Constructing Circularity: Network Building, Translation Processes, and Power Dynamics in the EU’s Energy-Intensive Sectors

Abstract

The European Union’s transition to a circular economy in energy-intensive industries presents a paradoxical phenomenon: despite the availability of advanced recycling technologies capable of recovering secondary raw materials equivalent to primary ones, adoption rates remain remarkably low. This study examines how heterogeneous actors construct networks in the EU’s circular economy transitions and through which processes certain network positions acquire power effects. Employing Actor-Network Theory as an analytical framework, the study analyzes EU policy documents, technical reports, and academic literature from 2019-2024, tracing “translation” processes across four material-technology assemblages: polyurethane chemical recycling, thermo-chemical processing of composites, mechanical recycling of plastics, and textile upcycling technologies. The research yields three principal findings. First, circular material flows are stabilized not solely through technical performance but through the alignment of heterogeneous actors’ interests via Callon’s moments of translation (problematization, interessement, enrollment, and mobilization). Second, power operates as a network effect: EU regulators through compliance mandates, platform operators through network effects, and standards bodies through technical specifications have positioned themselves as “obligatory passage points,” rendering their participation essential for other actors to achieve their objectives and thereby acquiring power. Third, non-human actors such as Digital Product Passports, artificial intelligence systems, and standards actively shape networks through inscription, delegation, and black-boxing mechanisms, encoding particular interests as technical requirements under an appearance of neutrality. This analysis challenges technological determinism, demonstrating that sustainability transitions are fundamentally sociotechnical network-building processes requiring continuous negotiation, maintenance, and democratic accountability.