Theory-Based Roadmap for Assessing Sustainability in the Collaborative Economy.

Shouheng Sun,Myriam Ertz

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.752867

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the current state of sustainability for the collaborative economy (CE). By utilizing the triple bottom line as a founding conceptual framework, the study summarizes and discusses the sustainability of the CE from three dimensions: environment, economy, and society. The study further proposes some targeted measures and suggestions to measure the level of sustainability of the CE and CE platforms. The result shows that the CE has partially fulfilled some of its initial promises pertaining to sustainability, such as creating new job opportunities, economic growth, the efficient use of space and physical resources, as well as social mixing. However, the current sustainability benefits remain much smaller than some claim and hope for. Therefore, governments, platforms, and the public should work together to solve current challenges pertaining to the CE to tap its sustainability potential.

Highlights

The redistribution and mutualization of goods and services among peers and various organizations have strongly affected the contemporary economic environment
This study organizes existing research on the collaborative economy in order to investigate its current state of sustainability
The two questions that guided the research were: Does the current collaborative economy (CE) achieve its original intention of sustainable development? And how to improve the sustainability of the CE? This paper draws on the triple bottom line as a conceptual framework to summarize and discuss the sustainability of the current CE from three dimensions: environment, economy, and society, and concludes by proposing some targeted measures and suggestions to promote the sustainable development of the CE

Summary

Introduction

The redistribution and mutualization of goods and services among peers and various organizations have strongly affected the contemporary economic environment. Through drastically different ways of creating, capturing, and disseminating value, the CE incurs multiple utilitarian benefits such as flexible resource provision roles (e.g., online product reseller, car journey provider, money-lender, housing provider), bottom-up self-regulating mechanisms, more authentic experiences for consumers, lower costs, and more sustainable uses of resources (Heinrichs, 2013; Daunorienë et al, 2015) Due to this superior efficiency, the CE has Sustainability in the Collaborative Economy been lauded for being a pathway to environmental and social sustainability (Botsman and Rogers, 2010; Heinrichs, 2013)

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