Sharing and Collaborative Economy: Future Scenarios, Technology, Creativity and Social Innovation 3030938816, 9783030938819

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SPRINGER BRIEFS IN ECONOMICS

Enric Bas

Sharing and Collaborative Economy Future Scenarios, Technology, Creativity and Social Innovation 123

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Enric Bas

Sharing and Collaborative Economy Future Scenarios, Technology, Creativity and Social Innovation

Enric Bas FUTURLAB University of Alicante San Vicente del Raspeig, Alicante, Spain

ISSN 2191-5504 ISSN 2191-5512 (electronic) SpringerBriefs in Economics ISBN 978-3-030-93881-9 ISBN 978-3-030-93882-6 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6 © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Ana, meu fofinha, já te disse que te amo?

Preface

Oh, I get by with a little help from my friends Mm, gonna try with a little help from my friends Oh, I get high with a little help from my friends Yes, I get by with a little help from my friends With a little help from my friends (Lennon & McCartney, 1967)

After decades of exaltation of the individual, it seems that now we are living in a good time for the collective: we are linked (or tight, or even maybe chained) to each other by social networks, in a global world where digital ubiquity and total availability—24/7—are the norm. You must be connected if you do not want to become an outsider and being left aside. It is like that old Nokia´s ad slogan of the 1990s “connecting people” which has become universal, total, and mandatory. Nowadays, people love to feel themselves being part of something collective (even virtual, even fake), sharing pieces of their lives—even daily, like a showcase diary—with others. Using co-working spaces instead of private boxes is cool. Also, it is sharing a car instead of owning one, and giving a second life to a secondhand jacket in the name of sustainability and the collective survival, instead of buying a new one (which certainly could dynamize economy even more). Ecosystem seems to be the dominant reference now, as part of the Zeitgeist, even ahead of economy, technology, or politics. So, to be cool you must co-work, cocreate, collaborate, and participate in collective processes, all the time. This is the contemporary mantra, and individuality has become an old-fashioned concept if not a sin. But, although it is certainly a book about the potentialities and benefits of co-creation and the possibilities that collaborative work offers, this is not a plea against individuality. Quite the contrary, and after considering various drivers and scenarios, it has been concluded that it is not possible—from a philosophical and conceptual point of view—to develop a true sharing and collaborative economy if it is not based on individual initiative. This could sound paradoxical, since a communal character is always ascribed to it, but without private initiative, private property, free choice, meritocracy, division of labor, and market segmentation (the bases of vii

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liberal capitalism), the sharing and collaborative economy would be nothing more than a Frankenstein—a living dead, artificially created—in the hands of the state. Would The Beatles, one of the references of co-creation in popular culture, have been possible without the talent (diverse and unique) and the individual contributions of its members? I do not think so. Things are more enjoyable, and perhaps even better, with the help of friends, as they sang in 1967, but the individual initiative, which is always free, is key in the collective process. That of yourself, and that of each of your friends. It was also in 1967 when Bertrand de Jouvenel published The Art of Conjecture, one of the most relevant references in futures literature. A conjecture is a judgment or opinion formed from indications or incomplete or supposed data. It is, let us say, a well-founded subjective assessment: it has an objective component, based on data and observations, but it is still a free interpretation: the ultimate result of a creative process that can only be ascribed to its author. This is the main treasure of our species: that, being part of a collective that gives meaning to its existence, each member is magically unique. Like creativity, which is unique ... and free. This book is dedicated to my wife, Ana, to my mums, Toti and Lilian, and to my beautiful little niece Maria Antonia—four unique and free women who, from their individuality, generate that feeling of community that gives meaning to life and that we call family. San Vicente del Raspeig, Alicante, Spain

Enric Bas

Highlights

• The ubiquitous nature of digitalization will radically determine the “new economy.” • The core issue in social innovation is not technology, but the social fabric, i.e., people. • Policymaking concerning regulatory means (free market, fair trade, etc.) tends to be controversial. • It is necessary to move from top-down to bottom-up (open) innovation policies. • The new economy relies on empathy: sharing, collaboration, and participation of individuals. • Sharing and Collaborative Economy is based on free choice and individual initiative.

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About This Book

This book provides a foresight-based exploratory analysis on the coming postcapitalist society and the transforming role played by technology, creativity, and social innovation in the new economy. The shared and collaborative economy (henceforth referred to as ShE) is here essentially understood just as proof of the current Zeitgeist: a sign of its time. A time, a reality—the “liquid modernity,” according to Bauman—where the formal social structures and institutions (not only the entities but also the identities) which have traditionally shaped and framed human societies are—slowly but inevitably—becoming “dissolved” into a new emerging social system of a complex and mutant nature. This leads to a challenging time for companies, governments, and individuals which entails as many risks and opportunities. The Horizon Scanning process to identify drivers likely to affect the ShE on the 2030 horizon—along with the subsequent future scenarios design—was developed by the author himself, in his capacity as research director responsible for its Foresight section, on the basis of “Open-DOORS” (Designing a network of cooperative creative communities to develop a sharing economy): a 2015-18 Interreg European Commission Project committed with stimulating both the proactive new economy and participatory/open social innovation initiatives within the Mediterranean area. This prior/previous work was later completed with the author’s individual research on breakthrough technologies and lifestyles carried out during his stay (academic year 2020/21) as Visiting Professor at CLICCS Cluster of Excellence on Climate Change and Society, led by the UHH University of Hamburg and the Max Planck Institute. Those outcomes, together with the preliminary and extensive futures research work performed by FUTURLAB during the last 20 years (mainly on megatrends, weak signals, and wild cards concerning technology, economy, society, ecosystem, politics, and culture), have defined the context to undertake this exploratory exercise where three plausible scenarios for ShE are considered by the author on the 2030 horizon: the probable future (“Balancing neoliberalism: the shared/collaborative economy as a new third way”); the contingent/rupturist future (“Hypercapitalism: xi

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neoliberalism on steroids, or the collaborative paradigm as a Trojan horse”); and the preferable future (“Post-capitalism, or sharing economy as the poster child of the Fourth Industrial Revolution”). This distribution was made according to a change of paradigm where horizontal management, cultural diversity, social responsibility, climate change management, and the transformative power of radical creativity and participation have finally assumed a leading/key role in the design of brandnew as well as more integrative and sustainable ways to approaching business and economy.

Reference Open DOORS: Designing a network of cooperating creative communities for developing a sharing economy Interreg Mediterranean. European Commission. https://open-doors.interreg-med.eu. Accessed 15 Aug 2021

Contents

1

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1 3

2

Why Foresight? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Foresight and Social Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Going Participatory: Foresight in Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 The Creative Futures Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 5 . 5 . 7 . 10 . 11

3

Horizon Scanning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Innovation Culture: Social Innovation as the Driving Force for a New Economy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 The Digitalization of Social Life, or How Technology Is Transforming Identities and Culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.1 The Unstoppable Spreading and Development of ICTs . . . . 3.2.2 The Emergence of New Players . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.3 The Hydra Effect in Digital Entrepeneurship . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2.4 Ubiquity of the Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.3 The Circular Culture: Sharing, Collaborative. . . Towards a New Economy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.4 ShE Seen as Controversial: Exploiting Vulnerabilities or Creating Opportunities? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.5 The Role of Politics: Regulatory and Legal Approach to the ShE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.6 Why Privacy Matters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.7 The Use of Personal Data in ShE; Legal Protection at Present: The Internet as a New Political Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 13 . 13 . . . . .

15 16 18 19 20

. 23 . 27 . 31 . 33 . 35 . 36

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6

Contents

Futures Mindmap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 The Art of Conjecture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 Key Drivers Considered for ShE_2030 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3 Dialectics of Change/1: How Social Subsystems Are Impacting on ShE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4 Dialectics of Change/2: How ShE Is Impacting on Social Subsystems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.5 Cross-Impact Matrix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 41 . 41 . 42

Scenarios for 2030 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Scenario #1: Extrapolative—Balancing Neoliberalism; ShE as a (New) Third Way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 Scenario #2: Disruptive—Hyper-capitalism: Neoliberalism on Steroids, or the Collaborative Paradigm as a Trojan Horse . . . . . . . 5.3 Scenario #3: Utopian—Post-capitalism, or Sharing and Collaborative Economy as the Poster Child of the Fourth Industrial Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 55

Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 State of the Art . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 Europe at the Crossroad . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Deconstructing the ShE Concept and Philosophy. The Regulatory Issue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4 Can ShE Be Considered an Alternative to Capitalism—As We Know It—? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.1 Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.2 Feasibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.3 Flexibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.4.4 Fair Play . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.5 Beyond the Paradox. . . . The Future of ShE in a (Big) Nutshell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

. 44 . 46 . 49 . 52

. 56 . 60

. 63 . 66 . 67 . 67 . 68 . 70 . . . . .

74 76 77 77 78

. 78 . 80

About the Author

Enric Bas is Professor of Social Change and Communication, and Participatory Foresight and Social Innovation, at the School of Economics of the University of Alicante (Spain) and Director of FUTURLAB-Creative Futures at the University of Alicante (UA). He is currently Guest Visiting Scholar at the German cluster of excellence “CLICCS—Climate, Climatic Change and Society” led by UHH-University of Hamburg (Germany) and Max Planck Institute, as well as at many other academic and research institutions worldwide. Further, Bas is Editorial Board Member of multiple scientific journals and book series and former Executive Board member of the WFSF-World Futures Studies Federation (2000–2005) and the European Futurists Conference Lucerne-Switzerland (2005–2012). He is a member of Techcast-Global (GWU) since the early 2000s, and the “SFRI-Strategic Foresight for Research and Innovation” experts’ group of the European Commission; currently, he is working as an expert in FoD (Foresight on Demand) projects for the European Union. Bas is interested in exploring the future, understanding complexity, implementing creativity, and stimulating proactivity, either for/with organizations (business-oriented, public, or NGOs) and/or individuals (mainly young and elderly people).

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Chapter 1

Introduction

The cut in interest rates with which the Federal Reserve reacted to the widespread local financial crisis (Mexico, Asia, Russia, Brazil) and technological advances in the late 1990s caused a rapid economic downturn, while the US economy grew exuberantly within what came to be known as the “new economy.” However, as stock markets reached never-before-seen record highs, the huge profits of companies such as Enron and World.com turned out to be fictitious. The Dotcom bubble ended up bursting in 2000. The technological advances that defined the “new economy” were here to stay, though, and those digital platforms and applications which enabled sharing of goods and services that changed the way we consume, have fun, study, find partners and live our lives became mainstream. In 2008, the financial crisis led people to increase their use of such technology— within a context described by Castells (2012) as the “Culture of the Crisis”—in an attempt to maintain/preserve their lifestyle. Sharing economy thus became an umbrella term for the different designations used to characterize the new economy, such as collaborative, circular, on demand, or zero-marginal-cost. They all share the use of technology that provides a link between the idle capacity of individuals and renting/sharing, environmental concerns, the community or network paradigm and, in the most recent concept, global recession, which acts as a catalyzer of such change towards a more collaborative future (Botsman and Rogers 2010; Pearce and Turner 1989). As recently stated in a publication of the European Union’s Joint Research Centre (JRC), “Collaborative Economy became the buzzword used to refer to all kinds of online platform-based business models in recent years” (Celikel et al. 2016). It is explicitly assumed that no consensus exists on a working definition for these platforms—nor robust evidence regarding their costs and benefits to society— which obviously constitutes a precondition for a proper policy agenda. This paper emphasizes the need to develop a well-defined, widely supported conceptualization of collaborative economy through which better tailored policy interventions related to its various dimensions can be carried out.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_1

1

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1 Introduction

The ‘European Agenda for (the) Collaborative Economy’ of the DirectorateGeneral for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs (European Commission 2016) revealed the European Commission’s interest in the Collaborative Economy and its potential to create new opportunities, for consumers and entrepreneurs alike, by contributing to increase competitiveness, employment and growth levels throughout the European Union. This document appeals to responsibility while developing this transition to a new economy based on sustainable models, additionally stressing the importance of (developing) further forward-looking research to orient policymaking through the exploration of future scenarios (Bock et al. 2016). The need for monitoring the Sharing & Collaborative Economy (ShE) in order to identify emerging obstacles and problems regarding online trust mechanisms and the impact of digital labor market) platforms on labor markets and social security systems should suffice to justify the undertaking of this future-oriented research; after all, responsibility when protecting public interest must always prevail. Nonetheless, anticipation is also required to explore the opportunities afforded by this challenging new environment via the identification of the best niches and practices for a more effective transition. Since this is a new and dynamic phenomenon which does not easily fit into existing frameworks, regulatory uncertainty stands out as one of the key concerns in relation to it. However, the ShE simultaneously paves the way for a promising future by encouraging a more sustainable and human-centered economic model. After all, in addition to the more commercially oriented ShE initiatives, it also has great potential both for the transformation of public services and for social innovation. On the basis of the scientific research carried out for decades in Foresight and the conceptual framework under study, this essay will try to provide a wide vision—a conjecture—on the possible future of the so-called Shared & Collaborative Economy over the coming two decades. On the one hand, this implies an exploratory analysis supported on a qualitative approach (even though quantitative data are obviously considered), and, on the other hand, it means—even thinking in holistic and global terms—focusing on the European Union and, more precisely, on the Mediterranean area. Chapter 2—entitled “Why Foresight?”—reflects on the convenience of developing forward-looking activities (the FLAs promoted by the European Commission) or, expressed differently, futures research initiatives, for the purpose of backing decision-making processes as well as the development of public policies. Foresight has become increasingly relevant when it comes to identifying and evaluating alternatives within complex, changing environments. However, Foresight not only is a predictive approach; it can and must be a proactive one too. During the last five decades, future studies have evolved from forecasting (predicting the future on an extrapolative basis) to participatory foresight (building the future proactively), where the ideal of a shared future for a community arises as the most effective way to approach anticipation.

References

3

Chapter 3—“Horizon Scanning”—explores key drivers worthy of consideration in the analysis around three main axes: social innovation as a cultural issue; the nature and impact of technology and digitalization in social life; and the basic aspects shaping this brand-new economic model (networks, business models, and law). The main actors (stakeholders, either already known or potential) and factors (processes, already identified or emerging, and contingent facts) are described in a narrative way and combining different sources. Likewise, a short explanation will be offered on how those intertwined actors and factors interact in the shaping of future alternatives. Chapter 4—“Futures Mindmap”—has as its main objective to explore the nature of the above-mentioned actors and factors, together with a range of plausible future interactions, seeking to develop a cognitive mind-map about the future (or, rather, futures): a visualization of dots and connections which should serve as the basis to develop alternative scenarios. Attention will be paid to weak signals and wild cards, as well as to the causal and casual effects between them, using a cross-impact table that collects and describes all the impacts deemed as plausible and relevant. The scenario analysis will rely on this tentative Futures Mindmap. Three Scenarios defined as Extrapolative, Disruptive, and Utopian (following the tradition in Futures Studies) are considered as plausible alternative futures in Chap. 5—“Scenarios Analysis.” All three Scenarios are shown in a narrative way and grounded on systems thinking (systems theory), the multilevel approach (fractals theory) and causal/casual relationships (chaos theory) with the aim of providing an integrated approach to the analysis of change and complexity. Needless to say, many more—perhaps infinite—plausible future scenarios would exist, but these three are the result of a clustering process developed by combining probability (what data show us), rational expectancies (what people would like or aspire to), and randomness (unexpected contingencies which may radically affect the future course of events). The “Conclusions” offered in Chap. 6 summarize what can be learned from this exploratory exercise, so as to better cope with the expected challenges and to take advantage of the potentialities detected—according to the author’s experience.

References Bock A, Bontoux L, Figueiredo do Nacimiento S, Szczdpanikova A (2016) The future of the EU collaborative economy; using scenarios to explore future implications for employment. JRC-Science Hub. Publications of the European Union, Brussels Botsman R, Rogers R (2010) Share: what’s mine is yours. Nhk Shuppan/Tsai Fong Books

4

1 Introduction

Castells M (2012) Redes de indignación y esperanza. Alianza Editorial, Madrid Celikel F, Abadie F, Biagi F, Bock A, Bontoux L, Figuereido do Nascimento S, Martens B, Szcezepanikova A (2016) The European collaborative economy: a research agenda for policy support. JRC-Science Hub. Publications of the European Union, Brussels European Commission (2016) Communication for the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. A European agenda for the collaborative economy. DG Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs, Brussels. http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri¼CELEX:5201 6DC0356. Accessed 5 May 2018 Pearce W, Turner R (1989) Economics of natural resources and the environment. John Hopkins University Press, Baltimore

Chapter 2

Why Foresight?

2.1

Foresight and Social Change

Manifest concern exists about the future in this historical moment of transition from the late industrial society to information society—or the advanced technological society. This is the Fourth industrial revolution: The Internet is merging with AI, biotechnology, robotics, VR, etc., while the 24/7 use of digital devices becomes widespread—even in undeveloped or poor areas—and mainstream: an essential part of twenty-first-century global culture. Furthermore, this Fourth industrial revolution (still in progress) induces change and complexity as no other had done before: it has a more pervasive nature, is more extensive, and affects all levels of social life: from global markets to individual identity—to which must be added that it owns a still unknown transformative force/power. The speed inherent to technological change with its multiple, multidirectional, and radical impact on essential aspects not only of our life as social beings—e.g. economic relationships, the values system, or day-to-day experiences associated with personal relationships, work, emotions, education. . .)—but also of organizations (management, customers, products. . .) generates a feeling of vertigo and uncertainty. Hence the growing interest in the futures vision as a necessary tool to approach the challenges faced in the present. The uncertainty and complexity inherent to the decision-making process explain why evidence-based descriptive approaches or predictions supported on short-term analyses seem not to suffice for decision-makers, nor even for the general public. Everybody needs some sort of additional reference about “what the future could be like,” even if it is tentative or conjectural. This is why developing forward-looking activities (FLAs according to EC nomenclature)—and mainly Foresight as a tool—has become essential in organizational and strategic management, both for the private sector and for the public administration. The European Commission has been progressively and systematically integrating Foresight into policy-making at least since the 1990s. It suffices to © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_2

5

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2 Why Foresight?

take a look at the sixth and seventh EU European Framework Programmes which, despite not containing any specific main lines on/references to Applied Foresight, show an implicit interest within the European Commission to promote futureoriented studies as a way to improve scientific projects. The Eighth Framework Programme (Horizon 2020) made even more visible this increasing interest in Foresight, both developing specific research projects and networks and recommending the integration of the foresight approach into any applying project. The coming ninth Framework Programme (now called “Horizon Europe”) has been expected to make it mandatory to include the Foresight approach in any project applying for a budget, regardless of the topic or scientific/knowledge area (European Commission 2017a, 2017b). Finally, Foresight is now explicitly considered as a quintessential part of the EU research and innovation policy: “One of the aims of Horizon Europe is to support the use of foresight in research and innovation policy in EU countries, with a view to strengthening common views of future challenges and opportunities for research and innovation in the EU” (sic). . . as it can be read at the official website of the European Union (https://ec.europa.eu/info/research-andinnovation/strategy/support-policy-making/shaping-eu-research-and-innovation-pol icy/foresight_en). Foresight is about foreseeing social change, so it is consequently related with change management (Bas 1999; Bishop and Hines 2007): foreseeing future scenarios implies automatically identifying existing future options for action while approaching a decision-making process. Since Foresight helps the decision maker to identify and to evaluate different options on the basis of scientifically founded conjectures (those narratives, kind of reference frameworks which we call scenarios), it can be considered an invaluable tool for strategic management either for orienting private companies and public policy-making initiatives. Foresight, because its emancipatory nature, helps organizations to better align their decisions with their vision and mission, by improving their strategic intelligence and proactive capacity. The classic/foundational readings in Futures Studies literature (Bishop and Hines 2007; Bell 1997; Masini 1993; Meadows et al. 1974) clearly show how the origin of this multidisciplinary approach is rooted in a historical time characterized by a high degree of uncertainty, and how the approach has evolved accordingly in the last decades. Just to highlight a few milestones in Futures Studies: it seems that the 1929 Stock Market Crash, which put the incipient financial capitalism on the ropes and made obvious the need of fixing the existing lack of effective systematic futureoriented analysis, was the reason why David Ricardo developed the early prediction models in quantitative economics. In the same line, the RAND corporation—then linked to the US government—developed the seminal Delphi Method in the 1950s with the aim of mapping plausible alternatives and future scenarios for reducing decision-making risks in a context of Cold War and high uncertainty. So, Foresight (or, in other words, strategic thinking or futures studies the way they are understood today—in twenty-first century), like the strategic management approach itself, could be considered just as consequence of the current Zeigteist: the so-called liquid modernity, a context of crisis and structural change marked by uncertainty, and the lack of cumulate information useful to foresee the future on

2.2 Going Participatory: Foresight in Context

7

the basis of previous experience; a context where trends forecasting (the extrapolative approach) seems to be not so interesting as weak signals (intuitive/creative) and wild cards (exploratory). Every social system in human societies is now being affected by global dynamics mainly—but not only—induced by the exponential growing of breakthrough technologies which are radically modifying and shaping the plausible scenarios to be considered in the coming future. The last three decades have witnessed a significant theoretical and methodological effort aimed to better understand the current change processes. Over the past 30 years, most of the main features characterizing this emerging scenario or “new reality” have been identified and analyzed. Zygmunt Bauman came up with a new concept to define the new emerging reality: “Liquid Modernity”. Bauman broke away from Anthony Giddens’s concept of “Late Modernity” and—probably even influenced by Ulrich Beck’s “Second Modernity” of Ulrich Beck and the “Surmodernité” proposed by George Balandier—he invented a new refreshing vision about/approach to this “new reality”: Bauman’s concept actually concerns both the continuous or “solid” (which becomes “liquid” by merging or losing its traditional features) and the discontinuous by nature (which can no longer return to a “solid” state). Bauman built up a consistent discourse about a society continuously under construction whose personal and organizational links had been born with a deadline; a society where humans only play a residual role or waste their life erratically. This idea was somehow anticipated by the Professor of the London School of Economics, Richard Sennet, in his book The Corrosion of Character. Amongst the main features of this “fluid society” or “liquid society” that we are speculating about would stand out—both collectively and on an individual basis—the loss of roots due to the continuous transientness and uncertainty considered above. Or to put it in a different way, the absolute loss of structural referents that could serve to guarantee solidness, continuity, and stability (as these concepts were perceived in the industrial society) not only in social life but also on a personal basis.

