Abstract
Human society is increasingly influencing the planet and its environmental systems. The existing environmental problems indicate that current production and consumption patterns are not sustainable. Despite the remarkable opportunities brought about by Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to improve the resource efficiency of production and consumption processes, it seems that the overall trend is still not heading towards sustainability. By promoting the utilization of available and underused resources, the ICT-enabled sharing economy has transformed, and even in some cases disrupted, the prevailing patterns of production and consumption, raising questions about opportunities and risks of shared consumption modes for sustainability. The present article attempts to conceptualize the sustainability implications of today’s sharing economy. We begin with presenting a definition for the digital sharing economy that embraces the common features of its various forms. Based on our proposed definition, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of the digital sharing economy as a use case of ICT. The analysis is deepened by applying the life-cycle/enabling/structural impacts model of ICT effects to this use case. As a result, we show the various positive and negative potentials of digital sharing for sustainability at different system levels. While it is too early to project well-founded scenarios to describe the sustainability status of digital sharing, the implications discussed in our work may help outlining future research and policies in this area.
Highlights
Sharing has been a common form of allocating and accessing resources in human societies
Our proposed definition for the ‘digital sharing economy’ is as follows: “A digital sharing economy is a resource allocation system, based on sharing practices, that is enabled by information and communication technology (ICT) and coordinated through participation of ind“iAviddiugiatlasl sahnadripnogsesciobnlyomcoymisma errecsoiaulrocergaallnocizataitoinonsyss(tbeums,ibnaessesdeosn) wshiatrhinthgepraaimcticteos,ptrhoavtiidseenteamblpedorary accesbsytoinrfeosromuartcioens tahnadt icnovmomlvuensieciatthioenr dtiercehcntoolorgiynd(IiCreTc)t manodnectoaorrydivnaltuede.”through participation of individuals and possibly commercial organizations with the aim to provide temporary Ouradcecefisns ittoiorensoouvrceerslathpast winvitohlvtehseeicthoemr dmiroecnt ocroinncdeirpetctomf ocnoeltlaarbyovraaltuive.e” consumption
By applying the LES model to the concept of the digital sharing economy, we have identified the core issues that have to be taken into account when assessing the potential contribution of a given instance of the digital sharing economy to sustainability
Summary
Sharing has been a common form of allocating and accessing resources in human societies. - Digital sharing is an enabler of bringing economy to the level of social practices whereby people become economic actors in their social bonds This creates opportunities for empowerment, it has generated debate on social inequality. The sharing economy has raised controversies about inequality—most of which vary depending on particular instances of sharing platforms—such as: entry barriers (in terms of dependency on holding an asset or having a skill to enter the platform-based labor market), labor conditions, wages, dependency on income and degree of satisfaction, and classification of workers (in terms of educational attainments and race hierarchies) and class-based/person-to-person discrimination [14] Based on these first insights from literature, we consider it important to reflect on the potential implications of the digital sharing economy for sustainability.
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