objects, much less with buying as its primary trigger. Consumers also highlight the difficulty to fully optimize the use of their products as well as the lack of channels to recirculate unwanted, unused or broken things. Finally, they show that objects tend to stagnate in the home, a reality that is inadequately captured by public authorities through waste collection and recycling systems.

Suggested Citation

  • Dominique Roux & Marie Schill, 2019. "Waste prevention in practice: Confronting public discourses about reusing, reducing, and recycling with consumers' perceptions of wasting material possessions," Post-Print hal-02877091, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02877091
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-02877091
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hal.science/hal-02877091/document
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Daniel A. Levinthal & Devavrat Purohit, 1989. "Durable Goods and Product Obsolescence," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 8(1), pages 35-56.
    2. Amber M. Epp & Linda L. Price, 2010. "The Storied Life of Singularized Objects: Forces of Agency and Network Transformation," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 36(5), pages 820-837, February.
    3. Joseph Guiltinan, 2009. "Creative Destruction and Destructive Creations: Environmental Ethics and Planned Obsolescence," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 89(1), pages 19-28, May.
    4. Gustavo Porpino, 2016. "Household Food Waste Behavior: Avenues for Future Research," Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, University of Chicago Press, vol. 1(1), pages 41-51.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kuppelwieser, Volker G. & Klaus, Phil & Manthiou, Aikaterini & Boujena, Othman, 2019. "Consumer responses to planned obsolescence," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 157-165.
    2. Guillard, Valérie & Le Nagard, Emmanuelle, 2018. "L'impact de l'obsolescence perçue des biens durables sur la décision de remplacement et la destinée de l'objet remplacé," ESSEC Working Papers WP1801, ESSEC Research Center, ESSEC Business School.
    3. Valérie Guillard & Emmanuelle Le Nagard, 2018. "L'impact de l'obsolescence perçue des biens durables sur la décision de remplacement et la destinée de l'objet remplacé," Working Papers hal-01718752, HAL.
    4. repec:oup:jecgeo:v:50:y:2023:i:2:p:282-302. is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Yi He & Qimei Chen & Dana L. Alden, 2016. "Time will tell: managing post-purchase changes in brand attitude," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 44(6), pages 791-805, November.
    6. Edward Kutsoati & Jan Zabojnik, 2001. "Durable Goods Monopoly, Learning-by-doing and "Sleeping Patents"," Discussion Papers Series, Department of Economics, Tufts University 0105, Department of Economics, Tufts University.
    7. Dennis W. Carlton & Michael Waldman, 2002. "The Strategic Use of Tying to Preserve and Create Market Power in Evolving Industries," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 33(2), pages 194-220, Summer.
    8. Koert van Ittersum & Brian Wansink, 2016. "The Behavioral Science of Eating: Encouraging Boundary Research That Has Impact," Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, University of Chicago Press, vol. 1(1), pages 5-14.
    9. Karin Brondino-Pompeo, 2021. "Mapping spheres of exchange: a multidimensional approach to commoditization and singularization," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 11(1), pages 81-95, June.
    10. Oded Koenigsberg & Rajeev Kohli & Ricardo Montoya, 2011. "The Design of Durable Goods," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(1), pages 111-122, 01-02.
    11. Chih-yi Chi, Woody & Wu, Shufen, 2006. "Intertemporal quality discrimination of a durable good monopolist," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 92(2), pages 184-191, August.
    12. Dmitri Kuksov & Chenxi Liao, 2023. "Restricting Speculative Reselling: When “How Much” Is the Question," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(2), pages 377-400, March.
    13. Maria Luisa Scalvedi & Laura Rossi, 2021. "Comprehensive Measurement of Italian Domestic Food Waste in a European Framework," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-17, February.
    14. Evrim Dener, 2011. "Quality uncertainty and time inconsistency in a durable good market," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 104(1), pages 1-24, September.
    15. Nallapaneni Manoj Kumar & Shauhrat S. Chopra, 2022. "Leveraging Blockchain and Smart Contract Technologies to Overcome Circular Economy Implementation Challenges," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-18, August.
    16. Joan Calzada & Tommaso M. Valletti, 2012. "Intertemporal Movie Distribution: Versioning When Customers Can Buy Both Versions," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(4), pages 649-667, July.
    17. Mikkel Nøjgaard & Cristiano Smaniotto & Søren Askegaard & Ciprian Cimpan & Dmitry Zhilyaev & Henrik Wenzel, 2020. "How the Dead Storage of Consumer Electronics Creates Consumer Value," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(14), pages 1-16, July.
    18. Atsuo Utaka, 2000. "Planned obsolescence and marketing strategy," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 21(8), pages 339-344.
    19. Sreekumar R. Bhaskaran & Stephen M. Gilbert, 2005. "Selling and Leasing Strategies for Durable Goods with Complementary Products," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(8), pages 1278-1290, August.
    20. Hagspiel, Verena & Huisman, Kuno J.M. & Kort, Peter M. & Lavrutich, Maria N. & Nunes, Cláudia & Pimentel, Rita, 2020. "Technology adoption in a declining market," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 285(1), pages 380-392.
    21. Francesco Nava & Pasquale Schiraldi, 2019. "Differentiated Durable Goods Monopoly: A Robust Coase Conjecture," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 109(5), pages 1930-1968, May.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    waste prevention; material possessions; public policy discourses;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02877091. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.