2.2

Going Participatory: Foresight in Context

Observing the possible ways to approach the Future (Table 2.1) across History most importantly allows us to distinguish how the social systems identified along the time arrow—together with the communities behind them—trusted prophets, ideologists, economists and a variety of other future experts to orient policy making. The advent of democratic capitalism (a hybrid of free market and representative democracy), and consequently of marketing research as well as public opinion polls, provided citizens with a choice to become involved in the management of future issues to a certain extent (even if it was only by voting or answering survey questionnaires). The role played by Foresight as a useful tool to orient political priorities and encourage democratic participation has progressively evolved in recent years, while the democratic systems themselves simultaneously underwent a change process as

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2 Why Foresight?

Table 2.1 “Ways to Approach the Future” (Bas 1999; Bas and Guillo 2012) Supernatural Primitive Societies Old Regime

Hermeneutic Secular Society Nation-state

Emancipatory Post-industrial Society Glocalization

Ideology Politics

Technical Industrial Society MassCapitalism Product Economy

Key point Dominant subsystem Foundation

Religion Culture Emotional

Emotional

Rational

Rational

Method

Qualitative God’s Orders

Qualitative Utopias

Quantitative Trend Forecasting

Qualitative + Quantitative Foresight

Attitude

Alienation

Alienation

Adaptation

Anticipation

Origin Paradigm shift

Knowledge Technology

Participatory Liquid Society Social Networks People Ecosystem Emotional +Rational Qualitative + Quantitative Creative Futures Innovation

well. In a number of regions, Foresight has emerged as an effective process for participatory democracy, networking, and interactive approaches, the reason for this lying in the fact that Foresight—understood as a process—has helped the joint development of future visions and common strategies (a shared future vision) inside communities. The frequent assumption that Foresight is participatory by nature somehow holds true because it runs self-assured over the quantitative “objective” data, trying to integrate subjective probability and group consensus in the analysis too. Actually, most Foresight methodologies and techniques (for instance, Delphi and Scenarios methods) rely on participatory processes: quantitative data are only used as the starting point of a process where a group of experts or qualified representatives undertake a systematic discussion pursuing to reach a broad consensus about what might happen in the future. Nevertheless, the social impact of this “top-down” way to approach Foresight has been somewhat neglected, insofar as it has sometimes adopted a reductionist format and remained sufficiently distant from the expectancies and needs of citizens and companies as to fail in its purpose. Or to be ineffective and useless. Perhaps the time has already come to evolve from a participatory method to a participatory philosophy in Foresight, bringing together all the stakeholders involved in a single process. After all, despite using participatory methods, Foresight has paradoxically been following/ a kind of top-down logic in the end, wrongly taking for granted that politicians (or civil servants) knew what society expected, and also that scientists were able to ascertain what the future might be like. It now becomes necessary to keep the emancipatory nature of Foresight re-connecting with the Zeitgeist: a new reality where knowledge is supplied via the Internet and digital means, and in which communication flows through social networks and reality is built on a bottom-up basis. Although working with scientists and representatives

2.2 Going Participatory: Foresight in Context

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definitely seems convenient, new elements and actors should be included in the analysis. Firms as well as public institutions and political parties sometimes have a problem with empathy when designing their products, services and election programs respectively. Envisioning the future empathetically—or expressed differently, connecting with civil society’s expectations—is far from easy. A compelling need exists for a more bottom-up model to define strategies: actually, it would be a mistake to approach Foresight without considering the horizontality and immediacy (in terms of public opinion generation) that ICTs—and particularly social media— have brought into the picture. Blind trust in the judgment of experts (supposed to have more and better access to knowledge) can no longer be the way in which citizens articulate their expectations. Another factor worth highlighting is the irruption of a brand-new generation of youngsters (the so-called “Generation Z” or digital natives) mainly characterized by having grown and been socialized within a digital environment—present in their life ever since their birth—that has largely determined not only their behavioral patterns, both personally and socially, but also how they interact, buy, vote, produce or access information. Consequently, despite the population aging process experienced in many world regions (which implies the preeminence in numerical terms of individuals whose socialization process took place within an analogical environment), a change is clearly required for these new generations of digital natives used to voting in real time everything that concerns their personal and social life by means of new tools (such as “likes” in Facebook) to become integrated—commercially as well as politically. The integration of these new users (citizens/consumers) through participatory processes will be essential for organizations to empathize with the social fabric and to improve their effectiveness regardless of whether they are private or public ones. Foresight needs to move from technocracy to empathy, from the top-down logic to a bottom-up one, so that it can prove really effective while supporting decisionmaking processes related to strategic issues. Because the future is not what it used to be: Technology is not as it used to be; Society is not as it used to be; Politics will not be as it used to be; Economy will not be as it used to be; the future will not be as it used to be. Not anymore. Digitalization and the ubiquity of the Internet, alongside its merging with AI, robotics and biotechnology, is leading us in to a brave new world governed by monitoring and digital interaction: individuals interact with their doctor, their home, their TV, their shoes, their teachers, their dealers, their representatives . . . . Things run from the physical to the digital world in real time, and sometimes we even find it hard to know if something has happened first in reality or in the virtual dimension, which in turn explains the importance acquired by social networking sites in the construction of social reality (icons, trends, leaders. . .) If total interactivity is the norm and the construction of reality takes places on a bottom-up basis, both governments and companies should embrace a really participatory Foresight, which basically means translating the way in which the/today’s world actually works (open, interactive, network-based, continuous. . .) into the logic of emancipatory prediction: let all stakeholders sustainably participate in an ongoing

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2 Why Foresight?

process of generation of future images/images about the future (predictions, expectations, etc.). Changing the rules to stimulate co-creation and open innovation while approaching Foresight is the only feasible way to reach this “emancipatory” level, adapting the decisions made by governments and companies to the expectations and proposals of citizens and consumers, respectively. Therefore, the use of participatory methods is a necessary but hardly sufficient condition to speak about a real “Participatory Foresight” that must be 100% integrative in order to become truly holistic and provide a 360-degree vision and thus properly address the complexity inherent to the grand challenges ahead of us.

2.3

The Creative Futures Approach

Participatory Foresight means, in a word, collectively creating the Future. So, Participatory Foresight would be about co-creation: a process where a wide range of different and heterogeneous sensibilities and points of view try to embrace a shared future vision for the community based on consensus. Therefore this “Creative Futures”—let’s say—method is implicit in Participatory Foresight, as the considered contemporary way to approach the Future which better fits with the Liquid Society: a conceptual framework where social networks put the people in the center, which means mixing the rational and the emotional and— consequently—understanding the Future as an open space to be built (approaching social change in a structuralist way), instead of a deterministic extrapolation based on cumulated knowledge and data. So, here quantitative data (past and present information) analysis must be completed by a qualitative approach (needed to generate some kind of information about plausible futures, alternative to the extrapolative). But imagining alternative futures, on the basis of qualitative methods, in Participatory Foresight, should not be understood as a synonym of generating utopias (under an “Hermeneutic” point of view, where ideology is the key point which means that anything can be proposed even improbable or just impossible) but—on the contrary—generating plausible scenarios on the basis of a realistic, pragmatic and scientific analysis. While utopistic thinking is for free (like dreaming), the Creative Futures approach seriously takes into consideration the cost opportunity that any decision-making process implies. While utopistic thinking uses creativity to completely invent an alternative imaginary world, understanding innovation as an end in itself (idealistic), the Creative Futures approach uses creativity to identify and generate plausible alternative options understanding innovation as a mean for social development (pragmatic). While utopistic thinking is top-down (a visionary leader identifies what you need, and what is better for you: everything for the people but without the people), the Creative Futures approach runs bottom-up on open and participatory basis actively integrating all the involved stakeholders from the very beginning. So, in the Creative Futures approach Social Innovation is “Social” not because is FOR the people (top-down innovation) but because it comes FROM the people

References

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(bottom-up). This is the logic/philosophy behind the architecture of some recently proposed methodologies like FLUX-3D (Bas and Guillo 2015): to guarantee the social dimension of innovation by integrating co-creative and participatory processes in the ideation and/or evaluation of innovative proposals. In the case of FLUX-3D, developed by us at FUTURLAB, the operative architecture of the methodology combines the qualitative and the quantitative in order to be able to—even slightly—trying to catch up with complexity. And its design (as a tool) follows, under a conceptual point of view, the spirit of the Creative Futures approach; or, at least, the way we understand it: as a mix of Systems Theory, Fractals Theory, Fuzzy Logic and Chaos Theory. Because complexity and uncertainty are connatural to these liquid times. And a proper, scientifically based, exhaustive, previous analysis is essential to generate useful plausible future scenarios and to properly (under a pragmatic/applied/social/ human-centered point of view) orient the creative process inherent to any innovation. Because, as Drucker (1985) suggested, some innovations are born from a flash of genius, but most are the result of a conscious and deliberate search of opportunity.

References Bas E (1999) Prospectiva; herramientas para la gestión estratégica del cambio. Ariel, Barcelona Bas E, Guillo M (eds) (2012) Prospectiva e Innovación Vols. 1 (Visiones), 2 (Experiencias) y 3 (Propuestas). Plaza y Valdés Editores, México D.F. Bas E, Guillo M (2015) Participatory foresight for social innovation. FLUX-3D method (forward looking user experience): a tool for evaluating innovations. Technol Forecast Soc Chang 101: 275–290 Bell W (1997) Foundations of futures studies. Transaction Publishers, London Bishop P, Hines A (eds) (2007) Thinking about the future. Guidelines for strategic foresight. Social Technologies, Houston Drucker P (1985) The discipline of innovation. Harv Bus Rev 63(3):67–72 European Commission (2017a) Strategic foresight in EU research and innovation policy; wider use, more impact. DG RTD-Research and Innovation, Brussels European Commission (2017b) Report of the expert group SFRI-strategic foresight for research and innovation policy in Horizon 2020; background papers. DG RTD-Research and Innovation, Brussels Masini E (1993) Why futures studies? Grey Seal Books, London Meadows DH, Club of Rome, Potomac Associates (1974) The limits to growth. Adfo Books

Chapter 3

Horizon Scanning

3.1

Innovation Culture: Social Innovation as the Driving Force for a New Economy

Foresight and innovation are often regarded as distinct ‘knowledge areas’ or ‘disciplines’; however, we could probably see them as the two sides of the same coin: the former (Foresight) as a transversal methodology; and the latter (Innovation) as the cultural dimension underpinning strategic thinking and management. At a historical moment when the problems that need to be solved are multifaceted and accordingly require transversal approaches for their understanding and resolution, it seems to us that any efforts to locate approaches of a multidisciplinary and flexible nature within the rigid watertight parameters of traditional disciplines and knowledge areas will prove fruitless. We need to search somewhere else. Foresight and Innovation feed each other since Foresight—as a methodological approach—provides of an instrumental tool to foresee plausible futures and envisioning—and tracking—best options to stimulate innovation, while Innovation (which could be understood as doing things in a new, creative and more effective way) provides a reason why—proactivity, emancipatory—to Foresight. And the result—or, better, aim—of their feedback is, definitively, to encourage social development and human progress through applying strategic thinking while approaching challenges to come. From this point of view, and in this context (strategic change management) the term “Social Innovation” could be considered as redundant since an innovation makes not sense if has not a social purpose, if it’s not contributing one way or another to social development and human progress; if it’s not social, in a word. After decades of only considering Research (getting information on scientific basis to generate basic knowledge) and Development (transferring and assimilating basic knowledge to specific organizational purposes) as basic items for social development and human progress, Innovation (proactively implementing transformation in organizations through creativity) was finally added to the polynomial in © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_3

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order to highlight that either information or knowledge are useless without considering—and implementing—their inherent transformative potential; or, in other words, in order to outline the quintessential role of creativity to ensure progress. So now it seems widely accepted, and almost nobody is questioning, that economic and social progress is determined by the R&D&I (research plus development plus innovation) equation (European Commission 2017; Etzkowitz 2008). Innovation is not an automatic process: the mere existence or availability of accumulated knowledge or new technology does not guarantee that innovation will take place. There is not a causal relationship, and the existence or availability of these items is something necessary but not sufficient to assure that effective innovation will occur. The point, most of times, is how to manage it when we have the knowledge and/or the technology; it’s not about the what but about the why and the how—values, priorities, etc.—so it’s cultural (Herbig and Dunphy 1998; Hofstede 2001). So, Innovation should be considered basically a cultural issue. This is why a difference between ‘innovation management’ and ‘innovation culture’ can—and should—be made (Bas and Guillo 2015): while ‘innovation management’ means periodically adopting innovations (products, processes or services) which have been generated externally to the organization, under a kind of adaptive and short term vision full of complexes and with no ambition, ‘innovation culture’ means an internal systematic effort based on purpose-making, creativity and an strategic vision based on proactivity . ‘Innovation management’ is exogenous, reactive/preactive, simple, reductionist, punctual and short-term focused; on the contrary, ‘innovation culture’ is endogenous, proactive, complex, holistic, sustainable and long-term focused. ‘Innovation management’ is a tool; ‘innovation culture’ is a philosophy. ‘Innovation management’ is for followers or adopters; ‘innovation culture’ is for brave real innovators and for leaders. That is why, as highlighted above, innovation necessarily identifies with the idea of assimilation: the organization implementing innovation not only has to accumulate but also ‘digest’ the knowledge and technology transferred, making them an integral part of its DNA and culture, on the basis of the defined purpose-making (vision and mission). It must likewise be understood as a sustained, endogenous process framed within each organization’s philosophy, rather than as an isolated, specific action or a succession of independent actions guided by a mechanism of reaction and adaptation to exogenous changes. Expressed differently, an organization that not only seeks to be competitive and aspires to leadership but also wants to be truly innovative cannot practice ‘innovation management’—instead, it will need to promote the development of an ‘innovation culture’ in its internal structure. Regarding Innovation, and assuming that the hypotheses put forward are true, ‘management’ behaves reactively (or, at least, preactively), whereas ‘culture’ has a proactive nature. The former, as explained above, tries to adapt products and processes to the changes already occurred or foreseen. Organizations implementing the latter, though, aspire to lead those changes and build the future in accordance with their desires. Using a cinema simile, they would be the actor and the scriptwriter in a film, respectively.

3.2 The Digitalization of Social Life, or How Technology Is Transforming. . .

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Because it is proactive and considering that alternative futures exist—as opposed to a single inexorable (and still) probabilistic/deterministic future—‘innovation culture’ entails adopting exploratory methods which permit to identify and assess future options as well as to design alternative scenarios through which strategic action lines can be defined. This is an extremely necessary exercise, as it permits to articulate such ‘internalization’ of the accumulated knowledge which innovation represents into specific initiatives that in turn must trigger changes in the desired direction. Foresight would consequently become a catalyst for innovative action by helping the organization to identify and assess alternative future scenarios and orienting decision-making processes in order to reach its preferred future.

3.2

The Digitalization of Social Life, or How Technology Is Transforming Identities and Culture

As Zygmunt Bauman (Bauman 2007) pointed out, this stage of history is allowing us to witness the rise of different—albeit highly interconnected—processes that shape a brand-new scenario where individual decisions should be made with no previous references, which means facing unseen challenges. Bauman (2007) referred to this as Liquid Modernity, characterized by the progressive and inexorable dissolution of every previous reference (social institutions, structures, and models), that once articulated social life by providing a framework to limit individual decisions and, consequently, to orient social action. The structures (solid, static) which have traditionally shaped social life are now dissolving into networks (flexible, changing); therefore, social life is becoming liquid and unpredictable. Nothing—except for change—can be taken for granted in this new form of society, where the only constant is change and the only certainty lies precisely in uncertainty. Since nothing lasts long enough to become a reference framework, flexibility (i.e. the ability to adapt to change) arises as the only solid norm; even though this may sound like an oxymoron, it actually is not. Society stops being a structure to become a network, a matrix of random connections and disconnections with endless number of possible permutations. The word “community”—understood as a group of individuals belonging to a solid structure linked to a specific physical place where everybody shares norms, values, and social institutions, as well as a vision about the future, and give mutual support to each other—gradually loses its meaning in this context, mainly because that way to understand the concept of community relies on long-term action, which very often goes beyond generations. Although network analysis as a method for sociology to study social interactions did not originally stem from the widespread utilization of computers or the Internet, ICTs have played a determining role in the consolidation of this Liquid Society where networks (flexible and changing) are increasingly replacing structures (solid and recurrent) as the main conceptual referent when it comes to mapping social interactions. Such Liquid Society could not exist in the absence of two elements:

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(a) telecommunications; and (b) the Internet. The same holds true for the Liquid Self—defined as a new stage where the main shift has led towards applications that let you introduce yourself to different people in different ways and at different times (Fizz 2014). The Internet currently available to society is perhaps the most transforming technology ever created by human beings, insofar as its multidimensionality largely affects social life. Most importantly, its unlimited potential to combine with other technological advances generates synergies of unforeseeable consequences. The Internet has changed absolutely everything, by shrinking and accelerating the world that was known to us so far. However, this is only the beginning of a completely new era: the biggest and most radical changes have not arrived yet. Both social organizations and individual identities will probably be reshaped until becoming unrecognizable, induced by mutual permanent feedback—a dialectical process that is bound to work faster and deeper than ever. Social life, and even private life, will jump on to a brand-new stage. Merging the Internet with artificial intelligence (AI), biotechnology, and robotics will bring about a dramatic change not only in terms of how people interact with one another (and societies are formed) but also as far as human nature is concerned. Thus, the future of human societies and that of the new Economy (Sharing or Collaborative Economy) are inextricably linked to the development (both quantitatively and in qualitative terms) of the Internet as well as of digital platforms and devices. The process of digitalization of social life revolves around four main axes previously identified (Bas 2015):

3.2.1

The Unstoppable Spreading and Development of ICTs

One of the main transformative strengths that characterize the Internet—alongside Information and Communication Technologies in general—lies in the pace at which it has taken over the world. Together with cell phones and PCs, the Internet stands out for being one of the most disruptive technologies ever, according to its adoption curve. As shown by Peter Brimelow (Brimelow 1997), Internet connection ownership reached 25% in the United States of America in 1997. Its adoption—defined here as the moment when at least 40–50% of the population regularly uses the technology in question—went faster than that of any other previous technology: it was completed after only 6 years! The adoption of other relevant technologies took far longer, as illustrated by the following examples: Cell phone (14 years); PC (18 years); TV (25 years); Radio (27 years); Microwave oven (31 years); Landline Telephone (37 years); and Automobile (62 years). According to the same source, the number of Internet users (individuals of any age who can access the Internet via whatever device type or connection) has grown exponentially during the last 21 years, going from 14,161,570 users (0.3% of the population in 1993) to 2,925,249,355 users (40.4% of the population in 2014).

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Another relevant, and perhaps even more important piece of information is the distribution—both in relative and absolute terms—of users currently accessing the Internet worldwide by country (Internet Live Stats n.d.). A quick review of the statistics provides us with a number of interesting insights: 1. Almost half of the users currently accessing the Internet are living in Asia (48.4%), followed by those living in America (21.8%), Europe (19%), Africa (9.8%), and Australia (1%). 2. Most of the countries with over three quarters of their population accessing the Internet are developed, amongst them the USA, Japan, France, the Netherlands, Australia, the UK, and Germany, Canada and South Korea actually exceeding 90%. 3. The top ten countries ranked in order of total number of users accessing the Internet are: China, USA, India, Japan, Brazil, Russia, Germany, Nigeria, UK, and France. 4. China has almost three times as many users as the United States of America; and Nigeria has more users than the United Kingdom and France (and, of course, South Korea, Australia or Canada)—even though Internet penetration only reaches 37.59% of its population (unlike what happens in the United Kingdom and France, where that percentage rises to 90%). The case of India deserves even more attention because, despite being the third country in absolute terms (after China and the United States of America), in relative terms, less than 20% of its population has access to the Internet. From a Liquid Modernity standpoint, this information suggests the possibility of a radical, upcoming transformation. If the notion of network soon comes to prevail over that of structure—the quintessential concept around which society has hitherto been articulated—the global power balance based on access to knowledge may change dramatically in the near future. This is not about which countries have greater or lesser access to the Internet in relative terms, but rather about how many people can access the Internet in absolute terms, within a true global economy. Regarding the future of sharing or Collaborative Economy, the disappearance of the old structures together with the subsequent prevalence of digital-based networks in the framing of social life may radically alter the way in which citizens approach economic transactions. This would consequently affect global Economy as we know it, transforming concepts such as job(s), taxes, retirement, holidays, or even the very nature of a company or of a business—as we know it. Territorial balance at a global level will be redefined as well. Obviously, this also relates to questioning the traditional role of public policies in the regulation of the economic activity, within a socio-economic context oriented towards free will; a new scenario where the global balance of power might vary.

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3.2.2

3 Horizon Scanning

The Emergence of New Players

The more people use the Internet and digital platforms/devices, the greater likelihood of new ideas emerging that lead to new businesses able to transform social life. If there are more Internet users (in absolute terms) in countries such as India, Nigeria, or Israel, probably most of the ideas will come from there. Therefore, while a very large proportion of the most relevant and largest companies worldwide—including Internet companies—are still based in the United States of America and even though Silicon Valley, where venture capital meets innovative geeks, remains the place to be for entrepreneurs, two trends deserve to be considered in relation to the possibility of a model reconfiguration (towards a more liquid one) in the near future: 1. Scale in innovation is changing from national/ethnic to human. Being innovative has nothing to do with the country where you were born: It has to do with/relates to your personal individual skills and networks. Robert Lenzer (2013) argued that the traditional trend of immigrants becoming entrepreneurs in the United States of America (obviously due to the fact that the USA basically arose as an invented country made up of immigrants and their descendants—he mentions Procter & Gamble, Pfizer, and U.S. Steel to exemplify that trend) has grown over the last two decades, not only because 25% of high-tech companies had at least one immigrant (e.g. Google, eBay, and Brightstar), but mainly because “75% of the companies funded by American venture capital had one core foreign-born team member as their CEO, CTO or VP of Engineering” (sic). Lenzer underscored the lack of STEM—Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics—graduates amongst American students, as well as the growing rate of non-American students interested in such topics, regardless of whether they study in the USA (ca. 60% of them joined STEM programs) or in their home countries. 2. Technology incubators are emerging in the world’s least expected places. Although venture capital still seems to feel more confident and appears to be better connected with the traditional innovative epicenters, mainly based in developed countries, both the World Start-up Report (The Economist 2014) and the 500 Start-ups Project (McLure 2013) show a changing scenario with an increasing multiplicity of focuses and the growth of outstanding initiatives related to Internet development across various geographical areas. This reveals a new context where priorities change, and in which transnational venture capital and investors will be able to operate at a truly global scale. Therefore, one can easily see how structures are turning/being transformed into networks as a framework for action, while new actors (people and places) are coming into play in/with the extension of the Internet. Rigid patterns are leading/giving way to flexible bonds, de facto transcending the traditional coercive structures and institutions (such as states, legal entities/authorities/courts. . .). Such developments take place because this last stage of our capitalism, referred to as ‘Post-industrial Society’ by Daniel Bell (1973) and as the ‘Information Age” by Manuel Castells (1996), is being ultimately built on the basis of total flexibility—a boundaryless

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global vision/worldview—as well as on the widespread and unlimited use of ICTs (with their ever-increasing and highly pervasive effects) and their multiple possibilities to merge with other technological and scientific advances. This emergence of new actors, basically operating within digital-based networks and playing a new role away from the formal structures and regulatory systems, is redefining the business world and Economy as a whole. Open innovation, where multiple stakeholders converge and prosumers emerge, and the ensuing democratization of business (which, despite still depending on investors and capital owners, is gradually moving towards a more social capital approach where flexibility, individual initiative, and social innovation now stand out as key elements), are distinctive features of the Shared or Collaborative Economy. These new “players”—pivotal in New Economy’s business models such as Uber or Airbnb—are challenging the old economic structures, while paving the way to understanding economic activity differently/in a new, different way.

