LEGAL ROADMAP FOR A CIRCULAR ECONOMY IS A RESEARCH PROJECT OF THE LISBON PUBLIC LAW RESEARCH CENTER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF LISBON SCHOOL OF LAW.

The basic concept of circular economy is quite easily defined as a socio-economic model in which extracted natural resources maintain their value in an efficient manner. It opposes that of linear economy, where humans extract, manufacture, consume and throw away, which has been the core of the development model since the industrial revolution: the «take, make, waste» approach. As the current environmental crises is a result of overexploitation of natural resources, the potential of the idea of a circular economy that could harmonize environmental protection and economic development is appealing for environmentalists, economists, and policy makers.

The transition to a circular economy has been the subject of high-level public policies and is inherent to several SDGs and to the European Green Deal, as the sustainability of production and consumption is a prerequisite for combating climate change and for reversing the trajectory of natural resource depletion. It has been demonstrated that the effectiveness of any instrument for the transition from a linear model (cradle-to-grave life cycle) to a circular model (cradle-to-cradle) depends on the combined weighting of diversified factors that are studied by different areas of knowledge. These areas include legal science, social psychology, and applied natural sciences. However, legal research on the topic has been scarce.