From ambition to impact? Assessing the quality of local circular economy plans

• Local circular economy plans’ intrinsic quality is assessed. • Plans are overly reliant on generic actions mobilising enabling governance modes. • Monitoring fails to prove the sustainability contribution of circularity actions. • A framework is proposed to adopt a theory of change-based monitoring approach. • Integrating circular economy into broader sustainability planning is recommended. Circular economy (CE) is increasingly promoted by local authorities to address sustainability challenges. However, CE plans face substantial operationalisation challenges due to limited leadership and resources within local authorities, a general lack of CE knowledge among stakeholders, insufficient data on material flows, the absence of standardised indicators, and a lack of procedural rigour during the elaboration of such plans. Existing research offers limited guidance on effective processes for designing, implementing, and monitoring these plans. This article addresses these gaps by examining 13 French CE plans (261 actions) through interviews with local authorities and document analysis. Results highlight limitations in current CE planning, including temporal inconsistencies across planning stages, overreliance on governance modes centred on stakeholder awareness-raising and facilitation (72% of actions), and generic actions lacking focus on specific material flows (54% of actions). A structured evaluation framework, grounded in the Theory of Change, is used to assess the intrinsic quality of CE action design. It defines a high-quality action as one that follows a complete causal chain, from a well-specified intervention to measurable sustainability objectives. Results show that only 51% of actions include quantitative objectives and that, of these, only 3% align with a complete causal chain. These findings suggest that applying such a framework as a quality benchmark could significantly improve CE action design. Additionally, the article suggests that if CE is a means to achieve sustainability, standalone CE plans should give way to integrated sustainability planning, where CE actions are included only if they demonstrate quantifiable sustainability benefits.