3.2.3

The Hydra Effect in Digital Entrepeneurship

There has been an entrepreneurial boom worldwide regarding the virtual realm. A recent report on technological start-ups (The Economist 2014) described it as “a Cambrian moment” (sic), metaphorically drawing a parallel between the current moment in digital entrepreneurship and what happened on Earth some 540 million years ago, when an unusual multiplier effect produced an amazing variety of species in a very short period of time, radically altering life on the planet. According to this report, “digital start-ups are bubbling up in an astonishing variety of services and products, penetrating every nook and cranny of the economy” (sic). And, although 90% of digital start-ups end up failing—as also shown in the report—the current volume of initiatives keeps growing at an amazing pace. Taking as a reference the contribution made by John Webb (2014) along with the data provided by the Online Global Report (Reynolds 2002), 1.35 million technological start-ups started operating in 2002—this being only a rough estimate, since figures either did not exist/were not available or had not been compiled for most countries. As implicitly suggested in this report, those enormous numbers are driven by the emergence of new actors and their increasingly prominent role. While the entrepreneurship ratio in traditional areas (including the EU, the Commonwealth or the USA) ranges between 5% and 10% (percentage of adults, from 18 to 64 years of age), it reaches nearly 15% in Latin America, and even more in developing Asian countries. It should additionally be stressed that this report was published shortly after the Internet bubble of the 1990s and before the appearance of currently widespread social media such as Facebook and Twitter, which make it possible/ much easier for individuals to interact with one another. Digital interaction or, expressed differently, the creation of formal or informal bonds by means of social networks, has proved essential to develop the kinds of creative/innovative ecosystems where those start-ups grow. Such ecosystems mostly

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have their headquarters in incubators or accelerators run by universities with the support of existing companies and private investors—though their main strength lies in their being highly interconnected worldwide. At present, anyone can create their own start-up from an original idea without needing to be based in Silicon Valley: even if you are operating in Malaysia, Kenia, Spain, or Iceland, being well connected and owning a good network suffices to reach success. In this regard, social media have meant a boom for global entrepreneurship, and they will surely stand out as one of the key factors for the exponential growth of the digital sector itself. As highlighted in the Forbes magazine (Zwilling 2013), the convergence of some different factors, amongst them the growing inability to innovate in large corporations, the real globalization of capitalist economy through its transformation into a single market, the rising number of incubators and accelerators, the availability of venture capital investments for the early stage, the low costs involved in creating a start-up, and the networking potential of social media, have triggered a sort of revolution in the global economy, fueling entrepreneurship and boosting it to a greater extent than ever before. These transformations become essential to understand the rise of sharing or Collaborative Economy and to foresee its future development in the years ahead.

3.2.4

Ubiquity of the Internet

The number of Internet users around the world currently amounts to ca. 5 billion, i.e. 60% of the total global population. Twenty-five years ago, the percentage of individuals with Internet access only reached 1% (Internet Live Stats). As a result of the military need to develop a secure environment for the protection of strategic data in the context of the Cold War, ARPA (the Advanced Research Projects Agency, linked to the US Defense Secretary) created the ARPANET in the late 1960s. Early protocols such as NCP (Network Control Protocol) and, since 1982, the TCP/IP (Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol) suite, made possible an independent system to exchange data between computers and local networks. After its establishment and growth across Europe from the late 1980s and through the 1990s, mainly around research and scientific regional networks, the Internet reached Asia, Oceania, Latin America, and Africa, transforming what had once been a hodgepodge of independent networks into a truly global entity before the turn of the century. After leaving behind its origins in the Military area, and becoming key to articulate scientific networks, the Internet eventually moved to business environment and thee mainstream. This third stage in the spread of Internet use (led by social media and entertainment) turned out to be essential for the definitive expansion and democratization of the Internet as it is known to us today. The Internet subsequently became a must-have around the world and, ultimately, a central part of popular culture: the tipping point towards ubiquity. In 2015, several driving forces sped up the process that led to total ubiquity, a full integration of the Internet into our living (both private and professional) routines,

3.2 The Digitalization of Social Life, or How Technology Is Transforming. . .

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through the convergence of the physical and the virtual spheres. At least five of those driving forces should be outlined here: 1. Rise of wireless. Even though wired connections have been largely improved and still remain the backbone of the Internet, wireless technology is evolving in a way that may radically change the scene soon: Wi-Fi has stopped being a complementary tool to become essential and, thus, to play a central role. Technologies such as Long-term Evolution (LTE) and WiMAX pave the way to access the Internet wirelessly at speeds comparable to those offered by broadband connections. This is extremely relevant, since portable devices (smartphones, laptops, and tablets) will be the dominant connection tool(s) by 2020 according to the Pew Research Centre (Rainie and Anderson 2008). This means being able to log on to the Internet anytime, anywhere. 2. Total access. Although there are still large geographical areas (mainly rural and/or undeveloped ones) with a slow access or even with no access at all to the Internet, some initiatives have already been undertaken with the commitment to spread the Internet to every corner of the planet. The A4AI-Alliance for Affordable Internet (http://a4ai.org), the world’s broadest technology sector coalition, has as its Vision for “everyone, everywhere, to be able to access the lifechanging power of the Internet affordably.” Amongst its technological sponsors and members stand out Google, Alcatel-Lucent, CISCO, Microsoft, Intel, and Facebook. The main private sponsor, Google, is developing ‘Project Loon,’ its own side project based on the large-scale utilization of high-altitude balloons placed in the stratosphere to create an aerial wireless network with up to 3G-like speeds. Anybody can log on to the Internet anywhere on Earth—and beyond— thanks to this project. In the words of Vint Cerf, widely known as one of the “Fathers of the Internet” and co-designer of TCP/IP protocols and Internet architecture, as well as Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist for Google: “there is a chance for an Interplanetary Internet” (Mann 2013). 3. Instant connection. Bell Labs recently announced a new 10GB world record broadband speed for data transmission (Alcatel-Lucentum 2014) which meant a big step towards fast connectivity. However, science research is reaching speed levels that still cannot be assumed by the commercial infrastructure—though it will probably not take long for that to be possible. For instance, it became known six years ago that the same company (Bell Labs) had broken the optical transmission (speed) record, 100 Petabytes per second kilometer (Phys.org 2009), which was said to outperform the most advanced commercial undersea cables by a factor of ten. Therefore, it is only a matter of time before speed increases to unknown limits, reaching the possibility of ‘Instant Karma.’ 4. Technological synergy. It becomes of paramount importance not to overlook the context of scientific and technological advances where the Internet is evolving. The latter can by no means been seen as an isolated phenomenon—despite being the best-known and most visible one—; it is only actually one amongst the main drivers of change. A combination between Internet ubiquity and Biotechnology could facilitate the automation of processes in a broad sense (solving one of

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biotech’s long-lasting problems: reproducibility—since human beings keep making mistakes). Likewise, it might help virtual reality (the replacement of the real world by a simulated one) merge with augmented reality (the modification of perception by using computer generated sensory inputs that complement the real world): artificial information about the environment and its objects could be overlaid onto the real world too (Azuma 1997). All of this could mix with Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and 3D technology, to quote but a few, for the purpose of producing plausible innovations: intelligent software programs, holograms used in visual online communication, online teleportation of tangible objects. . . (Epstein 2014). 5. Virtualization of social capital. As for the current and future impact of the Internet on social capital (interaction, participation, commitment, trust, sociability, etc.), this issue has already been addressed in several interesting and exhaustive empirical works (Wellman et al. 2001; Ellison et al. 2007) framed within the field of social sciences, where both worlds (virtual and real) are seen as complementary. A recent working paper published in GESIS (Sabatini and Sarracino 2014) had the question “Will Facebook save or destroy social capital?” as its title. Perhaps one should add “as we know it” or something similar to it. Social capital is exactly like energy: it can neither be created nor destroyed, but only transformed. Therefore, one should consider the possibility of a progressive virtual substitution of the real world, their mutual complementarity being nothing but an interlude between both worlds along the arrow of time. Evidence attests to the fact that social capital is being increasingly generated within virtual environments, since social life more and more often develops in—or through—virtual environments as well. Perhaps the point does not lie so much on whether the virtual affects the real (as something taken for granted becomes essential and will last forever) but rather on whether a process of merging and dissolving of the real world into the virtual one is taking place. Ubiquity arises as an essential axis for the development of ShE. Wireless networks are helping facilitate access by deallocating the connection to digital platforms and devices from a physical structure, consequently making it easier for people living in different territories to become involved in the new Economy. Wi-Fi plays a determining role when it comes to achieving the total access needed for a qualitative step beyond. Additionally, the increased speed in ICTs permits to develop a kind of digital culture in the heart of communities, since any transaction can be done practically in real time, which in turn fuels e-commerce while making it easier and more affordable. The technological synergy between digital platforms and smart devices helps users access them with hardly any technological expertise, thus largely contributing to the democratization of their use. And, finally, social capital is becoming key in the new Economy: branding, or brand reputation, has basically evolved into something directly connected to users, since they are the ones who assess—via their direct participation—the level of satisfaction regarding the brand and accordingly influence its future viability as a business model.

3.3 The Circular Culture: Sharing, Collaborative. . . Towards a New Economy?

3.3

23

The Circular Culture: Sharing, Collaborative. . . Towards a New Economy?

Back in the 1970s, the economic structure began to transmute, to emphasize the multiplication of transactions as an immanent process; this meant that business relationships came to be understood as short-run contracts. As a result, a fluid society emerged (Bauman 2007) in the form of decentralized networks. Within the myriad of such contracts, data access and analysis became strategic because they reduced transaction costs (Hui and Png 2006). This type of economic structure values the market as an ethical guide, capable of guiding human action, and emphasizing contractual relationships. It considers which social good can be more easily attainable when transactions grow in the economy, therefore taking human action to the market space (Harvey 2005). This demands the creation of information technology in order to accumulate, transfer, analyze, and use big databases with potential to guide decisions on a global scale, giving rise to the information society (Bossler et al. 2014). These technologies expanded the transactions performed in the market, both in time and in space. In parallel, the development of the Internet enabled the gathering and analysis of information on a big data basis, catalyzing this transformation towards the information society, whilst it emulates the networks of markets. Organizations simultaneously become global and information dependent, acquiring the form of complex networks in which culture, understood as an organizational model, determines the outcome. While corporations, civil society, and governments become exponentially interconnected—through the fluidity of dynamic relationships that transforms transactions—the cost involved in entering this game also increases due to uncertainty; hence the importance of reducing information asymmetry as the core concern of the information society. Aiming to access and control information, corporations and governments push the boundaries of privacy, gathering more and more data about both the users of their services and the citizens. As information acquires greater relevance, it becomes the object of exchanges, resulting in trade operations that alienate data provided to a firm by third parties, and privacy ends up becoming diffuse. Metadata emerge as a relevant element too, and anyone having the necessary resources available has the chance to cross those data to know everything about an individual and, therefore, predict their behavior (Strahilevitz 2005). The beginning of this transformation can be understood within the context of neoliberalism and the emphasis on financial markets. China’s expanded/continued growth during the late 1990s, along with that of other emerging countries, made US domestic debt rise. However, debt growth sustained both the US economy and global demand. At the same time, the low-cost production from China and other emerging countries, together with their integration into the global economy, reduced inflationary pressures. In conjunction with the monetary reserves of developing countries—influenced by IMF conditionalities—this contributed to lower interest

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rates, expanding credit, firstly sustaining the US economy and, consequently, the world economy (Ocampo 2008). When the Asian crisis (Krugman 1999) erupted, US President Bill Clinton referred to it as an “accident” while Alan Greenspan insisted that it was the result of a chronic failure of Asian capitalism to adopt the “free market.” However, a few months later, it became clear that the Asian crisis was only a symptom of something deeper: in August 1998, Russia went into default, and in September of that same year, the Long-Term Capital Management hedge had to be redeemed with $3 billion, for fear that a collapse could lead to a systemic financial crisis (Pinto et al. 2005). The Fed’s response was to cut interest rates. As a result, the economic storm was apparently rapid and the US economy boomed at the end of that decade, which led to its description as the “new economy.” In fact, while the stock market hit record highs, the boom started to show signs of stagnation, and the gigantic profits of companies such as Enron and World.com eventually turned out to be unrealistic. In 2000, the capital markets’ bubble was back in vogue and the US economy fell into recession, three million jobs being lost (Bossler et al. 2014). Nonetheless, the recession period did not last long, and shortly after, the US economy began to show signs of recovery, entering a favorable cycle again. Although the recovery was due to the incentives given to increase consumption, the latter did not come through higher wages and a larger supply of jobs—real wages remained stationary—but via an increase of consumer debt, whose interest rate favored obtaining consumer credits. All of this in turn encouraged the formation of a real estate bubble which, alongside mortgages, made consumer expenditure soar, allowing interest to fall. The injection of large sums of credit into the international financial system was the key to sustain the global economy. This created a more integrated global economy in which everyone was committed to ensure the stability of the whole system. Capital markets have grown faster than nominal GDP every year since 1981, except for 1987 and the biennium 2001–2002. The subsequent global financial crisis of 2008 can be easily understood in the light of the above. In parallel, the development of online platforms which facilitate the trade of idle capacity is considered an aftermath of the Great Recession, where sharing or rental was considered a new “social ideal,” leaving behind the overconsumption that had led to the crisis. As people put value in experience rather than ownership, the focus shifted towards the practice of sharing (Kaun and Stiernstedt 2014). In this sense, M. Castells (2012) adduced that, when people have no economic resources to maintain their lifestyle, they resort to any strategy to keep consuming under the capitalist system; it is what he calls “the culture of the crisis.” Although technology advancement gave rise since the 1990s to new subsectors such as the gig economy, the on-demand economy, cloud computing, or artificial intelligence—all of which include sharing economy—the question is whether they actually gave rise to the so-called “new economy.” The birth of sharing economy as we know it most probably dates back to 1995 with the establishing of eBay and Craigslist. These sites gained impulse as the result

3.3 The Circular Culture: Sharing, Collaborative. . . Towards a New Economy?

25

of the excessive consumerism in the U.S. that characterized the previous two decades, pushed by purchase of cheap imports mainly from China that led to users having a large number of unwanted objects at home. The key for the success of such websites as eBay and Craigslist was the reduction of otherwise high transaction costs from secondary markets—the sales of used products was a difficult task as sellers had to find potential buyers for products with limited demand and the buyers had to be assured that the product was in the conditions that the sellers implied. eBay reduced those costs through the measure of reputation of both sellers and buyers, creating trust in the secondary market. More specifically regarding sharing of different goods and services, in the car industry, the first player was Zipcar, launched in 2009, which offered hourly rental of locally placed vehicles in urban centers. Regarding lodging, Couchsurfing pioneered this sort of business partnering people that looked for a place to stay with people that had free space—at first without payment—already in 1999 (Schor 2014). Sharing economy, which means that wide segments of the population can take advantage of underutilized possessions which would otherwise remain idle (e.g. a car or a spare room) via digital platforms, is enabled through the digitalization of the socio-economy. In its earliest forms, such as Craigslist, users were connected through searchable lists published through a website. This permitted the exchange of goods and services locally/at a local level. In a second phase/stage of sharing economy, platforms like Airbnb and Uber allowed for sharing of goods through/ thanks to the development of mechanisms such as online reputation and signaling. This was (badly) needed because, when users share a good, the owner must retain (almost) all of its post-transaction value (Zervas et al. 2014). Although humans had already developed ways to share resources since the beginning of times and “new modalities” of the so-called “sharing” or “collaborative economy”—for instance, car sharing—existed since 1948 in cities like Zurich and were popular in North Europe during the 1980s, the transaction costs, mainly associated with information, were high and those initiatives only had a local scope. Digital technologies, though, made those costs fall sharply, online sharing acting as the catalyst that lifted them into a global status. As peer-to-peer (P2P) sharing activities can compete with formal economic transactions, this can eventually come into conflict with the current regulatory framework and impact on citizens’ welfare as consumers and service providers alike. Since the “sharing economy” increasingly covers fields such as transports, lodging, retail, logistics, finance, and the labor market, additionally operating in factor markets as well as product markets, these activities can affect the whole economy; hence their capacity to transform the socio-economic space and to significantly impact on regulations (Codagone and Martens 2016). For Botsman (2015), the term “collaborative economy” referred to the creation of decentralized networks to harness the value of underused goods, amongst them platforms such as Etsy or eBay. “Sharing economy” had to do with the discovery and utilization of goods with idle capacity, exemplified in Airbnb. “On-demand economy” brought together the business models which match customers’ demand with suppliers to deliver goods and services, for instance, Uber. “Collaborative

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consumption,” though, was defined as the “reinvention of traditional market behaviors like renting and lending, through the use of digital technology.” An example was BlaBlaCar. The Open Doors Project, main reference here, used the term “sharing and/or collaborative” as an umbrella term which holds/includes at least five of the seven characteristics listed below: • Self-awareness: the participants in a sharing or collaborative process are selfaware of doing things differently through a use of technology that connects them to their community. • Technical interface: it reduces the asymmetry of information, reducing transaction costs and enabling transactions to take place in the ubiquitous network space. It has a multiplier effect due the network configuration: the more users join a specific platform, the more services or goods are available, and the more people are willing to join. • Peer-to peer: exchanges take place in a decentralized way, because the relationship between supply and demand is horizontal in the collaborative or sharing economy. • Reuse of idle assets: ShE is anchored in the utilization of underused resources channeled through information technology. It is connected to the circular economy. • Value framework: the ultimate goal must be to increase not transactions but social participation, with/seeking positive externalities for communities. • Social capital: technology enables people to connect outside their “trust” circles, expanding social capital through mechanisms such as the measure of online reputation. • Trust and reputation: ShE is built through mechanisms which have a less coercive nature and are based to a greater extent on trust between its participants. Reputation measurements create the trust needed for operations to take place in a fluid space. In the light of the characteristics described above, the circular economy and ShE may overlap when digital platforms add the use of existing products instead of producing new ones. In accordance with this, ShE is a part of the circular economy, expanding the time during which a product can be in use. This enables a better usage of resources, as explained in the McKinsey (2015)—focused on the circular economy in Europe—which found that a car is parked 90% of the time on average and that office spaces are usually unoccupied 30–50% of the time during working hours. Furthermore, one third of food is wasted throughout the supply chain. Uber and BlaBlaCar are both online platforms which provide new value to the economy by allowing the usage of the idle capacity of cars; their business model and values are inherently different, though. One of the key issues when it comes to ShE is to know why people share: according to the Nielsen survey carried out in 2014, 28% of global respondents would rent their electronic devices for a fee and 23% were willing to rent power tools. Other items which interviewees would not mind renting are: bicycles (22%),

3.4 ShE Seen as Controversial: Exploiting Vulnerabilities or Creating. . .

27

clothing (22%), household items (22%), sports equipment (22%), cars (21%), outdoor camping gear (18%), furniture (17%), homes (15%) motorcycles (13%), and even pets (7%). Sharing economy is consequently more about a new form of buying than about merely “sharing” (Nielsen 2014). The most relevant ShE names/brands in music and the media are Spotify and Netflix; Airbnb and Home Exchange stand out in travel; Rent the Runway is the referent in fashion; Lyft and Uber are the ones to follow in transport; and TaskRabbit dominates the area of labor (Van Welsum 2016).

3.4

ShE Seen as Controversial: Exploiting Vulnerabilities or Creating Opportunities?

The Mediterranean region was responsible for one of the inventions that enabled trade during the Modern Era: the overseas agent. The competitive advantage of a trader at that time depended upon his ability to deliver goods without having to travel with them. Trust was fundamental to achieve it, and, without any governmental/legal support, the merchants operating in the region needed to be creative. With the aim of building trust across different geographic and cultural regions, the merchants leveraged two issues: the creation of a scenario in which reputation mattered (as overseas agents who were caught on corruption acts would fail to profit from them); and the formation of a community of people with shared interests that permitted to assess reputation (merchant coalitions) (Sundarajan 2016). ShE is deeply based on the two assumptions (as highlighted above), insofar as the overseas agents reduced information costs the same as today’s platform does, and the reputation of the overseas agents reduced security costs—similarly to the current rate systems—enabling this new form of interaction to thrive based on trust. Thus trust is a must to make possible the myriad of interactions that take the form of contracts that are carried out in everyday life. Regarding sharing economy, since the government regulations cannot follow the fast pace at which technology moves, corporate brands and its data governance standards become strategic to build trust among users. That is why platforms that can impose such standards as they hold a big share of users such as Airbnb, BlaBlaCar, or Uber acquire prominence in the ShE world, instead of smaller platforms or P2P systems. Because of the above, the transformative impact—in terms of a more rational form of consumption through the harnessing of underused goods such as cars or spare rooms—can become “neoliberalism on steroids” (Morozov 2013), increasing the concentration of wealth and diluting the power “of the people,” thus going against the first adduced agenda of sharing economy (Murillo et al. 2017). Although sharing economy includes non-for-profit transactions-based platforms, amongst them time sharing and food swaps, it is the transformative impact of for-profit platforms that receives the most attention due to their capacity to replace conventional economic activities through the use of technology.

