Putting the sharing economy into perspective

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.eist.2017.01.003Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • We provide a definition of the sharing economy.

  • We discuss the economic, environmental and social impacts of the sharing economy.

  • We discuss the current regulatory principles that governments apply.

  • We go into possible alternatives to the current commercial sharing platforms.

Abstract

We develop a conceptual framework that allows us to define the sharing economy and its close cousins and we understand its sudden rise from an economic-historic perspective. We then assess the sharing economy platforms in terms of the economic, social and environmental impacts. We end with reflections on current regulations and future alternatives, and suggest a number of future research questions.

Keywords

Sharing
Platform
Sustainability
Reverse technology assessment
Regulation

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