The functioning of a social life cycle and the perimeters of the study.

Résumé En

Social LCA (SLCA) aims to assess the social repercussions of the functioning of a social lifecycle. The idea of a life cycle invites us to follow in spirit the trials and tribulations of a product (a Swiss watch, for example) as it passes through different stages of its existence, from inception to use and up to its ultimate demise. We see the watchmaker assembling the pieces in a factory workshop. We mentally return to its origins, seeing the mine where the metal was extracted, visiting the farm where the cow whose leather hide would serve as the watch band was raised. We see the watch travel in a package to the store where it will be put on display. Before our eyes, we see the buyer in the jewellery shop, one who will wear the watch on his wrist for a long time. The life cycle concept also evokes the episode in which the watch, no longer usable, will be taken apart to recuperate metals in the recycling center. Furthermore, we suspect that the issue is not to follow the future of a single Swiss watch, but to examine thousands of watches being made, used, and recycled in this way. What is the social life cycle? It is clearly not a real object (in contrast with our watch). It is an abstract object, deliberately and scientifically constructed with a precise goal in mind. Because a precise goal is pursued, SLCA is interested only in certain aspects of the functioning of the life cycle of the watch described above. What aspects of functioning are of interest (section II)? How may one construct the social life cycle (section I)? How may one delimit the perimeters of the study in space and time and the choice of actors affected (section III)? First, one must remember that the objects themselves do not create social impacts. They are not alive, they do not act directly. It is human actions -- in interaction with the environment and particular objects -- that create social effects. Human activities aiming to produce goods and service are structured into organizations (businesses, government services, associations, workshops, banks, etc.), which is another way of saying that they are a condensation of rules and stable institutions. As Louise Camilla Dreyer discovered early on, organizations are the basic units of a social life cycle (Dreyer et al, 2006). In social LCA, it is organizations which create social effects through their behavior.