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The proponents of sharing economy claim that technology-driven changes will improve the efficiency of economy through increased autonomy and flexibility, in what is bound to become a “zero marginal cost society” (Rifkin 2014); instead, its opponents believe that “selling slivers of one’s life” can lead to a commoditization of daily life, weakening social ties and solidarity (Schor 2017). Furthermore, in relation to the for-profit sharing economy, and regarding the debate on whether renting or providing services can be considered “sharing,” one of the key issues to the Mediterranean region is the possibility that such initiatives might favor policies which prioritize business and undermine labor. In this sense, instead of empowering citizens, sharing economy as an umbrella term shifts the risk towards workers, as such platforms enable anyone to act as independent contractors, ridding them of the responsibility for their employees. In the words of the political economist Robert Reich, it would be a “share the scraps” economy (Institute for Public Affairs 2015). This becomes of paramount importance in the Mediterranean region, due to its high unemployment rates, mainly among the young, which makes this territory particularly vulnerable to situations of job insecurity giving rise to a new social class: the “precariat.” The EU defines as young a person below the age of 25. As of December 2020, Greece had a young unemployment rate of 30.4%, whilst Spain reached 37.1%, Italy 29.4%, Portugal 28.3%, and France 19.1%. By contrast, the average for EU-27 was 17.1%. Slovenia in turn had a lower unemployment rate of 12.1% amongst its young population (OECD 2021). Other young unemployment rates worth considering are those of Chile (22.2%), Finland (16.5%), Iceland (14.8%), Canada (13.6%), Austria (11%), United States (9.3%), Germany (7.5%), and Japan (4.5%). Furthermore, the undermining of labor rights, especially amongst young workers, alongside with the avalanche of online platforms which enable the exchange of goods and services, raises questions concerning aspects such as the role of sharing economy in inclusion and equality. Although no specific study has so far dealt with the impact of sharing economy on wealth distribution in the Mediterranean region or with the profile of those who take part in that “new economy,” the results drawn from other existing studies regarding the U.S. can be extrapolated to the Mediterranean when it comes to the possible pervasive effects caused by “neoliberalism on steroids”. A study authored by Schor (2016) shows the providers of services in sharing platforms in the United States as usually being highly educated and having other sources of income. These providers engage in activities traditionally restricted to “blue collar” workers. Resembling the patterns identified in Mediterranean economies, the 2008 financial crisis and the ensuing depression played an essential role in the expansion of sharing economy throughout the US. It is believed that the high unemployment and high private debt levels, along with the bad economic prospects, amongst other aspects, favored the fast adoption of such technology by young people, who assumed the role of influencers regarding this technological change. After all, this population group had been hit hard by recession (unemployment for under-25s rose to 19.1% in 2009 in the U.S., and even though the effects of recession

3.4 ShE Seen as Controversial: Exploiting Vulnerabilities or Creating. . .

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were worse amongst high-school graduates, college graduates also had to face a 9.9% unemployment rate in the country). Schor (2016) supports the idea of precariat in his study, as participants were highly likely to lack full-time employment and to be considered independent contractors (self-employed). At the same time, the percentage of those in alternative work arrangements within the US economy rose from 10.1% in 2005 to 15.8% in 2015. According to Ravenelle (2016), online platforms such as Uber and TaskRabbit accounted for 0.5% of US employment in 2015. To update this information, we should consider that in 2015, under Barack Obama’s administration, the Labor Department interpreted that mostly workers in platforms like Uber and Lyft should classify as workers, since they are integral to the company. However, under Donald Trump’s administration, the interpretation was that if the company does not pay for professional certification, licensing or worker’s expense products, they are private contractors. Joe Biden’s administration has not provided any definition in this respect yet. The impact caused by these platforms is a growing trend towards inequality and the shifts within the middle class/working class, not only because the owners of such platforms and their investors are gaining value from users on both sides (Schneier and Rashid 2014) but also because of the increased inequality amongst the bottom 80%, as they displace workers with a low education status when highly educated providers use such platforms to increase their earnings, in what is known as the “crowding-out” effect (Schor 2016). In the Mediterranean region, the conditions which served as a catalyst for the quick adoption of alternative exchange forms became more exacerbated than in the US. In Spain, independent contractors account for 16.1% of the workforce; in Greece, they represent 31.9% of the workforce, amounting to 22.5% in Italy, 16.7% in Portugal, 12.6% in Slovenia, and 12.4% in France. By contrast, the percentage went below 10% in countries such as Denmark, Germany, or Sweden, whilst the mean in the European Union is 15.2% (Eurostat 2021). Regarding inequality, according to the OECD Report on Inequality (2017), an ever-increasing divide exists between rich and poor people in Southern economies, their income inequality levels being higher than those found in other OECD economies. Tourism is another field that has proved vulnerable to the effects of sharing economy in the Mediterranean region, insofar as it stands out as one of the main pillars of these economies. As the most popular platforms rely on the sharing of houses/cars/local services, the already existing firms are facing more and more competition. By way of example, in France, the national railway operator (SNCF) offers a low-cost train service to compete with BlaBlaCar. Although sharing economy can help ease the peaks of tourism services, when traditional accommodation is likely to become saturated; nonetheless, it can push up the prices of long-term rents displacing traditional neighbors or altering the landscape of a specific region (European Parliament 2017). Faced with this debate about the rise of a new economy which rationalizes consumption as opposed to neoliberalism in its most predatory form, the regulatory framework can both catalyze sharing economy and counteract its pervasive effects.

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Because sharing economy challenges regulation on a daily basis and new answers are required, a “return” is taking place to ward a model of trust built within the reputation inside communities, hence the emphasis on the social network. The relevance of social standing amongst peers, emulated by technological advancement, has special implications for the Mediterranean region, as according to Edelman Trust Index (2021), a four dimensional index with scale from 0—lower trust to 100— higher trust—measuring trust in government, media, NGOs and companies, Spain has an overall trust index of 45 points , being ranked fourth among the 27 where people overall distrust more. In Spain the government ranked low: 34 points whilst companies had the higher perceived level of trust: 52 points. Global averages for government and companies trust index are 34% and 52% respectively, whilst Germany has a company trust index of 60, whilst the UK has a trust index of 36 and the US of 33. Culture arises as another relevant theme when it comes to sharing: two car-sharing platforms (Emov and Car2Go) in Madrid reported that users kept rental vehicles inside their homes, despite the existence of rules according to which cars must be left parked in public areas so that other users can access them (as mentioned in the local newspaper El País in 2017). Another significant reference is provided by the entrepreneurship level across the Mediterranean region: Slovenia occupies the 25th position in this ranking, whereas Spain ranks 31th, lower positions corresponding to Italy (36th), Greece (50th), and Croatia (54th) (Global Entrepreneurship Index 2020). At the other end, countries such Switzerland ranks 2nd, Canada occupies the 3rd position, with Denmark (4th), Finland (10th), and Germany (15th) also at the top part of this ranking. Therefore, it becomes evident that, under the current situation, individuals living in the Mediterranean region do not find themselves in an advantageous position when it comes to resources, attitudes (risk taking) and infrastructures when compared to their peers (the Netherlands and Finland rank 11th and 12th, respectively). This translates into low levels of entrepreneurial action throughout these territories and can make it more difficult to embrace the dynamism that characterize the economy of sharing and collaborative platforms. As for the structure of? Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), they represented 99.83% of the total number of Spain’s companies and 72% of its employment in 2019. In Italy, they account for 99.91% of all companies and 78.5% of employment. In Croatia, they reach 99.7% of the total of companies and 68.7% of employment, the percentages for Slovenia being 99.81% and 72.92%, respectively (Ipyme 2020: Statista 2021). The fragmentation of the industry can generate threats as well as opportunities for the region: within a logic of blockchain and real P2P, the structure micro, medium and small enterprises are bound to thrive, since their knowledge about entrepreneurship and industry will not be strongly affected in the model developed by Etkowitz (2002). In a concentrated data-owned world, MSMEs lose their market share to large corporations, reducing the participation of MSMEs in the economy, thus causing social erosion due their role in supporting the economy activity in such countries.

3.5 The Role of Politics: Regulatory and Legal Approach to the ShE

3.5

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The Role of Politics: Regulatory and Legal Approach to the ShE

The reduction of transaction costs, as explained above, is the catalyst of sharing and collaborative economy. This has special implications for the Mediterranean region, precisely characterized by its high transaction costs: Italy occupies the 46th position in the Doing Business ranking and the 108th as far as enforcing contracts is concerned; Croatia ranking 51st and 23rd, respectively. Slovenia reaches the 37th general position the and 122nd in terms of enforcing contracts, whereas Spain is ranked 28th in general, and 26th specifically in relation to enforcing contracts (World Bank 2020). Coase’s seminal paper ‘The Nature of the Firm’ (Coase 1937) explained industrial structures through transaction costs. When it comes to sharing and collaborative economy, these costs emerge as a crucial element in its large-scale development. Yet, the sort of business that depends on reducing transaction costs is not new at all: business lawyers, real estate brokers, and art dealers are examples of them. Nonetheless, systematic differences exist between transaction costs associated with information and the enforcement costs of the “market economy” as well as those involved in sharing or collaborative economy: markets use a combination of price, managerial reporting, and command flows to assess such transaction costs; instead, sharing or collaborative economy resorts to social cues which are not formal. The difference consequently lies in the fact that markets rely to a greater extent on formal enforcement, as opposed to sharing and collaborative economy’s higher dependence on informal enforcement. For the Mediterranean region, the informal or alternative forms of enforcement can provide an alternative to the weak enforcing position regarding business/entrepreneurship. However, the current situation shows that sharing and collaborative economy—especially through giant platforms such as Airbnb and Uber—has brought with it legal concerns on issues like fair competition, labor rights, privacy, and consumer rights, amongst others. Nevertheless, we can distinguish between consumer-to-consumer and businessto-consumer sharing economy companies. In the former, partners’ collaboration should take place on an equal footing, as the providers and users are connected through the intermediation of an independent company. AirbnB, Uber, and Couchsurfing work with such intermediation platforms. Because Mediterranean countries’ growth is relying to a significant extent on the direct, indirect, and induced impact of tourism—which accounted for 13.1% of Italy’s GDP in 2019 and is expected to reach 11.9% in 2027 (WTTC 2021: WTTC 2017), for 14.1% of Croatia’s GDP in 2019, forecasted to reach 15% in 2027 (WTTC 2021; WTTC 2020), for 24.3% of Croatia’s GDP, expected to reach 31.5% in 2027 (WTTC 2021: WTTC 2017), and for 10.6% of Slovenia’s GDP in 2019, forecasted to reach 14.5% in 2027 (WTTC 2021: WTTC 2017)—the disruptive potential of sharing and collaborative platforms in this industry becomes overwhelming; hence the proliferation of regulations regarding rental and ridesharing.

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Consonant this, the utilization of technological platforms has transformed the tourism industry from the emergence of the Internet, bringing about changes in relation to traveling options, reducing the asymmetry of information through booking platforms, fee quotations, and other travel services. P2P platforms have gained prominence alongside the traditional “B2C” travel platforms during the past decade: online marketplaces allow not only for a short-term occupation of idle assets but also for the short-term usage of assets when they are destined for permanent occupation (Gutiérrez et al. 2017). Even though the advertising of such services focuses on an idealized image of sharing or collaborative economy, placing the emphasis on the relationship between guest and host, the business model of these companies (and of their current competition) revolves around generating profit, their risk being reduced to the provision of an online structure and marketing, since—unlike travel operators or owners—brokers have no responsibility to abide by regulations such as safety standards and registrations. In this sense, owners do not usually factor their costs and risks proper (ly), and quoted prices are below the ones that would exist should this be shaped by economic factors, thus creating an “urban precariat” (Brauckmann 2017). Airbnb launched in 2014 a predictive algorithm able to provide hosts with a recommended price, depending on factors like space, rating, and geographical location, amongst others. Uber introduced in 2012 a dynamic pricing algorithm that considers waiting times. These (two) platforms are examples of two-sided markets (Hagiu and Wright 2015), as opposed to eBay, which can be considered a multiple-sided market. Although the potential owned by sharing and collaborative economy can overcome formal transaction costs in the Mediterranean region, the disruptive impact of such platforms on the local economies has generated strong incentives to regulate. The utopians believed that the sharing and collaborative economy would empower citizens, make the economy go green, and strengthen communities. Instead, these platforms’ trend to “grow and dominate” (Google, Facebook, Amazon) presents a scenario where sharing and collaborative economy becomes “business as usual” as the most plausible one (Schor 2014). Spain has introduced regulatory constraints to the operations of rental and ridesharing companies—Uber appealed to the European Court of Justice after its Uber X services were banned in the country, and municipalities have enacted laws demanding the registration of rental properties and/or limited rentals such Madrid that enacted a law that restricts temporary rental according to zones. In turn, Italy also banned Uber in April 2017, and to this day only allows for licensed drivers to operate in the country. Regarding Airbnb, Italy passed Decree 50/2017—known as Airbnb Tax—which governs short-term rentals (not exceeding 30 days) and obliges intermediaries to withhold taxes. In Slovenia, the current regulation does not permit the operations of Uber X. Regulations are harsh concerning Airbnb too: besides registration, owners must have at least the approval of 75% of property owners in a given building to be able to list their property in Airbnb. Croatia tried to limit Uber’s operations in the country which was rejected by the Misdemeanor Court in Zagreb in

3.6 Why Privacy Matters

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September 2017. As for Airbnb, owners must be registered as small businesses business and obtain the corresponding licenses to rent. One of the key issues throughout the Mediterranean region is the strong presence of a “shadow” economy. According to Medina and Schneider (2018), shadow economies become established in heavily regulated, weakly administered countries. In Italy, 19.8% of its GDP can be attributed to the shadow economy, the percentage being 17.2% for Spain, 28.4% for Croatia, and 23.1% for Slovenia. By contrast, Germany’s shadow economy accounts for 13% of its GDP, this percentage going down to 9.9% in France (Medina and Schneider 2018). Spain has led the Mediterranean region with the creation of the CNMC in 2013: this entity presented strong arguments to remove unjustified government regulation on digital platforms, arguing that the government’s intervention is only justified when the market fails, and also that IT can reduce market inefficiencies which made regulation necessary in the past—as the lack of information forced the development of protective regulation in sectors such as transport and housing, for instance—; instead, reputation and geolocation can provide consumers with better information (CNMC 2015). Although the potential of such technology to reduce market asymmetries is recognized in Spain, due to the tradition in the “shadow” economy and various interest groups the country approved in December 2017 a Royal Decree which increased the obligation of digital platforms to inform the Tax Authority about details of the transactions carried out between the parties involved. With respect to the legal regulation of digital platforms, the ECJ’s ruling corresponding to Case C-434/15 Asociación Profesional Elite Taxi v Uber Systems Spain SL established that “The electronic platform Uber provides, by means of a smartphone application, a paid service that consists in connecting non-professional drivers using their own vehicle with persons who wish to make urban journeys,” which implies that it is “inherently linked to a transport service and, accordingly, must be classified as a 'service in the field of transport' within the meaning of EU law.”

3.6

Why Privacy Matters

When individuals interact with one another through the Internet, the content of their communication is not the only information exchanged. People also send data about their own communicational process that allows their message to reach its destination. This is the classical definition of metadata: “the data about the data.” This information comprises the premises where the connection was established, when it took place, through which server, and to whom it was addressed, amongst other aspects. However, with a big database, people leave a registration of their profile and their behavior on the internet, thus expanding the definition/concept of metadata. Today, people are permanently sending metadata, even during their sleep, since smartphones can track their location and update the system continuously.

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As data have great value in our fluid society and data-mining has become the business model of virtually every technological corporation, more and more traditional businesses are quickly adhering to it. There is an anecdote about the Visa Card company, according to which the latter can anticipate divorce one year prior by analyzing its clients’ shopping profile (Schneier 2016). The above-mentioned examples show the importance of metadata access as a competitive advantage of/for firms: when companies know the shopping pattern of a customer, when they know where their customers are and when they access, companies are able to anticipate not only the demand but also the price their customers are willing to pay, which in turn allows them to target their advertising. Even more importantly, the data shared by people on social media—with the technological progress experience during the last decade—as well as the metadata can be analyzed, extracted, and combined to reveal everything about any given individual (Bossler 2015). Regarding ShE, due to the digital nature of the current phenomena, users are required to provide personal data—and to make their metadata available—if they want to access these platforms. Participating in the ShE requires exchanging massive amounts of data, which inevitable raises issues linked both to privacy and to the ownership and control of information. Today’s public debate on the impact of sharing economy and the need to regulate it shows opposed views. Its supporters argue that sharing economy can be a new useful framework to mold human interactions and rationalize the contemporary economic model, giving a boost to development and empowering citizens via the availability of greater opportunities; instead, its detractors describe sharing economy as a “neoliberalism on steroids” (Murillo et al. 2017) that pushes new boundaries in the free market, fragments the existing relationships, and undermines social and labor rights, ultimately leaving people under the threat of changing algorithms. One of the differences between P2P and B2P structures is that the latter stage an exchange between strangers, which raises the issue of incomplete information and, consequently, increases the risk involved in future transactions. Within a conventional market, brand reputation (B2P) or licenses, in the case of a professional, effectively lessen such risks. In the P2P economy, this role would be played by the crowdsourcing of information from users through ratings/data about reputation. This information reduces asymmetry and increases the willingness of individuals to take part in the exchange (Schor 2016). Focusing digital reliance on reputation becomes a key issue in the present-day economic scenario; and it permeates B2P relationships too. Amazon, where most transactions depend (up)on users’ ratings, is a clear example thereof. Even Yelp can disrupt brick-and-mortar business (Sundarajan 2016). These differences between P2P and B2P bring up legal issues such as the level of accountability of sellers/providers in these platforms and the responsibility of the latter as far as user/consumer/employee rights are concerned. Since these platforms enable individuals who are not commercial providers to offer their services/goods, problems may arise in relation to the skills and the license of a BlaBlaCar driver or

3.7 The Use of Personal Data in ShE; Legal Protection at Present: The Internet. . .

35

the safety standards of a specific lodging announced on Airbnb, to quote but two examples. Regarding problems associated with privacy and ownership, personal data and metadata can create user profiles: what they do; what they eat; where they are; what their medical history is like; and likewise, what their political views are. For this reason, when all this information is crossed to a larger database—data-mining and the data market are permanently expanding—corporations acquire the ability to predict behavior and anticipate choices, ultimately influencing what is sold. In a virtual world, this means that freedom can be reduced, both by corporations which limit users’ options when they send their information towards certain user profiles, and by governments which know everything about those users and can place them within “terrorist” or “criminal” profiles; after all, the whole process has a clearly arbitrary nature. In other words, if you have a relationship with someone who is being searched, even if you are unaware of it, you will automatically become a suspect too. More specifically concerning ShE, as platforms do not disclose their metrics— because they constitute their competitive advantage—evaluating their real impact becomes a difficult task. A study authored by Hall and Krueger (2015) about Uber’s economic impact even raised controversy, since these scholars could not determine whether the outcomes were positive or negative. In parallel, Uber and Airbnb publish their own reports about their positive influence on communities. As explained by Malhotra and Val Alstyne (2014), the “utopian” narratives about sharing economy were quickly replaced by legal disputes.

3.7

The Use of Personal Data in ShE; Legal Protection at Present: The Internet as a New Political Space

Personal Data are already subject to some sort of protection through legal systems worldwide when they potentially or actually harm people or companies. One of them is the Google Search Index, which provides negative information about someone when they use its algorithm to determine the relevance of a search or a personal video released on YouTube that violates someone’s intimacy and exposes their most ridiculous moments. Note that Civil Liability is a basic principle of judicial systems at a global level. Notwithstanding, liability arises when some damage exists that requires assessment. As for the generation of metadata about billions of people everywhere, it falls into a blurred category, considering that corporations and governments are free to analyze (all) the information gathered through the Internet. In 2006, the European Court of Justice) established a guideline for the interpretation regarding personal data by invalidating EU’s Data Collection Directive, on the ground that massive/ metadata generation interferes with the right to privacy, and the access to such information cannot be justified by vaguely reappealing to risks like

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serious crimes or terrorism: governments’ access to those data must depend on a previous evaluation by a Court or an independent Administrative Body/Board, States’ interventions likely to affect the freedom of European citizens being thus limited pursuant to Constitutional Law. As for corporation’s behavior, the European Court of Human Rights has steadily decided in favor of privacy, laying down the “right to be forgotten” in relation to the Google Search Mechanism. Following along the lines of the European Court, German, Dutch, and French Courts have prioritized privacy and personal data protection, with rulings against the collection and storage of data by private corporations such as Facebook. Although the emphasis on transactions driven by the speed of information in a globalized world might suggest the idea of a universal demand for this new Magna Carta, analyzing the surveys and decisions made by Courts of Justice in different countries provides evidence that people do not always show the same levels of concern everywhere when it comes to data access.

