The shift towards a circular economy (CE) has become a key element of the transformation of current production and consumption patterns. Because it is seen as an approach to decouple growth from resource consumption and to increase competitiveness and consumption, it is high on the political agenda. Over the last decade, CE has additionally received a lot of scientific attention. However, CE still has a lot of potential to exploit: in 2020, only 8.6 percent of the global economy was “circular”. 

The article is the introduction to the special issue "Kreislaufwirtschaft". At "Ökologisches Wirtschaften Online" the article is available as a free download:
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