Hugo d’Assenza David, “From Idea to Action. Instrumenting the limits to growth. A study of policy change and advocacy coalitions interplay towards the City Doughnut in Amsterdam urban governance”, 2ème Prix AIRE de la Recherche Étudiante sur l’Environnement, 2022

Nous vous signalons le décernement du 2ème prix AIRE de la Recherche Étudiante sur l’Environnement 2022 au mémoire de recherche d’Hugo d’Assenza David intitulé From Idea to Action. Instrumenting the limits to growth. A study of policy change and advocacy coalitions interplay towards the City Doughnut in Amsterdam urban governance.

Abstract

This research establishes the policy change process behind the City Doughnut, that emerged

in Amsterdam from the development of the municipal circular economy strategy in 2020, and

explicitly questions the essence of the city as a growth machine. Drawing upon an analytical

framework applying the Advocacy Coalition Framework to urban governance, we decentred this topic

from urban studies and environmental science considerations, and proposed a reflection embedded in

the sociology of public action field, leaning on a framework that recently regained attention and is

particularly suitable to analyse policy innovation.

With this research, we assessed the condensation process between the Kate Raworth’s theory

and the implementation of the City Doughnut as a policy instrument. With a qualitative research

method combining secondary data analysis and semi-structured interviews, the study of this unique

case highlights how circular economy became a field of conflict between advocacy coalitions opposed

on the definition of what it means to ‘grow’ for urban governance. The first dominant ‘urban growth

coalition’ puts forward capital accumulation as the core matrix, and economic growth as a pre-

requisite for prosperity. The alternative ‘urban thrive coalition’ opposes to it an ecosystem growth, a

more holistic vision of prosperity: they consequently argue that socio-environmental components

should take precedence over, and even cap, capital accumulation practices. Circular economy is then

a multifaceted and debated development: while it puts forward a technological fix to perpetuate

economic growth, by decoupling it from resource consumption, for the first, circularity is one of the

sine qua non conditions to cap capital accumulation practices and achieve a socio-ecological

transition for the latter.

Findings highlight that the City Doughnut is the product of the strategy of ‘urban thrive

coalition’ actors. Their collective action not only mobilised pre-existing attention drawn to circular

economy to institute unbounded capital accumulation as a public problem, but also endorsed the

Doughnut theory as a relevant response. Through this, we have seen the importance of experts, and

in particular the theoretical leadership of Kate Raworth, in this policy learning process, but also the

importance of shifting political balance in favour of Greenleft in the municipal coalition. Even if this

marks a secondary change in Amsterdam urban governance, it carries with it the seeds of further

transformations. Both because of its post-capitalistic theoretical charge and the policy perspectives it

opens, this instrument admits itself a performative potential on actors’ activities, and for the conduct

of public policies in urban governance, and beyond.