References Alcatel-Lucentum (2014) Alcatel-Lucent sets new world record broadband speed of 10 Gbps for transmission of data over traditional copper telephone lines. Press Releases. http://www.alcatellucent.com/press/2014/alcatel-lucent-sets-new-world-record-broadband-speed-10-gbps-trans mission-data-over-traditional. Accessed 18 May 2018. Azuma R (1997) A survey of augmented reality, Presence Teleop Virt, 6 (4), 355–385. http://www. cs.unc.edu/~azuma/ARpresence.pdf. Accessed 20 May 2018. Bas E (2015) The liquid self: Exploring the Ubiquitous nature of the future internet and its pervasive consequences on social life. In: Winter J, Ono R (eds) The future internet: Alternative visions, Public administration and information technology book series, vol 17. Springer, Cham, pp 193–215 Bas E, Guillo M (2015) Participatory foresight for social innovation. FLUX-3D method (forward looking user experience): a tool for evaluating innovations. Technol Forecast Soc Chang 101: 275–290 Bauman Z (2007) Liquid times: Living in an age of uncertainty. Polity Press, Cambridge Bell D (1973) The coming of post-industrial society: A venture in social forecasting. Basic Books, New York Bossler A (2015) Metadata analytics, law, and the future of the internet. Pub Admin Inform Technol:141–154. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-22994-2_9 Bossler A, De Andrade D, Pereira P (2014) A emergencia da China no pos-crise financiera de 2008: o consenso de Beijing, desde a microfísica do poder. Revista Relacioes Internacionaes Seguredad (online) 9:21–47 Botsman R (2015) Defining sharing economy: what is collaborative consumption—and what isn’t. Fast Company, p 27 Brauckmann S (2017) City tourism and the sharing economy – potential effects of online peer-topeer marketplaces on urban property markets. J Tour Fut 3(2):114–126. https://doi.org/10.1108/ jtf-05-2017-0027 Brimelow P (1997) The silent boom. Forbes. https://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~charvey/Teaching/ Independent_Studies_2000/Solano/homeec.htm. Accessed 3 June 2018 Castells M (1996) The information age: economy, society and culture. The rise of the network society, vol 1. Blackwell, Oxford

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Kaun A, Stiernstedt F (2014) Facebook time: technological and institutional affordances for media memories. New Media Soc 16(7):1154–1168. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444814544001 Krugman P (1999) What happened to Asia. Global Competition and Integration:315–327. https:// doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-5109-6_14 Lenzer R (2013). 40% of the largest U.S. companies founded by immigrants or their children. Forbes. http://www.forbes.com/sites/robertlenzner/2013/04/25/40-largest-u-s-companiesfounded-by-immigrants-or-their-children/. Accessed 28 July 2018 Malhotra A, van Alstyne M (2014) The dark side of the sharing economy . . . and how to lighten it. Commun ACM 57(11):24–27. https://doi.org/10.1145/2668893 Mann A (2013) Google’s chief Internet evangelist on creating the interplanetary Internet! Wired. http://www.wired.com/2013/05/vint-cerf-interplanetary-internet/. Accessed 9 July 2018 McKinsey (2015) Growth within: a circular economy vision for a competitive Europe. https://www. mckinsey.com/business-functions/sustainability/our-insights/growth-within-a-circular-econ omy-visionfor-a-competitive-europe McLure D (2013) Startupfest 2013 – How to beat the Series A crunch. Why Internet marketing Matters (a lot). Available via International Start-up Festival. http://www.slideshare.net/ startupfest/how-to-beat-the-series-a-crunch-why-internet-marketing-matters-a-lot-davemcclure . Accessed 17 July 2018 Medina L, Schneider F (2018, January) Shadow economies around the world: what did we learn over the last 20 years? International Monetary Fund Morozov E (2013) To save everything. The folly of technological solutionism. PublicAffairs, Click Here Murillo D, Buckland H, Val E (2017) When the sharing economy becomes neoliberalism on steroids unravelling the controversies. Technol Forecast Soc Change 125:66–76. https://doi. org/10.1016/j.techfore.2017.05.024 Nielsen (2014, May) Is sharing the new buying? Reputation and trust are emerging as new currencies. https://www.nielsen.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2019/04/global-share-commu nity-report-may-2014.pdf Ocampo JA (2008) El auge económico latinoamericano. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago) 28 (1). https://doi.org/10.4067/s0718-090x2008000100002 OECD (2021) Unemployment data. https://data.oecd.org/unemp/youth-unemployment-rate.htm. Accessed 4 August 2021 Phys.org (2009) Bell Labs breaks optical transmission record, 100 Petabit per second kilometer barrier. http://phys.org/news/2009-09-bell-labs-optical-transmission-petabit.html. Accessed 23 Mar 2018 Pinto B, Gurvich E, Ulatov S (2005) Lessons from the Russian crisis of 1998 and recovery. Man Econ Volat Crises:406, 438. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511510755.012 Rainie L , Anderson J (2008) The future of the internet III. Pew Research Center. http://www. pewinternet.org/2008/12/14/the-future-of-the-internet-iii/. Accessed 28 Mar 2018 Ravenelle AJ (2016) Sharing economy workers: selling, not sharing. Manuscript submitted for publication Reynolds P (2002) GEM-global entrepreneurship monitor executive report, Babson, London Business School and The Kauffmann Foundation. http://www.gemconsortium.org/report. Accessed 19 June 2018 Rifkin J (2014, July 3) The rise of the sharing economy. Los Angeles Times, Op-Ed. https://www. latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-rifkin-airbnb-20140406-story.html Sabatini F, Sarracino F (2014) Will Facebook save or destroy social capital? An empirical investigation into the effect of online interactions on trust and networks. GESIS-working papers 2014|30 GESIS.Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften, Köln Schneier B (2016) Data and goliath: the hidden battles to collect your data and control your world (Reprint ed.). W. W. Norton & Company Schneier B, Rashid F (2014, April 9) News: surveillance is the business model of the internet: Bruce Schneier – Schneier on security. Schneier on security. Retrieved May 17, 2021, from https:// www.schneier.com/news/archives/2014/04/surveillance_is_the.html

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Schor J (2014, October) Debating the sharing economy. Great Transition Initiative. Retrieved July 12, 2021, from https://greattransition.org/publication/debating-the-sharing-economy Schor J (2016) Debating the sharing economy. J Self Gov Manag Econ 4(3):7–22 Schor JB (2017) Does sharing economy increase inequality within the eighty percent? findings from a qualitative study of platform providers. Camb J Reg Econ Soc 10(2):263–279 Statista (2021, July 6) Number of people employed by SMEs in Slovenia 2008–2021. https://www. statista.com/statistics/936839/employment-by-smes-in-slovenia/ Strahilevitz LJ (2005) A social networks theory of privacy. The University of Chicago Law Review, Chicago, pp 919–988 Sundarajan A (2016) Sharing economy: the end of employment and the rise of crowd-based capitalism. MIT Press, Cambridge The Economist (2014) A Cambrian moment. http://www.economist.com/news/special-report/21 593580-cheap-and-ubiquitous-building-blocks-digital-products-and-services-have-caused. Accessed 14 Mar 2018 Van Welsum D (2016) Sharing is caring? Not quite: some observations about ‘The Sharing Economy.’ World Bank. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/23648 Webb J (2014) How many start-ups are there? Get2Growth. http://get2growth.com/how-manystartups/. Accessed 30 Mar 2018 Wellman B, Haase AQ, Witte J, Hampton K (2001) Does the internet increase, decrease, or supplement social capital? social networks, participation, and community commitment. Am Behav Sci 45(3):436–455 World Bank (2020) Doing business: 2020 https://doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-1440-2 WTTC (2017) Economic impact. https://wttc.org/Research/Economic-Impact. Accessed 26 June 2021 WTTC (2020) Travel & tourism economic impact | world travel & tourism council (WTTC). Retrieved June 26, 2021, from https://wttc.org/Research/Economic-Impact WTTC (2021) Economic impact. https://wttc.org/Research/Economic-Impact. Accessed 26 June 2021 Zervas G et al (2014) The rise of sharing economy: estimating the impact of (the) Airbnb on the Hotel Industry. Boston School of Management Research Paper Series 2013, 2016. http:// citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi¼10.1.1.644.7793&rep¼rep1&type¼pdf. Accessed 17 Mar 2018 Zwilling M (2013) A new era for entrepreneurs and startups has begun. Forbes. http://www.forbes. com/sites/martinzwilling/2013/12/25/a-new-era-for-entrepreneurs-and-startups-has-begun/. Accessed 23 Mar 2021

Chapter 4

Futures Mindmap

4.1

The Art of Conjecture

As Immanuel Wallerstein, founding father of the World Systems Theory, stated in his book Utopistics, or the historical options for the twentieth century: “I guess that, when systems work normally, determinism prevails on both individual and collective free will. However, in times of crisis and transition, the free will factor becomes key. The world of 2050 will be what we make of it.” Therefore, ignoring the complexity of the times that one lives in, while feeling wrongly safe in the comfort zone provided by determinism (and quantitative trend extrapolation) can prove highly ineffective as well as dangerous when trying to develop forward—looking activities. The father of French Foresight (“La Prospective”) Bertrand de Jouvenel, a Club of Rome member and a political philosopher who—together with Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen—is also considered one of the earliest proponents of what is currently known as Ecological Economy, published in 1967 a book entitled “L’art de la conjecture”—regarded as a seminal work in the field of Foresight. Its relevance lies in the implicit vindication—at that time revolutionary—of using a qualitative approach, subjective probability, and creative thinking to study the future and to identify alternatives. That is the main difference between Foresight (or Prospective in French) and Forecasting: while Forecasting is purely extrapolative, Foresight is speculative by nature. Foresight provides a wide range of possible futures using a heterodox set of methods which not only take account of the most probable scenario but also of a disruptive scenario and even a preferred one. This approach to the future is open to subjective judgement and qualitative data and, instead of reducing uncertainty within the narrow limits of the error range adopted in mathematical modeling, it assumes randomness as an essential part of the prediction game. Both wild cards (unexpected contingent events) and weak signals (seeds of change still not consolidated but

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_4

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potentially very influential) are integrated, alongside trends (already identified, consolidated transformation processes) into the prospects. Therefore, Foresight entails a change of mentality in relation to Forecasting: the aim does not consist in ascertaining what the future WILL be like (which seems impossible within such an ever-changing, complex global context) but to ask ourselves what the future MIGHT be like, integrating into the analysis not only the probable but also uncertainty and the potential actions of all the actors involved. This has nothing to do with blindly following certain scientific procedures, but rather with obtaining a broad range of useful information (regardless of its source) to make the right decisions, so that we can ultimately reach the preferred future. The above shows what Foresight is all about: proactivity, anticipation, horizon scanning, and exploratory analysis; a more creative and innovative way to address prediction; a method to become a leading actor—and no longer a beholder—while addressing the future. Furthermore, Foresight has proven useful to deal with complexity in decision-making, mainly when thinking on a long term basis. This is why both governments and companies around the world have been progressively incorporating Foresight as a strategic management tool during the last two decades.

4.2

Key Drivers Considered for ShE_2030

The Horizon Scanning process that seeks to identify drivers likely to affect the Shared & Collaborative Economy on the 2030 Horizon—framed within the openDOORS project (Designing a network of cooperative creative communities to develop a sharing economy) and supplied together with the preliminary futures research work performed/undertaken by FUTURLAB (Bas 1999, 2012, 2015; Bas and Guillo 2012, 2015; Bossler 2015; Bossler et al. 2014; Reinhardt et al. 2008; Reinhardt et al. 2011; European Commission 2017a, 2017b)—can be somehow summarized here. These drivers were clustered into three categories: trends, weak signal and wild cards. Trends arise as strong processes inducing change in a consolidated manner, and rooted on a long-term dynamics which, being already identified and defined, consequently becomes predictable. In turn, Weak Signals are seeds of plausible change that may become consolidated or not as influential trends, based on recent observation and evidence. Their being already identified but still fuzzy makes them slightly predictable, and even embryonic. Finally, Wild Cards can be described as unexpected events able to provoke radical tipping points, grounded on conjectures about the possible—and potentially influential enough to be taken into account—and unpredictable, albeit foreseeable. The goal was to identify five drivers within each category for every subsystem/ dimension of social life, taking as a reference six basic subsystems that shape the social system, namely: economy; culture; politics; ecosystem; security; and technology (Table 4.1):

4.2 Key Drivers Considered for ShE_2030

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Table 4.1 Basic drivers for ShE (sharing and collaborative economy) Economy

Culture

Politics

Ecosystem

Security

Technology

Trends Glocalization Digitalization Sustainability/Circularity Short-run Contracts Shared ownership Ecological awareness Healthy lifestyles Relativism Online Education Open Access Bubblization/Radicalization Fake news/ public opinion Crisis in formal institutions Crisis of leadership Participatory Democracy Climate change Overpopulation Aging in Developed countries Sustainability as a priority Genetic engineering Digital Dependence Digital Surveillance Unstructured institutions End of the welfare state Polarization/Radical Inequality Big Data and Analytics Hyperconnectivity Ubiquity Exponential capacity Exponential velocity

Weak Signals Flexible Business Models Intangible Economy Prosumers Digital currency Precariat

Wild Cards Financial Crisis Stock Market Collapse Exponential income Universal Basic Income Tax on Resource Use

DIY into the mainstream Experience over ownership Education on demand Bottom-Up Innovation SMEs dominating the business culture City (Polis) vs State End of representativeness Direct Democracy Alternative formulas Split governance

Generalization of Anomy End of formal education Liquid identity Virtual reality preeminence Collaborative IoT Reversal of globalization Rise of Populism End of Democracy Technocracy Government-owned platforms

New forms of migration Alternative energies Alternative agriculture Back to primary exchange Hyper-productive goods

Ecological collapse Pandemics Alternative ecosystems (Mars. . .) Singularity: end of death Universalization of 3D printing Dark Web bigger than the Internet Digital networks collapse Robots making final decisions Radical rejection of digitalism International digital monopoly Quantum Computing Cyborgs Algorithm-determined life Virtual Life environments Robotics domination

Anti-system global movement Cyberwar Legal framework questioned Blockchains as contracts Concentration of venture capital

Internet of Things Biotechnology Artificial Intelligence Decentralized networks Universal access

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4.3

4 Futures Mindmap

Dialectics of Change/1: How Social Subsystems Are Impacting on ShE

As argued above in the introductory pages, the future of the ShE cannot be approached without fully understanding the current social context (regarding economy, politics, culture, security, environment and technology)—the Zeitgeist. As a multidimensional phenomenon which not only has an economic nature but also affects—and is affected—by the social system as a whole, it seems convenient to explore the dialectic process that may eventually lead to transformative changes. Where does the Shared & Collaborative Economy come from? We will try to summarize it below (Table 4.2): As a typical product of its time, the ShE can be seen as resulting from the convergence of different processes and their mutual interactions. Let us delve deeper into the different social subsystems involved: Economy Contrary to what might have been expected, the 2008 global crisis failed to induce a radical change in the dominant model. Nothing was questioned or rethought from the inside. Quite the opposite, the cumulative/speculative/extractive nature of the capitalist financial system stays alive and kicking. The consequence: a radical increase of economic polarization at a global level due to capital concentration. Approximately 1% of the population owns 50% of global wealth, and the eight richest individuals have as much wealth as the poorest 50% of the world population. In other words, the dream of/a more egalitarian drive (sustained for a long time on the previous successful experience of the welfare state) has eventually turned into a nightmare because the system is simply unable to provide formal redistribution mechanisms. The lack of formal opportunities within the system to escape from Table 4.2 How social subsystems are impacting on the ShE (shared and collaborative economy) Economy

Culture

Politics

Ecosystem

Security

Technology

DEMANDING a new model to replace speculative capitalism based on extractive procedures, basically since the 2008 crisis, and fueled by the exponential growth of inequality globallyl. INFLUENCING through an explicit demand of alternative options structured around shared and collective participation, and the emergence of new niches to form digital platform-based ad-hoc communities. REGULATING in order to protect public interest, giving priority to new initiatives in social innovation that originate from the bottom instead of letting large companies take control of the new economy. ADVISING/SUGGESTING a radical change and a reformulation of the way in which economy interacts with people and nature, requesting a less extractive and a fairer and more redistributive economic model. PROTECTING prosumers from the asymmetry of information that characterizes the “new economy “and against the pervasive effect of digital platforms on social life in terms of anomy and/or disinformation ENABLING the creation and development of shared collaborative platforms through the use of digital resources that facilitate a bottom-up dynamics while blurring or diminishing physical barriers.

4.3 Dialectics of Change/1: How Social Subsystems Are Impacting on ShE

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poverty or merely improving one’s own economic situation is creating a breeding ground for new business/economic concepts and formulas. Sharing & Collaborative model could therefore appear as a kind of alternative supported on creativity and communal experience where all citizens would have the chance to become prosumers. Culture A generational change is taking place, not only from the point of view of Ecology but also, and essentially, from the perspective of its cultural implications: the evolution of Millennials—the first digital natives—into key transformative agents. Faced with the lack of opportunities emerging from the formal economy, self-employment and entrepreneurship are becoming an increasingly valid option for this generation. Moreover, as the first generation over decades expected to achieve a lower level of incomes than their parents, looking for alternatives to traditional employment—and accordingly embracing a different perception about economic transactions—is now/already a quintessential part of millennials’ personality. To which must be added that the failure of protective mechanisms implemented from the public sphere (mainly budgets related to unemployment and retirement) is forcing these individuals left aside of the established job market to pursue inventive solutions in order to survive. This problem becomes especially serious amongst aged people, an ever-growing segment in an overpopulated and aging society like ours. Therefore, culturally speaking, the formal resistance to share and to collaborate (a dogma socially assumed for ages in a society that relied on idolizing individual success and private property) is disappearing, and more and more people choose to seek new formulas. Politics We are currently going through a challenging time when it comes to politics: the traditional parties can no longer provide the answers (and/or the right questions) that citizens expect from them. Representative democracy—a tradition in western developed countries—is falling into decline as institutional instability grows. Participatory democracy has emerged, with people demanding a more direct participation in the management of public issues, driven by the preeminence and ubiquity of social networks, in which immediate interaction is a must. Thus, States find themselves at a crossroads, trying to strike a balance between the empathy towards these new more participatory and collaborative formulas and their traditional protective role based on respecting the regulatory framework. A duality consequently arises in relation to politics and regulation: on the one hand, the system is giving room to the ShE because of its obvious positive impact on the dynamization of the economy as a whole and, more specifically, on self-employment; and, on the other hand, there is a strong resistance to change inherent to the normative nature of the political subsystem, for which these new formulas imply a challenge. Ecosystem The current economic model is widely believed to be unsustainable, so some changes being compellingly needed to guarantee its resilience. When it comes to the ecosystem, the challenges not only have to do with the environment (natural resource exploitation, global warmth. . .) but also with demography; and, obviously, with a combination of both. Therefore, a widespread concern exists about the need to

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look for an alternative economic model, a more sustainable one both in terms of respecting nature and in relation to guaranteeing the minimum standard living conditions for human beings. The ShE seems to provide a new way for humans to interact with the natural environment by rethinking how we live, produce, and consume. In this context, such ecological awareness—completely established as mainstream, four decades after the Club of Rome’s report “The Limits of Growth”—appears as a good breeding ground for economic initiatives and business models based on sustainability, since more and more people are becoming receptive to reusing and sharing/showing a willingness to reuse and share (on a regular basis). Security Asymmetry in information is perhaps the biggest security-related challenge to deal with in a prosumers’ world. The ying/yang logic lies behind it: the flexibility required to simultaneously assume different roles in the economic world implies a potential bigger vulnerability due to the competitive nature of the market. ShE’s Achilles heel nowadays is probably the extent to which prosumers are exposed to an exchange logic where information does not necessarily have a symmetric nature. The promise made by these new formulas relies on individual reputation, mutual confidence, and a sufficiently solid and fair regulatory framework to ensure the viability of such a new model. Thus, any proposal concerning ShE should strive to prevent anomy, disinformation, and misinformation in order to avoid the perverse effects inherent to any model grounded on sharing and openness. Technology Social networks and applications laid the foundations to build new business models based on a collaborative logic, and digital platforms have definitively and thoroughly transformed the parameters within which economic activities used to take place. Most of today’s successful collaborative business models— including the popular Airbnb or Uber—depend on combining the solidness provided by the digital platform (which intermediates between the parties and channels both the supply and the demand with hardly any restrictions, offering a sort of regular contract) with the advantages brought by a digital social network (which makes it possible to know other users’ experiences and even to interact with them in real time). Therefore, the mediation of technology may even not be absolutely necessary to develop proposals like these; digital transformation is arguably fueling ShE by facilitating the design, management and spread of any such business models.

4.4

Dialectics of Change/2: How ShE Is Impacting on Social Subsystems

As explained above, ShE is nothing but a product of its time. Nevertheless, its operation in a living social ecosystem that influences and affects its own development, is inevitably transforming it. Let us see how the social subsystems of reference may be affected (Table 4.3):

4.4 Dialectics of Change/2: How ShE Is Impacting on Social Subsystems

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Table 4.3 How ShE (shared and collaborative economy) is impacting on social subsystems Economy

Culture

Politics

Ecosystem

Security

Technology

EMPOWERING netizens through the possibility of becoming entrepreneurs of their own life, under a transaction-based economy, focused on a human-centered business model. OPENING THE DOOR to a radical change in lifestyles. The possibility to replace ownership, compulsory consumerism, and accumulation by a culture based on DIY, sharing, and co-creation. CHANGING the way in which citizens approach the management of social issues that affect public interest, increasing the ability to influence public policies by introducing a more participatory and collective scheme. RAISING AWARENESS about the need to develop a more resilient economic model based on sustainability and respect for the ecosystem (including human beings) and the potential benefits that would derive from it. CHALLENGING the current legal framework, which has proved unable to give the proper responses so that a balance can be reached between the liquid economy and the solidness required to protect public interest. INCREASING THE FEEDBACK between economy and technology, making individuals and organizations more dependent on digital devices and means.

Economy ShE allows for the empowerment of citizens by providing them with a network-based way—with or without digital means—to manage their individual resources (time, budget, labor force, technical or intellectual abilities, creative skills, personal initiative. . .) according to their own agenda and preferences. This may radically transform the traditional way to understand business and job creation, together with other side aspects such as the balance between working and leisure time, the formal structure of a company, labor interactions, or retirement. More precisely concerning business models, ShE is bound to significantly alter the traditional concepts of time and space, leading to on-demand and distant-work schemes, alongside a more human-centered perception about economic activity. Even in the marketing and advertising industry, the focus is not on the product anymore, but on the user. And the core issue in the business, which is irreversibly moving from the tangible to the intangible, no longer has to do with selling something but with providing a satisfactory experience that users are willing to pay for. Culture Although digital nomads still represent a small percentage of the working force at present, this way to approach work and self-employment will most probably end up being highly relevant in the near future. Co-working spaces are becoming more than an anecdote or a cool singularity in the urban environment, reaching high performance levels in cities all over the world: those hubs are often the embryonic settlement where the most innovative business activities first took place. Ownership does not constitute a priority anymore; the obsession with material property has shifted towards an interest in enjoying temporary experiences. And more importantly, a different system of values is—at least in an embryonic, not yet widespread, way—progressively replacing the traditional capitalist values (with) in large population segments, mostly young generations—the so-called digital natives or Millennials.

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Politics Social Media, mostly articulated around the use of digital platforms, have dramatically changed the way in which public opinion is created—for the better or for the worse. The downsides of this phenomenon would be the lack of quality control (a consequence of everybody being a potential prosumer as far as information is concerned), the reductionism inherent to the “like culture” which dangerously obviates the complexity of social issues, and the demonstrated use of bots for the massive production and dissemination of fake news with the aim of influencing public opinion and driving it according to the interests of specific stakeholders. The upside could be that individuals now have the chance to become easily involved (by simply giving an opinion or supporting others’ initiatives) and to cause an immediate impact on social change and politics. This is a revolutionary development, since it puts/places representative democracy at a crossroads: if the natural environment (the Internet and social networks) where the new generations have grown up has an eminently participatory nature, direct participation in the design— and evaluation—of public policies might shortly become a legitimate aspiration of citizens that formal political institutions (rigid by nature) will not be able to obviate/ ignore. In other words, because of its participatory nature, sharing and collaborative Economy could induce—or at least influence/favor—a structural political change. Ecosystem The network-based Information Society has undoubtedly made it possible for citizens to access hitherto unknown information—different from the “official” one—regarding environmental issues. Furthermore, when it comes specifically to sharing and Collaborative Economy, it is worth bearing in mind that many of the initiatives undertaken within this new approach to the production and commercialization of goods are mostly based on a shared desire to reach/attain/ensure resilience—making any business model viable/feasible—by respecting/taking care of the environment (including human beings). In this sense, the Shared and collaborative Economy helps raise awareness about the need both to protect/preserve the ecosystem and to promote an ecological concern within corporations—mainly SMEs but also larger-sized ones through corporate responsibility departments—through the proposal of a new model—an innovative operational framework—which is less interested in extractive and speculative strategies centered on short-term profit and more conscious, respectful, and committed to long-term thinking. Security As implicitly suggested above, ShE currently entails a real challenge that the formal institutions which have traditionally shaped the social system find it hard to deal with. They suddenly have to play a new complex game: trying to survive within a pre-existing framework articulated around old-fashioned rules; hence the shock: liquid initiatives flexible by nature operating within a rigid framework. Several key security issues have now entered the public agenda too: for instance, how to protect privacy or how to assure the development of such a new model within the limits of a system of rules able to guarantee fair play for everybody. This would probably stand out as the main impact that the liquid economy as a whole—and sharing and collaborative Economy in particular—is producing on the security subsystem.

