Market Futures and the Role of Market Studies in the Making of Circular Economies

This chapter explores how Market Studies scholars can usefully direct their expertise and attention to the complex challenges thrown up by the required shift to the imaginary circular economy. We propose a framework and research agenda for the infrastructuring moves required to fundamentally shift the sociomaterial, technical, political and economic arrangements that sit below our linear economy, in order to reconfigure how our economy works. The need for greater fungibility at a local, regional, national and international scales, and for new forms of governance are seen as critical to success. However, while Market Studies scholars are well-equipped to address these challenges, we need to do more than simply deploy existing conceptual frameworks and tools, asking, what demands do circular economy concerns place upon Market Studies? We argue that theories of materiality and valuation need to be extended if not reformulated, to accommodate many of the features associated with circularity. We recommend that scholars engage more actively with understanding the infrastructures of supply and demand that compose the linear economy, the practices that sustain that demand, and the practices of repair, remanufacturing, retrofitting, upgrading, and enabling new modalities of access to goods.