Contextualising Circularity in Australian Office Fit-Out Value Chain: A Mechanism-Based Qualitative System Dynamics Analysis

Office fit-outs generate substantial material waste and embodied carbon, largely due to frequent alterations driven by lease turnover, make-good obligations, organisational changes, workplace reconfigurations, and evolving aesthetic expectations. Although circular practices and supporting collaboration structures have been identified, limited understanding exists of how their implementation is shaped by specific national contexts. This study contextualises these practices and collaboration structures by examining how Australian contextual conditions influence their implementation through interacting mechanisms. A Qualitative System Dynamics approach was employed through expert focus groups with operational and strategic stakeholders across the Australian office fit-out sector. Stakeholder knowledge was translated into a Causal Loop Diagram and analysed through pathway analysis to identify mechanisms influencing Circular Building Design, Circular Product Design, and Circular Business Models. The findings reveal that contextual conditions do not operate as isolated barriers or enablers but interact through a multi-level architecture comprising core implementation and broader contextual mechanisms. Together, these mechanisms explain how policy, market, infrastructure, socio-cultural, organisational, and value-chain conditions enable, constrain, and reshape circular implementation. The study also maps participant-proposed interventions to the specific points within the causal architecture that they are intended to target. Although the resulting model represents a participant-informed qualitative dynamic hypothesis that neither estimates causal effect sizes nor ranks mechanisms or interventions, the study offers an analytical approach for contextualising circular transitions that may be adapted and tested in other construction contexts.