4.5 Cross-Impact Matrix

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Technology From the wheel to the internet, and IoT or AI, technology has always been a key driver in the social system, affecting not only politics or culture but also, and mainly, the economy, as Kondratieff cycles show. The Horizon Scanning exploratory exercise made it clear that the development of digital media (the Internet and others) is going to having a multiple and, at the same time, decisive impact on the shaping of the future society. Since technological development has been—and continues to be—exponential during the last five decades, it is strongly influencing the evolution of capitalist economy, by—also exponentially—increasing the feedback between those two social subsystems. ShE is fueling all these dynamics, demanding technological solutions to shape and improve the new economic model.

4.5

Cross-Impact Matrix

Below can be found a holistic—albeit brief—reading of the processes already identified (Table 4.4): Economy The capitalist financial system based on ownership, accumulation, speculation, and debt, collapsed in 2008. It was a tipping point which—despite later deriving into a shared & collaborative model—initially installed the “low cost” culture within the broadest group of consumers (middle class) in western developed countries. The crisis had an especially relevant structural impact on Europe, where the Welfare State had guaranteed social protection (health, unemployment, retirement) and equal opportunities (education) for almost 6 decades, and also changed the mindset of a large part of its population. Then, a new philosophy associated with the need to maintain the living standards favored the rise of the circular economy— supported on recycling and reusing—which has been gradually assumed by citizens. The effect of the economic collapse on security basically relates to precariat and the loss of acquired rights, which may eventually lead to the impoverishment of large population segments—this would in turn be a potential source of social and political instability as well. Even the circular economy, structured around free and participatory processes, is not necessarily linked to electronic devices, P2P platforms play a determining role and have come to stay. Culture Networking—as a way to interact and live—is absolutely determining Economy, since many—if not all—business models that have been recently driving world economy rely on digital platforms and networks. This network-based culture, which has definitely become a lifestyle, is liquid by nature: concepts, organizations, and interactions are characterized by their flexibility and convergence. Networks can basically be described as bottom-up systems—more horizontal than hierarchical— whose prominence in social life is affecting the political culture: the traditional representative logic now moves towards a more participatory one, which means a huge challenge for formal institutions. The creation of active communities around informal networks increases collective awareness towards ecological issues (mainly because a community is an ecosystem in itself). However, insofar as a majority of

Cause/effect Economy Culture Politics Ecosystem Security Technology

Economy 2008 Crisis Networks Neoliberalism Sustainability Metadata Big data

Culture Low-cost Liquid Loss of hope New lifestyles Laxity “Like” culture

Politics Welfare (state) crisis Participatory Restraint Responsibility Transparency Fake news

Table 4.4 Cross impact matrix about ShE (sharing and collaborative economy) in 2030 Ecosystem Circular Awareness Glocalization Resilience Challenge Connectivity

Security Precariat Vulnerability Instability New model Analysis Threat

Technology P2P Interfaces Control Catalyze Facilitator Feedback

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4.5 Cross-Impact Matrix

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their members are always using electronic platforms and devices, those communities become vulnerable to disinformation and/or surveillance. Technology is providing more and more “real” interfaces in order to satisfy the demand for better platforms that permit to interact by removing the gap existing between “true” reality and the ecosystem provided by the digital world—based on a virtual reproduction. Politics Neoliberalism is becoming dominant while the new economy explicitly or implicitly rejects—or pretends to avoid—interventionism. Paradoxically enough, the alternative to the financial capitalist system somehow seems to be nothing but a vindication of laissez-faire, closer to Adam Smith than to the Keynesian political approach. This could be the “dark side” of the ShE if no solid regulatory framework exists than can guarantee equal opportunities. The loss of hope in formal politics is leading to a complex scenario when it comes to establishing a consensus-based regulatory framework. Thus, there is a kind of restraint in formal politics due to the lack of majority support. The crisis of formal political structures—traditionally underpinned by the State as a reference—is leading to a simultaneously centrifugal (supranational structures) and centripetal (local authority, symbolized in cities) concentration of power which could be referred to as “glocalization” (global/local, bypassing the intermediate reference that used to be the State). This logic adds a plus of complexity and instability which results in an uncertain environment that the authorities try to counterbalance by means of technology-assisted surveillance (either direct—cameras—or indirect—big data—). Ecosystem Global warming and the potential danger of an ecological collapse is conditioning Economy by boosting a new model committed to sustainability. Since the release of the Club of Rome’s report on the 1970s (“Limits of Growth”), which was a bestseller and somehow marked the beginning of the green movement, protecting the ecosystem has progressively become a major concern during the last five decades. Nowadays we can say that ecologically friendly behavior is finally mainstream—as part of the collectively assumed lifestyle. This global concern is obviously influencing politics, which has to be environmentally friendly too— regardless of ideology—assuming its responsibility by including ecology in the political agenda. Resilience is the goal: guaranteeing the long-term survival of the planet, and of the human race too. For this reason, environmental instability has become a priority as far as Security is concerned, since ecological collapse poses a real risk that must be dealt with. The need for a more effective and responsible way to interact with the ecosystem requires technology-assisted control mechanisms (e.g. using drones or smart self-regulated systems for agriculture in the USA) so that efficiency can be reached. Security Metadata—the data about the data: the analytical/interpretative use of the information generated by individuals while they operate with digital devices (e.g. making a call, sending an email, or searching for information on the Net)— are perhaps the biggest issue regarding the protection of privacy and civil rights. However, metadata also arise as a powerful tool to develop new businesses and transforming Economy. Therefore, the massive use of all this information can prove

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useful for surveillance as well as marketing purposes: in both cases, it has the potential to provide a wide picture of social/group behavior and—at the same time—of individual behaviors, when necessary. Interestingly, social networks are transmitting a fake sensation of security that leads into laxity: people are not afraid to unrestrictedly show their opinions and preferences on social media. This is challenging, a threat: this laxity makes it possible for individuals to be a victim of themselves: what you did (or showed) in the past may condition your present and ultimately determine your future. Regarding metadata and surveillance, there is an increasing demand of transparency: citizens request information from the government about how the generated data are used either by companies or by the government itself. The need to cope with emerging threats (terrorism, hacking. . .) serves as the excuse to support the use of technological devices for surveillance. Anyway, this is nothing new: by way of example, the Internet itself was financed by the U.S. government in its origins. Technology The impact of digital platforms allows for a business-oriented harnessing of the accumulated information: the world of big data is transforming economy, and the coming blockchain might help complete this task. The “like” culture—based on total feedback: everybody interacting and expressing their opinions all the time about everything—makes it possible to map people’s preferences, interests, fears, and expectations in real time: from cookies to blockchain, technology is providing tools to track everybody’s trail. Likewise, public opinion can be easily shaped due to the above-mentioned feedback and the bubble generated by it: since most users access information exclusively via digital platforms, and the latter can be programmed using algorithms to automatically select and supply information at convenience, the vision that a vast majority of individuals have about reality is confined to a narrow, easy-to-manipulate window. Hence the great success of fake news; why they work so well. Another interesting issue worth commenting on is the merging of digital technology with biology and AI that points at the future possibility of developing smart digital devices embedded in organic tissues, within a sort of natural interaction between machines and human beings that would represent a huge step forward in terms of hyperconnectivity. Albeit promising, this may also sound scary, from a security perspective: where lies the right level of development to prevent technology from becoming a threat to humans? Technological convergence might reach a Cambrian point, the start of a new era, based on automatic and continuous feedback between machines, where human intervention would probably become unnecessary.

References Bas E (1999) Prospectiva; herramientas para la gestión estratégica del cambio. Ariel, Barcelona Bas E (2012) Creative futures the role of youth in a brand-new world, to be young! Paper presented at Futures Conference 2012, Finland Futures Research Center, Turku, 5–8 June 2012

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Bas E (2015) The liquid self: exploring the Ubiquitous nature of the future internet and its pervasive consequences on social life. In: Winter J, Ono R (eds) The future internet: alternative visions, Public administration and information technology book series, vol 17. Springer, Cham, pp 193–215 Bas E, Guillo M (eds) (2012) Prospectiva e Innovación Vols. 1 (Visiones), 2 (Experiencias) y 3 (Propuestas). Plaza y Valdés Editores, México D.F Bas E, Guillo M (2015) Participatory foresight for social innovation. FLUX-3D method (forward looking user experience): a tool for evaluating innovations. Technol Forecast Soc Chang 101: 275–290 Bossler A (2015) Metadata analytics, law, and the future of the internet. Pub Admin Inform Technol:141–154. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-22994-2_9 Bossler A, De Andrade D, Pereira P (2014) A emergencia da China no pos-crise financiera de 2008: o consenso de Beijing, desde a microfísica do poder. Revista Relacioes Internacionaes Seguredad (online) 9:21–47 European Commission (2017a) Strategic foresight in EU research and innovation policy; wider use, more impact. DG RTD-Research and Innovation, Brussels European Commission (2017b) Report of the expert group SFRI-strategic foresight for research and innovation policy in Horizon 2020; background papers. DG RTD-Research and Innovation, Brussels Reinhardt U, Roos GT, Stiftung für Zukunftsfragen, British American Tobacco Company (2008) Future expectations for Europe. Primus Reinhardt U, Bas E, Barroso JM (eds) (2011) United dreams of Europe. GOETZ, CH. Verlag

Chapter 5

Scenarios for 2030

A number of key transforming actors and factors deemed as relevant have been explicitly or implicitly mentioned so far in this work. For sure, many do not appear described or considered in their own right (according to their potential influence) and some others may have been completely overlooked, but this is only a humble and limited attempt to deal with uncertainty and to approach complexity for the only purpose of reflecting on what comes next or, rather, what could come next, as a merely intellectual exercise. As usual when dealing with very complex, ever-changing contexts, the range of possible futures is multiple—if not infinite—since a slight mutation (a delay or a branching) in the further development of a driver’s observed variations may lead to completely different scenarios. Therefore, it seems convenient to think in terms of combinatorial analysis, exclusively paying attention to the driver (actor/factor) under study. And if unexpected contingent events occur—as it often happens both in nature and in society—then the multiplicity of possible futures turns out to be boundless. Therefore, a clustering effort becomes essential when thinking about future scenarios. Only by reducing the range will we be able to highlight manageable options for action; the effort would prove sterile otherwise. Expressed differently, building futures scenarios—which are neither more nor less than coherent conjectures—always poses a challenge in which objective information meets subjective perceptions and values, and the required extrapolative analysis invariably merges with a creative and critical approach. Three main scenarios—extrapolative; disruptive; and utopian—have been considered and narratively exposed for ShE in the medium term (2030), in accordance with the preliminary description and analysis carried out by the authors as well as their subjective perception.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_5

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5.1

5 Scenarios for 2030

Scenario #1: Extrapolative—Balancing Neoliberalism; ShE as a (New) Third Way

The instability experienced by the global financial system during the 1990s placed western democracies at a crossroads. The dilemma for most western democratic countries was how to guarantee the maintenance of public services and goods regarded as basic for social stability without the state going bankrupt. The financial problem—rooted in economic dynamics—posed an important challenge in the political agenda: how to reach/strike a balance between the unsustainable leftist protectionism (based on the old socialist aspiration about the State playing a key role in social life, despite being ineffective) and the unfair right-wing “laissez-faire” (or wild neoliberalism supported on free will and the absence—or laxity—of regulatory frameworks). Or, more simply stated, how to keep the welfare state—or its egalitarian balance—within the global capitalism that resulted from the collapse of the communist bloc. During the late twentieth and the early twenty-first century, the solution came from Bill Clinton’s “New Democrats” in the USA, and from Tony Blair’s “New Labour” in the UK, through a new concept sealed as a global referent: “the third way” (understood as something in between the State and the market). A kind of social democracy, or to put it in a different way, fair capitalism. This formula remained valid until the worldwide crisis broke out (even Barack Obama’s “yeswe-can” slogan is somehow connected with this third way). However, the third way lost much of its traditional support over the following decade after the 2008 crisis, due to the discontent with the political elite (in general), as well as to the anger derived from the massive loss of jobs and the speculation carried out from the financial world. The consequent loss of faith, both in the market and in the State, led to re-create the dangerous post-crisis political scenario experienced in the 1930s through a “new” populist narrative: “the people” versus “the system” (which includes both public administration and business companies). The failure of the financial system in 2008 boosted the search for a new approach to Economy during the following decades, and some synergies took place: not only the socioeconomic context favored a more horizontal and bottom-up model; there was also a general claim amongst citizens for fair, sustainable, and collaborative initiatives. Additionally, the development of technology—together with the easier access to it—made possible an exponential growth of social networks based on the extensive use of digital means (platforms and devices). This emerging “digital culture” laid the foundations for new business proposals focused on transactions rather than on production, more oriented towards the intangible (the experience) than towards the product itself: business models born small and local, but with no limits whatsoever and a truly global vocation. Since the 1990s, when the Internet became mainstream worldwide, and access improved to a huge extent (both quantitatively and qualitatively)—above all, thanks to the extensive use of smart devices—social networks spread until becoming quintessential in the construction of public opinion regarding both politics

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(information, disinformation/fake news. . .) and business (marketing, advertising. . .). By way of example, the number of users on Facebook amounted to ca. 2.2 billion in 2018 (almost one third of the world population at the time). Therefore, social capital progressively became the main asset for any government or business organization operating within the framework of the capitalist global system. A manifest conflict of interests arose around 2020 between States—including their citizens—and the big companies that ran digital platforms. This conflict once again stemmed from the clash between free market and public interest. Two main reasons can help explain it: on the one hand, because of the assumption that social networks would mean—in the medium/long term—an improvement for democratic participation both in politics and in business, governments implicitly supported their development during a long period. On the other hand, the inherent rigidity (or solid nature) that characterized the bureaucratic procedures traditionally implemented by public institutions left States exposed to a new “liquid” reality where social change had become faster and more complex than ever before; this rigidity led to a kind of reactive—never proactive—behavior when it came to regulating (fixing limits, imposing taxes. . .) all the innovative activities that shaped the new Economy. This inertia in the development of social media—during an initial stage—and collaborative platforms—a bit later—without any restrictions whatsoever from the State, drew a scenario where a few large companies operating in the digital business owned users’ data and were reluctant to accept the preexisting market and legal rules, including the payment of taxes to any government. The reasons argued by these enterprises basically referred to the intangible logic of P2P, where they simply acted as volunteer facilitators in a sharing process that—according to their own perception—could hardly be considered a conventional business to which regulations or taxes apply. Soon, the lack of regulation produced a power vacuum that led to unfair situations both in the political sphere (proliferation of fake news, massive cyberattacks affecting regional and global stability, manipulation of public opinion. . .) and in the economy (unauthorized sale of databases with users’ information, unauthorized spamming, intrusive actions like the utilization of bots. . .). After several scandals, including suspicious attempts to interfere with democratic processes or to alter some market logics, many governments and supranational public institutions reacted trying to protect public interest and democracy. Faced with the risk of being supplanted by companies, States decided to counterattack using their power: the legislative ability to regulate market and social life. In 2030, after more than 10 years of conflicts between public administration— originally reluctant to deregulate existing economic sectors and activities of public interest, and/or to leave new emerging ones unregulated—and the digital platforms that provided support and infrastructure to collaborative business models and communities, a balanced situation has been reached. During the two decades following the crisis, public administration in most Western democracies has been able to strike a deal with those big companies (the owners of digital means) as well as to find a way to tax their activities and to enforce public ownership of users’ data in order to

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guarantee both the survival of the public sector and the role played by the State in the building of democratic societies. In Europe, ShE has developed with a low degree of dependence on Silicon Valley’s major companies, and within the regulatory framework of the welfare state (guaranteeing free market alongside social protection). Four stages define the process followed by the public sector (national governments and the European Commission) in the Old Continent when it comes to the attitude towards social media and digital platforms: the “fearless” initial period (2005–2012) of explicit acceptance, widespread unconditional support, and active involvement in social networks at an institutional level—even the European Commission is active on Facebook—; the “wait-and-see” second period (2012–2017) of implicit tolerance during the expansion of digital platforms and their transformation into key actors of the new Economy, where public institutions remained basically inactive and unwilling to intervene or even to regulate; the “conflict” third period (2017–2020), in which the clash of interests between the private companies that ran digital platforms and the government(s) (public sector) became evident, mainly regarding privacy, data ownership and management, financial issues (taxes), and political problems (fake news); and the “regulatory” fourth period (2020–2025), during which States asked companies for more transparency in terms of digital data management, and demanded that they fix their legal infringements—potential ones or those already committed by action or omission. This fourth regulatory period includes reaching specific agreements, either nationally or at a European level, to ensure safety and privacy in users’ data management. Social stability stands out as a priority for Europe (which was basically created as an institution to prevent another war in future), and a full regulatory framework has been finally developed: the digital Economy cannot be stopped and is bound to have a very positive effect; however, public intervention is needed in order to preserve social stability and welfare, sometimes even requesting private companies to share the ownership of digital users’ data with the State in cases of public interest/when public interest is at stake. Therefore, after this long and winding road towards the assimilation of the digital Economy, Europe has succeeded in reaching a kind of balance between market and public interest in 2030 through a regulatory framework that gives room to undertake sharing and collaborative initiatives while simultaneously guaranteeing the legal protection of citizens against unfair monopolistic games. In this context, it is possible to move away from a top-down digital economy (promoted by hi-tech companies and lobbies operating worldwide) to develop bottom-up initiatives coming from civil society, based on mutual trust and rooted on regional or local networks. Being a heterogeneous land of regions, Europe has a long tradition in transnational network building. Ever since the Roman Empire, the continuous mutual exchange of knowledge and goods has shaped European idiosyncrasy as a melting pot where different cultures have been able to coexist for centuries. During the Middle Ages, two main networks dominated Europe: the Hanseatic League (North and Central Europe); and the Italian Route (connecting Southern Europe with North Africa and the Middle East), After 800 years during which nation-states prevailed in

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global commerce as well as in terms of political and cultural influence, the twentyfirst century opens a new scenario where cities and urban aggregations are back as main actors of the global system. In 2030, self-organized interregional communities (like the OpenDoors network) supported on networks built for collective knowledge creation and exchange have turned into the backbone of social life throughout the European territory. This informal infrastructure formed by international communities of smart cities and regions where civil society acts as the pivotal stakeholder coexists with the formal infrastructure represented by the European Union (and national governments). The high transferability and scalability potential regarding best practice solutions amongst EU member states for the Mediterranean region is harnessed within a suitable institutional framework (which not only reduces uncertainty and protects consumers but also provides legal guidance and harmonization), a sharing economy regional cluster becoming accordingly operational within the Mediterranean area. Despite the high concentration in the digital market (platform providers and data managers) initially observed during the first and second stages described above (2005–2017), 2018 witnessed the appearance of new collaborative platforms which are creating a new digital trust ecosystem that goes beyond the initial focus on imitation to adopt a more creative approach. This has only been possible thanks to the effort made in the European Union to design and implement tailored policy frameworks suited to regulate the new sharing Economy sectors and, at the same time, to provide an institutional environment that is flexible and open enough to favor new sharing initiatives in the medium and long term. Sharing or collaborative Economy has definitively acquired the status of a strategic, key issue for Europe’s future that needs an adaptive and flexible long-term vision—but also sufficiently solid as to protect public interest and guarantee stability—on the part of public institutions. The Mediterranean region has managed to achieve these equilibria between private and public interests earlier than other parts of Europe, thus providing local economies with a competitive advantage. This has its roots in the pioneering Spanish moves to regulate both sharing economy and privacy rights: the courts of Spain settled the “right to be forgotten” and empowered its citizens as owners of their information for the very first time, in addition to which they banned Uber Pop. Both decisions were subsequently reaffirmed by the European Court of Justice, thus laying the foundations for a public legal framework regarding sharing economy and data ownership issues. The similar rulings made by Italian, Slovenian, and Croatian courts furthered a convergent regulation. Likewise, the Mediterranean region has become an innovation hub due to its central role in attracting talent from MENA (Middle East and North Africa) countries as well as from Latin America. If Italy was the fourth European country by investment in 2016 and Spain ranked second by investment in sharing economy and third by the number of accelerated start-ups (European Accelerator Report 2016), these legal advancements in the simultaneous protection of public and private interests brought an influx of capital and new/innovative ideas. Smart legislation along the same lines, such as the possibility for anyone to incorporate personal

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ratings, allowed users to change platforms easily, which weakened the trend towards monopoly, as companies lose value when users do not concentrate in a single platform.

