The transition to a more circular society has been adopted as a guiding principle in several countries' policies. The present paper reviews the international definitional and theoretical approaches to the circular economy originating in the Anglo-Saxon environment with a view to assessing their applicability in the (post-) transitional context of CEE and identifying the elements of their integrative conceptual core. The main finding is that scientific research of circular economy and circular business thinking takes two relatively independent directions (normative/positive), as it is grounded in two different methodological approaches. The paper shows that it is possible to use a starting point for further research on circularity that would not be based on dichotomous approaches but on integrity (holistic approach).