5.2

Scenario #2: Disruptive—Hyper-capitalism: Neoliberalism on Steroids, or the Collaborative Paradigm as a Trojan Horse

In 2018, 10 years after the worst global economic crisis since 1929, ShE arose as a promising alternative to the wild speculative neoliberal model that, around 2008, had led the financial system to chaos and provoked serious damages to the social fabric in every single country of the western hemisphere: soaring employment rates, companies going bust, cuts in social protection, polarization, poverty, misery. . . Europe was perhaps even more strongly hit by this crisis because it seriously compromised the welfare state—the backbone which keeps Europe stable. The situation was even more painful and dramatic in the Southern European countries bathed by the Mediterranean where capitalism (the Protestant ethics and its understanding of both private and communal life) has always clashed with the local ancient culture. Only 12 years later, in 2030, the promise has become disappointment despite the social demand of a less-extractive and less-speculative model; and the expected evolution from the traditional top-down logic to a more bottom-up approach has ended up being only a mirage. In 2030, the hyper-technologization of society can hardly be denied, and social life is now completely digitalized: each and every human experience (from education to leisure, from emotional life to professional activity. . .) somehow or other takes place through technological means (devices and platforms) which also govern the socialization process and any sort of human interaction. Life revolves 360 degrees and 24/7 around technology. This pervasiveness derives from merging the different drivers that shape the future Internet (total access, ubiquity. . .) alongside the synergies with other technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Biotechnology, and Virtual Reality. Digital dependence (and surveillance) is widespread and strongly felt by individuals and organizations alike: since every human interaction occurs via digital platforms or devices, it can be systematically tracked and monitored. This explains why the data digitally generated by users—whether they are big data or metadata— become essential in Economy and Politics, or concerning Security: the large-scale exploitation of users’ data which turns them into “reputational assets” (social capital) implies a significant reduction of opportunity costs that can help organizations improve their effectiveness. As a result, Economy relies on a model characterized by the extensive and systematic use of data as main commodities: a model focused on transactions (rather than on production) and short-run contracts, the commoditization of everything,

5.2 Scenario #2: Disruptive—Hyper-capitalism: Neoliberalism on Steroids, or. . .

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increased intangibility, and monopolistic concentration (as illustrated, for example, by Google or Facebook buying every emerging platform, device or app seen as relevant). The empowerment of netizens and the rise of entrepreneurship as well as the boom of the start-up culture during the past two decades does not seem to have sufficed for the change of paradigm that was expected by 2030: although the Collaborative approach assumed that technology was going to be a key element to facilitate P2P interactions and to help individuals emancipate from companies (becoming relevant and free players/stakeholders in any economic transaction), just the opposite has eventually happened. The convergence of an increasingly global dependence onto monopolistic technological companies (mainly coming from Silicon Valley) that finance and run the infrastructure which underpins the new Economy, together with the generalized loss of confidence in representative democracy and traditional politics (apparently unable to properly face the arising challenges), places the State—and accordingly the public institutions that shape it at present—at a crossroads. Paradoxically, or not, both extremes—once again have focused against the State and its traditional regulatory role in social life since the emergence of the antisystem movement (Wikileaks, populist parties, etc.), whose criticism of the State as the enemy of the people runs the risk of losing “digital sovereignty” and, therefore, of leaving big/large private corporations as the only alternative to provide twenty-first-century infrastructures. The growing relevance of the immaterial assets owned by large companies such as Google-Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon, or Alibaba, which in itself proves the importance that the data digitally generated by users have in the new Economy, situated them in the epicenter of the then emerging ShE around 2020, although their business model somewhat differed from the collaborative one in the beginning— mainly because this new economic paradigm is basically data-driven. These corporations are the owners of the data systematically generated through their different tentacles: Google Maps, Google Earth, Gmail, Instagram, or WhatsApp, to quote but a few. They also own the existing technological infrastructure, the financial resources needed to buy emerging competitors; and, of course, they have the ownership or control of all the digitally generated data, in addition to the ability to share/exchange/sell them with other companies on a profit basis. And with States too. Because no efforts were made by States to enforce a strong non-commodity regime concerning the public ownership of data (and the associated infrastructure), their control is in the hands of large corporations which continue to operate in a theoretically free market, working on a fair play, competitive basis. However, this system de facto works as a monopolistic game managed by a few players. This is the situation in western/democratic countries in 2030. Only in Russia, China, and a few more countries where the State—explicitly or implicitly—took control of digital infrastructures, has data ownership been kept away from private companies and stayed in the State’s hands. The transfer of data ownership from the State to private companies means the dissolution of the public sector into the private sector. Such a change has enormous political implications: the State—as a formal representation of public institutions—

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traditionally based its power as main actor on the collection and management of public data: from the census to taxes or the army. Statistics (the data generated by the State)—a fundamental element to build the regulatory frameworks needed to articulate social life—have traditionally been in the hands of the State, whose power relies on these data. The situation has radically changed now, as most of the relevant data concerning citizens are owned (generated and managed) by private companies. The private ownership of data and infrastructures in the digital Economy, together with the liquid regulatory context—because of the State’s inaction—induced by the collaborative narrative (widely accepted and supported by citizens), facilitates the monopolistic concentration of wealth and power, in a pure “laissez-faire,” neoliberal way. Exactly the opposite of what had been expected. To this must be added the dismantling of the welfare state: if the State can tax neither these companies nor prosumers, due to the legitimization of the collaborative formula, then it will not have a budget to cover the expenses related to pensions, education, unemployment benefits, healthcare. . . The destruction of the welfare state much more strongly affects Southern European countries—paradoxically those which demand and are more dependent on public support, albeit simultaneously reluctant to pay taxes— which become poorer and more unequal in terms of wealth distribution than the ones located in Northern Europe. This double paradox reveals the weaknesses and contradictions that are present in the narratives of the ShE as a sort of utopian vision destined to definitively transform the world for good, by enhancing democracy and empowering citizens. This collaborative utopia supported on the widespread use of social networks which was meant to transform neoliberal capitalism into a more egalitarian and bottom-up paradigm, actually turned out to be nothing but a Trojan horse, since it facilitated the concentration of (political as well as economic) power in a few hands: those of the organizations able to produce, manage, and own data. Inequality and social polarization levels are far higher in 2030 than 20 years ago. The “new economy” basically represents a neoliberal capitalism with few or no regulations coming from the State, which plays a testimonial role in most countries, even becoming totally irrelevant, since it is de facto dominated by large firms which deliver basic services like education or health, traditionally provided by the public sector. In many cases, individuals are no longer citizens of a country, but employees—or users—of a company, this being the current key reference to build anyone’s social identity. Compared with the expectations, this would look dystopian. The erosion of the State caused a stronger impact on Southern European countries, where coercive structures and institutions are needed to keep communal life safe and stable in the long term, and in which the regulatory and protective system provided by the State (or by a solid public sector) consequently becomes more necessary. The lack of proactive public policies leaves the initiative and the control of digital infrastructures in the hands of the private companies that own the data generated by users. Due to the difficulties—and the resistance—to impose taxes on these economic activities theoretically based on a P2P philosophy (but only possible thanks to the mediation of digital platforms owned by private companies), along with the traditional tendency to favor shadow economy in the Mediterranean area,

5.3 Scenario #3: Utopian—Post-capitalism, or Sharing and Collaborative. . .

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the State loses a substantial capacity not only to develop public policies (health, education. . .) but also to guarantee fair play in job hiring or the implementation of economic activities, as well as to protect vulnerable groups, including elderly people, youngsters, women, or immigrants. Therefore, a double paradox becomes evident regarding ShE in the Mediterranean Area: on the one hand, although this new paradigm was meant to provide an alternative to wild/neoliberal capitalism and wealth inequality, it reinforces both of them by facilitating monopolistic concentration through a lack of regulation coming from the public sphere and a new conception of user data ownership, which belongs to private companies. On the other hand, this new paradigm was supposedly going to be an alternative for Southern European/Mediterranean countries because of the flexibility that characterized their societies; however, the absence of a regulatory framework together with the concentration of very few actors eventually led to economic chaos and poverty. The Mediterranean region—characterized by an omnipresent shadow economy— faced increased unemployment rates amongst young population segments, a financial crisis, and the need to keep consumption standards at what came to be known as a “low-cost lifestyle” or the “culture of crisis.” All of this, paired with growing levels of entrepreneurship, led to the fast adoption of such technologies, without a proper debate about their potential impact or their pervasiveness. The private sector concentrated around Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises could not compete with the large corporations that owned all the data. Citizens paying twice when using online platforms (in order to connect them with prospective buyers or sellers that acquired their personal data and metadata), the multiplier effect of networks when they reach more users alongside the pervasive economic structure, resulted in the State’s erosion. In turn, migratory pressures offset the aging demographics, making this region more prone to having a legion of “precariat members” and “digitally illiterate people,” thus widening the gap between those who own data and know how to use them and the bottom 80%—who cannot.

5.3

Scenario #3: Utopian—Post-capitalism, or Sharing and Collaborative Economy as the Poster Child of the Fourth Industrial Revolution

After the 2008 crisis, the demand of a “new Economy” that we could briefly describe as a more sustainable and human-centric approach, has become generalized. A better use of resources and assets now constitutes a priority, massive consumerism and consumption patterns being on the ropes. Lifestyles seem to evolve from this compulsive consumerism to a more selective and environmentally friendly one based on ecological awareness. Furthermore, ownership no longer appears amongst the priorities of young generations, who prefer to accumulate experience instead of goods. A kind of “fair individualism,” less selfish and obsessed with greed and more

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focused on proactiveness, and additionally oriented towards collaborative initiatives, prevails as a sharing philosophy. “Access over ownership” has become the new mantra for a whole generation. A significant cultural shift is taking place within this socio-economic context: being an entrepreneur or participating in the development of a start-up has become cool and accessible to everybody (that is the cornerstone of the start-up movement) and, therefore, the general feeling is one of business democratization; the rise of the prosumer culture, where everybody may simultaneously be a consumer and a producer. Technology (from digital platforms to 3D printers) allows for the development of P2P marketplaces, DIY and ad-hoc production. Here is the original promise of sharing economy: a better utilization of resources, boosting efficiency and building social capital as well. Concomitantly with this cultural paradigm shift, a radical change is taking place at a technological level during the first quarter of the twenty-first century. This Fourth Industrial Revolution changes the way in which people work and interact with one another, introducing a whole range of opportunities for social transformation. Significant breakthroughs have been achieved during this period in fields such as Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Internet of Things, Geolocation, Augmented reality, Robotics, Energy production, Blockchain. . . that further embed technology 360 degrees and 24/7 in the everyday life of individuals and organizations. The synergy of economic, cultural, and technological shifts (together with their permanent mutual feedback) has created the right conditions to develop a new concept—the digital Economy—that differs radically from any other previous formula because of its virtual, intangible, and liquid nature. The Internet of Things lies at the core of this digitalization process, connecting everything and everyone. IoT involves deploying a network of tentacles (or sensors) that systematically collect data and provide deep, detailed insights about users, products, and platforms, as well as information that can be analyzed (by means of data analytics and artificial intelligence algorithms) to make better decisions, together with a smarter system designed to improve resource management efficiency. The synergy of IoT with AI brings together and processes vast amounts of information that make it possible to generate models and highlight relevant issues— which might eventually mean a competitive advantage—without the need for a large investment in time and resources. These technological synergies, based on a large-scale, systematic production of information about any interaction with the aim of improving effectiveness, radically transform the Economy and the way in which businesses are created and run (including tangential—albeit essential—aspects like job creation), starting by key niches such as construction or transport. It will not be long before the impact is perceived in those sectors: for example, while cars used to be largely owned and parked 95% of the time, the autonomous vehicles working around 2030 are no longer owned but shared between different owners: these intelligent cars keep moving around cities to pick up and drop off passengers, significantly increasing

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their utilization while reducing their number (as well as the pollution that they cause) with the additional help of electric mobile energy. Simply changing how we use cars has meant a radical transformation of important aspects, amongst them the way in which urban environments are conceived, how people live and interact, the formation of new communities, or the use of time. These kinds of initiatives require a long-term, solid partnership between the public sector (mainly local authorities, but also regional and national ones) and the private companies that provide the technology and/or drive the service, in order to more suitably design and manage the business models that characterize the digital Economy. Those models should firstly rely on mutual trust (between the public and private sectors) so as to inspire confidence in citizens. After all, trust is the cornerstone of sharing and collaborative Economy. The technological driver conceived to improve trustworthy, the Blockchain, works providing everyone with a public ledger, a record of all the transactions that have taken place between different players. This public ledger automatically updates when a new transaction occurs, thus increasing transparency, since these updates are instantly notified to every player. Because all interactions are mapped and communicated to everyone involved—or interested—, this system makes it easier to interact with others on an equal footing. Therefore, any product or service can be tracked and traced all the way in a transaction chain from the very beginning and until it reaches the consumer. Each of these transactions is recorded on the blockchain and remains available to everybody, allowing all parties to use the data so that they can optimize their role and increase their efficiency. It additionally reduces the transaction costs associated with verification and certification, enables smart contracting and inventory accounting, and ensures fair payments across the value chain. All (of) this contributes to truly lead the economic activity to circular outcomes and not simply to improve linear efficiency. Furthermore, the development of blockchain, in conjunction with regulation, allowed individuals to create and operate online platforms, whereby platforms could enable self-enforced smart contracts, without the need for a neutral third party acting as the “State” (corporations). Small competitors enter the game and smart contracts make possible a real P2P economy. As blockchain offers the chance to keep records of an information set in a central location instead of a massive database such as that of Airbnb, it permits to make multiple copies and distribute them throughout nodes of networks. Thanks to this, for instance, a car can know who its owner is. Around 2020, most of the governments in western democracies agreed on a global regulatory framework for the purpose of guaranteeing fair play and the sustainability of public policies, within a context of low interventionism in the economy. The aim was to favor open innovation ecosystems where bottom-up initiatives could be easily developed with hardly any restrictions. States made an effort to adapt to this new “liquid” Economy by reducing their interventionist role as much as possible and leaving behind their coercive nature to become more empathetic and participatory.

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Once people had acquired the ability to make these smart contracts with everything that they owned, incentives to keep property were maintained. On the same level, these self-enforced contracts allowed individuals to control any transaction in which they engaged, maintaining profits and empowering netizens. Regarding the law, as its function consisted in reducing transaction costs, property rights were expanded to intangibles and reinforced in order to internalize all externalities. However, contract enforcement became automated through blockchain, thus cutting costs with the judiciary system. A new concept of law emerged. In the Mediterranean region, characterized by high transaction costs and lack of trust between third parties (World Bank 2016), as well as widespread ownership (INE 2014–2017), blockchain contracts unlock economic potential, generating exponential growth. This permits a double leverage: internationally, barriers to Do Business in Mediterranean economies are reduced, as a result of which trade thrives; and, at an individual level, citizens are empowered when they can engage in interactions involving a large amount of social capital. This model allowed the Mediterranean region to prosper taking advantage of its own structures: the fragmentation of the power owned by large corporations derived from the history of these countries—with the “model of cooperatives”—resulted in a proliferation of platforms linked to sharing and collaborative Economy. This restructuring of the economy through FinTech and blockchain contracts overcame the limitations of financing, as well as other structural problems of Mediterranean economies, making them likewise more prone to adopting technology. This becomes essential in countries characterized by a high level of exports and for being vulnerable to an ever-changing demand.

References European Accelerator Report (2016) GUST. Retrieved July 18, 2021, from https://gustmarketingproduction.herokuapp.com/accelerator_reports/2016/europe INE – Instituto Nacional de Estadística (2014–2017) Resultados by periodo, intervalo de tamaño and tipo de operación. [Dataset]. https://www.ine.es/jaxi/Tabla.htm?path=/t37/p198/p01/serie/ &file=02003.px World Bank (2016) Indicators. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator. Accessed 14 Mar 2018

Chapter 6

Conclusions

“Democracy depends on the belief of the people that there is some scope left for collectively shaping a challenging future” (Jurgen Habermas)

6.1

State of the Art

ShE is a growing trend worldwide: companies such as Uber, TaskRabbit, and AirbnB have already become huge global players. Estimates say that sharing economy will reach revenues of 335 billion USD by 2025 in different fields, including home and car sharing, lending, and video streaming (PWC 2015). According to Schor et al. (2020), when presenting four sharing economy categories (finance, transport, tourism, and retail), 86% of US consumers had engaged in at least one sharing economy activity, with 39% of them having used transport sharing. The average age of this group was 43, and they showed a moderate intention to share other kinds of services/goods. The future looks brighter for sharing economy amongst the younger generation, though: 29% of consumers, with an average age of 35, had engaged in three kinds of sharing: transport, retail, and tourism; and they were clearly willing to keep using sharing platforms—18% had engaged in all four categories with an average age of 33. As for China, the world’s second biggest economy (World Bank 2021), sharing economy had a transaction volume of USD 522 billion in 2020 and should keep a 10% growth rate until 2025 (State Information Center 2021). Its State Information Center (2021) claims that the COVID-19 pandemic boosted sharing economy growth by 2.9% in China last year: the lowered utilization of travel and work platforms was compensated by the rise of knowledge and medical care platforms, which recorded a growth of 30.9% and 27.8%, respectively. Transport is expected to lead ShE revenues worldwide, reaching USD 10.4 billion in 2021, with about 20% thereof being generated in the United States. This growth, as the drivers analysis points out, is catalyzed by ecological and economical concerns (Statista 2020a, 2020b).

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 E. Bas, Sharing and Collaborative Economy, SpringerBriefs in Economics, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-93882-6_6

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One of the main reasons for the rapid expansion of ShE platforms, in addition to the drivers already mentioned above, has to do with companies’ cost structure and the globalization of local markets: when players like Uber enter an otherwise local transport market, they can reduce operational costs because they operate on a centralized basis—i.e., they only have only one platform that fits every market— reducing the need for warehouses, local employment, or platform development. When Credit Suisse (2015) carried out a worldwide analysis about users’ attitude towards sharing economy, they found out that 28% of them are willing to share electronics such as smartwatches, computers, or televisions. Quupe is a Canadian platform which makes that possible: you can rent house tools or camping gear, among thousands of other items, from local users. Ca. Twenty-six percentage of users would like to share economy services such as Netflix or Amazon, and apps like Fon already allow you to share your internet connection. Twenty-one percentage of them would not mind sharing their cars: platforms such as Blablacar have become extremely popular in countries like Germany, France and Spain (where it reached 83 million users in 2019 according to their Chief Operating Officer). 17% of users would share their furniture, and 15% would be willing to share their homes (AirBnB has 1400 islands, castles and different properties listed, but most of them run of a full-ownership basis, and not with a home sharing scheme, according to AirDnA data (2021): 57% of the properties listed in New York belong(ed) to the aforesaid full-ownership category, a percentage that reached 86% in Paris, 65% in Madrid, 74% in Rio, 75% in Tokyo, and 60% in Lagos).

6.2

Europe at the Crossroad

Europe as a whole, and particularly the Mediterranean region, pose special opportunities and risks when exploring sharing economy. The Mediterranean Sea—the vehicle of new ideas for centuries—has now become a barrier which divides different worlds. Furthermore, the asymmetric effects of European Union integration, along with the high unemployment rates in Southern European countries, especially among the young, and made even worse by the excessive informality that characterizes such economies and the high unemployment rates, act as catalysts to adopt new forms of economic exchange that own the potential to transform the Mediterranean region through the harnessing of underused assets, the reuse of goods, or the creation of a zero marginal cost economy. This becomes especially important when assessing the costs of Doing Business in those economies: Spain occupies the 30th overall position in the Doing Business Report (2020) and the 26th position in the enforcement of contracts category. Italy ranks 58th and 122nd, respectively. Portugal is the 39th and the 38th in these two rankings. France occupies the 32nd and 16th position, respectively. Slovenia in turn ranks 37th and 112th, whilst Greece is the 79th and the 146th. By contrast, Germany occupies the 22nd overall position and the 13th in the enforcing contracts category,

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and the United States ranks 6th and 17th, respectively, while China is the 31st and the 5th. As the main purpose of these online platforms consists in reducing transaction costs, sharing economy opens opportunities that can help the Mediterranean region overcome its structural failures (Sundararajan 2016). Beyond the transformational impact of an economy with a “zero marginal cost” in traditional areas where Mediterranean economies perform well such as tourism and services, the expected exponential rise of ShE will further economic growth throughout this region (European Parliament 2017). In terms of job creation and technological advancement, some authors (Jenk 2015; Koopman et al. 2014; Thierer et al. 2015) see sharing economy as a new form of competitive pressure and economic innovation which can lead to an expansion of productivity through the use of ‘dead capital.’ Its potential lies in the creation of new markets under disruptive innovations (Codagnone and Martens 2016). From this perspective, with a libertarian approach, digital sharing platforms provide a means to reduce the demand for regulatory controls, since they are themselves built under self-regulation mechanisms. Regarding institutions, this could prove beneficial to Mediterranean economies via the potential convergence into more efficient regulatory systems (Munkøe 2017). In turn, the special conditions that prevail in Mediterranean countries can also aggravate their vulnerabilities under sharing economy, posing a threat such as the dilution of the already weak labor structure, bringing the so-called “precariat” (Standing 2014), the breakage of social cohesion through the commoditization of everyday life, increased inequality (rates), and the acceptance of the “culture of the crisis” as a way of life. Existing studies stress that the factors likely to increase inequality amongst the poorer 80%—under the “sharing economy” platform—as well as the undermining of labor rights in the United States could be extrapolated to the EU. The high unemployment rates amongst the young, combined with the excessive relevance of the informal economy, alongside the significant participation of the self-employed in the labor market, and the unstoppable penetration of digital technologies make the region become a melting pot suited to adopt a new Economy favored by the “culture of the crisis.” According to the analysis of full-time sharing economy, workers are more likely to earn less than employees in the “offline” market. Special arrangements exist in many European countries to formalize the employment of privately-hired workers. For example, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, and Italy have schemes in place for household services (e.g., cleaning, gardening, child and residential care) and home repair (de Groen and Maselli 2016). Belgium uses the voucher scheme for household services (titres-services) that was established to respond to the increasing demand for these services, thus improving the working conditions of cleaners and providing the sector with a formal status. Households are paying €9 gross—or €7.65 after taxes—per hour. In turn, the workers received €11.06 gross per hour plus social security (i.e. sickness leave, pension, and unemployment benefit) in 2013 (Gerard et al. 2014).

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Deconstructing the ShE Concept and Philosophy. The Regulatory Issue

According to the Cambridge Dictionary of the English Language, the adjective collaborative means: “involving two or more people working together for a special purpose” (sic); and the definition for the verb to share is: “to have or use something at the same time as someone else” (sic). It seems additionally interesting to highlight how Sharing Economy is defined: “an economic system that is based on people sharing possessions and services, either for free or for payment, usually using the internet to organize this” (sic). Using a dictionary, where any significant is linked to a signifier, when looking up the meaning of a word, it becomes essential to communicate correctly because that will largely help decode a narrative and—subsequently—understand accurately what it means. Pursuant to this, and if we take the Cambridge Dictionary as a valid reference, any form of economic exchange—from simple barter to commercial for-profit activity—would have a collaborative nature. From this point of view, Airbnb, Trampolinn, Homeaway, or Intercambiocasas hosts are certainly not collaborating with their guests any more than Meliá or Scandic Hotels do with their customers. Therefore, what do we mean when we talk about “Collaborative Economy”? Who is collaborating with whom? And. . . what is supposed to be the difference—if any—? And what is exactly meant when we talk about “Sharing Economy”? What exactly is being shared here? Freelancers on online platforms such as Freelancer, Fiverr, or Upwork are not sharing their skills with the world more that I am sharing mine—either for free or for payment—with the University of Alicante or the European Commission. This is an unquestionable fact. There is wide consensus on the central role that the Internet plays in the “Sharing and Collaborative economy” to facilitate transactions between buyers and sellers for a fee, as well as on the fact that it focuses on idle assets (either tangible—rooms, cars. . .—or intangible ones—time, skills. . .—). Therefore, when a consumer hires a taxi that has idle seats through an online app, what would—conceptually—be the difference with Uber or any other carsharing platform that charges a fee for the service like Uber itself or even Blablacar? And for that matter, when a consumer hires an idle room in Scandic Marski during a short visit to Helsinki, or when I am hired—during my idle time and either for free or for payment—by the University of Hamburg for a guest speech? What would be the difference with regard to sharing (skills, time, . . . any idle asset, whether it is tangible or intangible) or in collaborative terms with anyone else hiring an Airbnb or being hired for a temporary job or a tendering? Is the fact that hotel chains or private investors—solely seeking profit—colonize the Airbnb offer compatible with sharing philosophy? Are small owners with vacant rooms not allowed to make a profit? Is it fair to buy five electric drills—or five tourist apartments—to speculate with them while taking advantage of the rise of the collaborative economy? What degree of greed would be tolerable to continue calling

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it sharing and collaborative Economy? At what point of the speculative process does it stop being collaborative? Should governments regulate these new businesses supposedly based on basic and collaborative exchange? If the answer is yes, ought the legal requirements to be the same as those applying to traditional businesses— supposedly based on greed and speculation—? Is it fair and convenient for the government to regulate an activity—regardless of whether it has an economic nature or not—against the opinion of all the stakeholders involved in it? If the lack of regulation in the gig economy—for instance, in the delivery sector—seems convenient both for the platforms (because of the reduced fixed costs), for the hired drivers (since they are worth in terms of flexibility and money), for providers (considering the lower costs and the higher flexibility), and for consumers (the delivery is cheaper as well as faster) . . . then is it fair to impose a regulation? Does the possibility exist to develop a new way to approach business without the government and the State accepting and respecting the free-will, profitbased orientation that is also inherent to these sharing and collaborative initiatives? Can we develop it in the absence of a regulatory legal framework, be it specific or generic? A lot of controversial questions come to mind. Thus, can we really talk about a “Sharing” and/or “Collaborative” Economy with features that distinguish it from—so to speak—traditional business? Perhaps these labels made sense when they first appeared around the first half of the 2010s. Then they applied to start-ups, including pioneers such as SnapGoods, Nextdoor, MyNeighbor, and Share Some Sugar in the USA, that aimed to help neighbors or small communities lend one another things like electric drills or any other kinds of small home devices/stuff. However, some of today’s platforms still claim to be sharing and collaborative when, being truly realistic, we could state that many of them do not follow that approach at all. Nowadays, the “Sharing” and “Collaborative” labels may give a wrong impression of those platforms being hands-off intermediaries between ordinary individuals who want to exchange goods and services under a non-profit peer-to-peer logic (closer to barter or borrowing than to obtaining a direct profit/income from the transaction) as they probably were in the beginning. Additionally, it can hardly be denied that definitely they both create and shape specific market niches along with the behaviors of all the stakeholders concerned (users, providers. . .) by changing the rules when they deem it appropriate to scale the business and make it more profitable. Although it would be inaccurate—since we theoretically live in a free market economy—to say that they are exploitative, stating that they promote true sharing and collaboration might also sound too naïve. Or (returning to the dictionary) we could even say: yes, their business models rely on a sharing and/or collaborative logic, but not in a radically different way from that of the traditional business models that they were originally supposed to provide an alternative to. Capitalism is, by definition, an economic system in which private individuals or businesses own capital goods. The production of goods and services relies on supply and demand in the general market (market economy) instead of working through central planning (command economy) as it usually happens, for instance, in feudal, mercantilist, and socialist formulas where democracy has failed or is simply

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non-existent, leading to lack of competition and a coercive influence exerted by the government on the Economy. Even though free will and laissez-faire (which would imply democracy as the natural political system linked to capitalism) are essential in this economic system—together with the private ownership of means of production—, most countries (including the USA) practice a mixed formula that incorporates a certain degree of business regulation by the government (in the form of property rights, fees and taxes, amongst other instruments). Despite the regulatory activity undertaken in those countries, the inner logic of the market economy is based on voluntary trade—the mechanism that drives activity in a capitalist system: the owners of resources/assets compete with one another over customers, who in turn compete with other customers over goods and services. It is the supply and demand balance that defines prices—not the government or the State—and coordinates the distribution of resources. Profits (and losses) arguably depend on the efficiency degree reached when using those resources while producing the highest value good or service. Economists such as Ha-Joon Change (University of Cambridge), Richard Murphy, or Christopher Snowdon (Institute of Economic Affairs) like to explore the connection between selfishness, greed, and capitalism in order to debunk—or rather dismantle—what they regard as wrong myths about free market ideology. Basically, they disagree with the assumption that all economic agents (including customers) are selfish, as summed up in the famous statement made by Adam Smith The Wealth of Nations (1776): “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard of their own interest” (sic). Here we would somehow be faced, once again, with that old dichotomous Hobbes vs. Rousseau debate on human nature and the social contract. As is well known, according to Thomas Hobbes, man is bad and selfish, always looking for his own interest; hence the need for the State to keep his instincts under control through a social contract; on the contrary, Jean Jacques Rousseau considers man good by nature, Society being to blame for corrupting him through inequality. Nonetheless, going beyond the caricature, Adam Smith’s lucidity can help us cope with the current economic problems and challenges, as shown by the member of the UK Parliament and Oxford University alumnus Jesse Norman in his book (Norman 2019) and commented on by Amartya Sen. Because, apart from being naïve, it makes no sense whatsoever to try and reduce the complexity of human behavior to a daltonic sort of scale based on oppositions of the type black/white, 0/1, good/bad, etc. Furthermore, it would be as inaccurate to say that the economy depends on greed as it is to say that the former does not depend on the latter. Perhaps, and this could seem obvious, we should start from the idea that any human action or initiative on an individual basis stems from an expectation (for something to be better, maybe?) and consequently seeks to have an effect, to cause a change, to achieve a reward—be it material or immaterial, either for selfishness or out of empathy. However, at the same time, we human beings are a social species that relies on cooperation to survive and thrive. Both the individual and the social dimension are consequently needed in order to ensure prosperity in a community.

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As the journalist Bill Emmot wrote in his article Why Adam Smith wasn’t a heartless neoliberal (Emmot 2018) “markets may work thanks to the «invisible hand» of self-interest, but to Smith they are above all social constructs, bringing together millions of people in relations of exchange and empathy, and depending on rules, enforcement and other interventions by the state. They cannot and must not be simply left alone: truly ‘free’ markets are a myth and private enterprise anyway often ends up as crony capitalism, a «conspiracy against the public», in one of Smith’s better-known phrases.” Therefore, this is not about black or white: recognizing the key role played by private initiative (regardless of whether it stems from selfishness or pure altruism) to energize the economy is not at odds with assuming that the community (by establishing the necessary political and legal mechanisms) must tidy up the playground through regulatory measures that guarantee both fair play (in every type of transaction) as well as a certain social balance and mobility (through some redistribution to guarantee equal opportunities); in a nutshell: a certain degree of consensus exists that capitalism not only can but also needs to coexist with a balancing welfare state. But then. . . what should the balance between both worlds (laissez-faire and regulation) be like so that it can guarantee the plausibility of this new “sharing and collaborative” business model whose main feature is arguably the flexibility inherent to the massive use of technologies (apps and Internet platforms) when arranging economic interaction? Just like any other innovation, in its different forms (shared, collaborative, gig, etc.) ShE opens new opportunities and simultaneously entails plenty of challenges for individuals (citizens, consumers, users. . .), companies (new and traditional), and governments (mainly States but also supranational and local/regional entities) alike. After all, this does not only affect a single country or a specific group, economic sector or activity. . . it has an overall, global scope. And despite being a new formula too, it is “old” at the same time, insofar as it follows patterns and involves problems and opportunities that resemble those present in the traditional businesses that it is supposed to replace. That global nature, which is inherent to the logic of any contemporary business model, represents an added complication—in regulatory terms—for the political management of these “new economy” formulas. Despite being raised locally, all these companies—let us call them “initiatives”—aspire to become global; or, at least, to solve global problems by acting locally. This is nothing new in itself, though: globalization (that old term coined in the late 1980s/early 1990s) gave a name to the centuries-long phenomenon of global labor division that dates back—at least—to the times of the ancient Roman Empire, when every region contributed to “global order” (then the Roman order) with different incomes—from olive oil to slaves—according to their possibilities. It can hardly be denied that Google, Facebook, and all the other companies that operate worldwide pose a big problem for the governments that have to regulate them. Is it feasible to tax their activity? How? By means of a digital canon or. . .? And who should tax their activity? The country of origin where the firm has its headquarters, the country where their servers are placed physically, the country

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where its users reside? Or should it be some sort of supranational entity instead? Something similar happens with Airbnb, Uber, or Deliveroo. This is in fact one of the most challenging aspects when it comes to these new business models, and the subject of heated debate, because all those companies mentioned above are neither suppliers nor buyers, but intermediaries facilitating a P2P interaction. And this means, as they see it, a radical difference with respect to traditional business: they are not selling anything directly, but only connecting people: buyers and sellers; artists and followers; companies and freelancers; lovers, friends, families, peers, et cetera. At a global level and by digital means. What makes ShE—in other words, the “new economy”—different to the traditional way to understand business is—in one word—flexibility. All the “sharing and collaborative” initiatives have in common their being liquid: adaptive, flexible, and mostly based on the digital (intangible, immediate, changing, pervasive, etc.). They can be considered liquid because their raison d’être is basically trying to be flexible enough to facilitate a real time-based adaptation to the supply and demand dynamics. They follow a ‘go-with-the-flow’ logic; a liquid one. The aim pursued with this flexibility is to achieve high satisfaction levels amongst all the stakeholders and users involved in any such experience or transaction—whether it is a commercial exchange (idle tangible assets: a car, a room, a device, a tool. . .) or a labor exchange (idle intangible assets: time, skills, knowledge, expertise. . .)—by increasing efficiency in the process and subsequently/consequently generating welfare in a more human-centric and sustainable way. Thus, by definition, trying to fit those “liquid businesses” within the rigid normative framework that characterizes the traditional business environment might turn out to be counterproductive. . . since it could kill any possibility for ShE to become a real alternative to embrace a new economy, a new approach to capitalism.

6.4

Can ShE Be Considered an Alternative to Capitalism— As We Know It—?

Some might say that Capitalism—supported on individual initiative, free will, and private property—is the only economic system that has made possible generalized high welfare levels for the human population on earth. None of the historical alternatives (from feudalism to communism) resists any comparison with capitalism in terms of wealth generation over time. On the contrary, most—if not all—of them were eventually proven inefficient, unequal, and unable to provide a community with an acceptable and sustainable degree of social and economic development. In contemporary Capitalism, evidence attests to the fact that the balance between individual action (guaranteed by Democracy and freedom) and general interest (guaranteed through redistributive—albeit not invasive—Keynesian public policies) represents the best option to sustainably increase the living standards of any community. It suffices to check public statistics and compare today’s numbers with those

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of 1800 (or 1900, 1920, 1950, 1980 and so on and so forth). Economic development, individual income, life expectancy. . . any indicator makes it crystal clear. Certainly, the same cannot be said of those countries where democracy or free market does not exist. And all of the above has been possible despite the shadows, of course: just like everything else in Nature, Life, or the Universe, no system is perfect. Nothing lacks a counterpoint; we are permanently engaging in a balance-and-harmony game, as the “ying-yang” figure so wisely shows us. And some might argue that—in spite of corruption, greed, inequality, black economy, or ineffective political interventionism, amongst other issues—capitalism has turned out to be the least bad economic system known so far, exactly as representative Democracy has proved to be the least bad political system. However, inequality and socio-economic polarization persist and, alongside the need for more eco-friendly formulas to successfully address climate change management, have become the Achilles heel of the current capitalist system. Now we have to face the boomerang effect of mass industrialization, massive fossil fuelbased energy consumption, and the debt associated with financial capitalism. Those are perhaps the most challenging issues ahead of us. Although ShE arose as a more human-centric, eco-friendly, low-consumption formula to face the above-mentioned challenges, it would require a socio-economic and political context where flexibility and regulation are properly balanced in order to become a consolidated alternative. We should likewise bear in mind that the existing legal framework may not be sufficiently flexible to create the right conditions for new business models based on sharing and the collaborative. The recent US Supreme Court’s ruling on the Uber case in February 2021 was too easily welcomed by many, even though the profits of the company and the drivers, as well as the benefits enjoyed by customers will probably be lost. The drivers, who used to take advantage of an unexpected freedom (in contrast with the benefits inherent to indefinite contracts) will have to choose between becoming a worker/ employee or being fired. Customers in turn are bound to assume the indirect costs derived from Uber’s transformation into a cab business, and Uber itself—if it eventually survives as a business firm—will be nothing but a poor shadow of its former self. Something similar may happen to Deliveroo and other gig companies that operate under sharing and collaborative “umbrella,” including all the freelance companies that hire professionals all over the world, if the “applying-old-regulationformulas-to-new-businesses” philosophy triumphs in the near future. The point here is. . . ought ShE initiatives to work within the narrow formal legal framework of traditional businesses? Or should the established legal framework adapt to these flexible formulas, considering that all the participant stakeholders are free to join them or not? In other words, can we request that Uber drivers—who voluntarily entered this business being previously aware of the conditions, for the better or for the worse—have the same benefits and duties as if they were in a standard/traditional company? Or is that a contradiction in terms? ShE refers to a work environment where labor is structured around temporary employment, contracts, and ad-hoc projects inside a global marketplace (with all its

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pros and cons). Instead of receiving hourly or salaried compensation, holidays, and so on, workers are paid by one-time projects or tasks. Likewise, when it comes to idle physical assets, ShE carries with it the immediate benefits agreed on by both parties that derive from the temporary hiring/sharing of such assets (homes, cars. . .) rather than having an assured income for renting under rigid standardized contractual terms. Changing the model unquestionably entails both benefits and risks. ShE can offer a long-demanded flexibility that will help these individuals reconcile their working hours—by customizing them—with their own needs and preferences. Furthermore, ShE enables companies to become more efficient by maximizing—or rationalizing—the human capital that they manage, focusing on satisfying users’/consumers’ needs. And it all on a P2P basis, trying to reach a balance in real time that satisfies every stakeholder involved, assuming that all parties have agreed on some preliminary conditions. In a nutshell, ShE simply provides a new formula to approach economic transactions more effectively and sustainably that relies on prior consensus. No one can possibly expect to enjoy the benefits of being flexible and simultaneously avoid the risks involved in it, though. Or, expressed differently, it is impossible to build a “new economy” framework while keeping the old regulatory rules at work. These are mutually exclusive options. What conditions would therefore be needed to make ShE viable? At least four “Fs” should be considered:

6.4.1

Freedom

Free market, and free will, are essential to set a shared and collaborative economy in motion. This would simply not be possible in the absence of a political and regulatory context that is flexible enough as to encourage individual initiative. It also automatically implies the existence of a political democratic system that can guarantee society’s openness. By definition, ShE cannot work in an autocratic or highly normative political system. That is so because, despite being often regarded as an alternative to contemporary capitalism, ShE relies on the same basic foundations: individuals’ free will to operate without the intervention of the State. It is impossible for the shared and collaborative economy to develop without the sort of regulatory framework that political democracy and free market provide. In short: implementing ShE in the context of a dictatorship or an extremely rigid market tightly controlled by the public sector would make no sense at all. ShE initiatives can be considered bottom-up social innovation initiatives that essentially revolve around individual initiative. In fact, some might say that ShE is more deeply rooted in individual initiative and free will than the traditional businesses in contemporary capitalism themselves.

6.4 Can ShE Be Considered an Alternative to Capitalism—As We Know It—?

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Feasibility

Any ShE initiative must be implemented, effected, or accomplished within an environment of equal opportunities. Since ShE is essentially committed to meet the expectations of all its stakeholders and supposed to enter the competitive playfield inherent to any free market economy, its viability will depend upon satisfying all the actors involved in the activity. Although it can be artificially sustained too, ShE should definitely remain sustainable on its own, since its own existence and resilience depends directly upon voluntary initiative. If a ShE initiative fails to last, it will most probably happen—by definition—because it has failed to fit the social expectations. Consequently, any attempts to maintain it artificially (only on the grounds that it seems cool or politically correct, for example) via public financing/funding would be not only useless but also counterproductive. Perhaps it might work as a political marketing campaign in the short term, but the model would never succeed in the medium and long term. Even though ShE has been presented as an alternative business model to capitalism, and accordingly welcome rather passionately by critics of the system, it actually has its roots in the very true basics of capitalism: free will and the supply-and-demand logic. In other words, it will work only if it does so by itself, if it is feasible: the public sector has nothing to do with it.

6.4.3

Flexibility

ShE is a natural born flexible initiative by definition. Its social dimension follows a bottom-up approach, never being directed or implemented on a top-down basis. It is consequently linked to the freedom and impulse for peers’ free-will-based behavior to be conceived and embraced. The legal framework should adapt to make ShE plausible and viable without an active intervention of the State, considering the particularities of its own specific (P2P) nature. Interventionism should only operate to the minimum extent strictly necessary to ensure the feasibility of any initiative (under)taken on a free will basis by individuals, tailoring the existing legal framework in terms of labor and taxation without being detrimental to any personal or collective rights in the eyes of the stakeholders involved: after all, it is up to the latter to determine the agreement on the basis of their own will, not to the government or to any (other) political body. ShE relies on a bottom-up dynamics where consensus and free will become essential, but it would not work if a top-down logic drives the social innovation that ShE represents: this would eliminate all the potential that ShE owns to create jobs/employment and wealth, and with it, the world of opportunities that ShE opens—as an innovative option—within a rigid and stagnated economic context where unemployment, black economy, and corruption keep drowning the hopes of many. Without the creative power behind ShE initiatives it will be very hard to find alternatives to the current situation. Thinking out of the box means first and foremost being flexible; i.e. flexibility holds the key to success.

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Fair Play

ShE was born as an alternative to the traditional, standard systems that approached business, transactions, production, consumption, and transport more creatively; as a new way to understand the economy built on a P2P basis—and mostly through the Internet—which tried to embrace current Zeitgeist mantras such as equality, sustainability, resilience, or empathy, to quote but a few. However, it did not take long for the new formula to start showing its own dark side: shadows regarding some possible abusive behaviors (often related to speculating instead of focusing on the original basic exchange of idle—tangible or intangible—assets between peers) that would contradict sharing and collaborative philosophy underlying it. In a utopian perfect world, where all the agents would act in a completely fair manner towards the other operators in the system, political intervention would not be needed, but— moving closer to Hobbes and away from Rousseau—human nature unfortunately seems to be neither pure nor perfect. And corruption, lies, unbridled greed, speculation, swindling, or violence are the order of the day, even in creative and idealistic contexts like those of ShE initiatives. Therefore, the government will have to adopt a set of legal measures in order to guarantee Fair Play, always taking into account the particularities of ShE. It is no use applying the existing legislation on labor or taxes to the new business formulas; that would kill them. The regulation has to be different, suited to the needs of ShE and designed to protect its implementation under fair play conditions. A legal framework is needed that can make ShE possible without affecting its foundational philosophy.

6.5

Beyond the Paradox. . . . The Future of ShE in a (Big) Nutshell

The different/new business model that ShE stands for with respect to traditional capitalism has been very often presented as the promising panacea that could open a window of hope for a more inclusive, egalitarian, and sustainable way to approach Economy. After the supposed alternatives to capitalism (such as communism and socialism amongst others, mostly based on the State being either the owner of the means of production and distribution or the main actor determining the legal and operative framework through active and constant political intervention in the Economy) have proved to be far more ineffective than capitalism itself, many thought that the time had come for Civil Society to lead the change. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), defined as “the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all” (sic), draw a desirable future scenario to aspire to that seems to fit like a glove with the seminal philosophy and concept behind ShE, mainly in relation to climate action, as well as sustainable consumption and lifestyle patterns. The ShE formula implies a radical mindset change towards a mental framework where using has become a priority as

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opposed to owning, in which collective well-being must prevail over private profit/ interest, and where all actors/stakeholders must be free to interact in peer-to-peer transactions regarding the exchange of both tangible assets (properties, tools) and intangible ones (knowledge, time). It is here that the paradox arises, though: developing ShE according to its own philosophical and conceptual roots would firstly imply assuming the prevalence of liberal capitalism features like private property (if nobody owns anything, then how can any exchanges be raised?), individual initiative (if someone is forced to share or collaborate, that will collide with freedom of choice and denature ShE as an alternative), segmentation of markets and consumers (if all of us share the same needs or expectations, then what would we be supposed to exchange?), and division of labor (if everybody has the same skills and ambitions, then why should any exchange or collaboration be needed?). All four aspects are intrinsically linked to the roots of liberal capitalism: private property; free will; segmentation; and division of labor. As a matter of fact, we could add a fifth aspect, search for profit, although it does not necessarily have to be centered on greed or the expectation of a material profit (it could also seek a more “generous” or “selfless” interest, such as helping improve other people’s welfare, contributing to planet survival or any other spiritual aspiration). However, this human pulsion based on the satisfaction of an expectation must exist as a basic stimulus for interaction to occur. Any initiative needs a compelling reason for someone to undertake it. Thus, according to the five points listed above . . . can ShE be considered an alternative to capitalism (as many believe) despite sharing its foundations with the former? Or should it rather be regarded as a return to the very roots of free market capitalism? If laissez-faire lies at the core of the ShE philosophy, which should be understood as a way to approach social innovation (business innovation for a social purpose) supported on a bottom-up logic, how can we avoid the perverse consequences that may arise in the absence of a proper regulation? Is it possible to develop ShE initiatives guaranteeing fair play—preventing speculative collateral consequences—without the political intervention of States via the implementation of regulatory frameworks? In that case. . . would the need for top-down regulatory supervision by public institutions and governments, allegedly required to protect public interest not contradict the foundational aspects of ShE? Would it not provoke the denaturation of the bottom-up logic underlying ShE, since the latter is supposed to be purely bottom-up? Then, why do those praising ShE as a more integrative, egalitarian, and sustainable approach to Economy, and defending its participatory basis and bottom-up nature, simultaneously plan to impose a top-down regulatory framework and play with social engineering to supposedly safeguard stakeholders’ interests (very often without being asked to do so)? Is this just an unconscious contradiction? Or, alternatively, what part of the equation is misunderstood? Although there seem to be no easy answers to these questions at the moment, they should be thoroughly discussed so as not to fall into contradictions or deepen the

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paradox: choices are made after clearly identifying and evaluating realistic and coherent alternatives (future scenarios?) and, then, prioritizing one/some of them. The future is consequently open and full of challenges as well as opportunities. Sharing or Collaborative Economy has come to stay, and it can be considered—as part of the Zeitgeist, liquid modernity—a logic consequence of human societies’ evolution derived from various processes, amongst them the cultural paradigm shift inherent to the demographic, economic, and technological changes experienced during the last few decades. Therefore, the transformative effect of ShE will depend on the dialectical interaction of five main axes: the public sector (the States and their regulatory role); the private sector (managing digital platforms and devices); technological development (opening new possibilities); data ownership (essential in a trust-based, ShE); and civil society (individuals’ expectations and ability to actively and creatively merge into communities and participating in social change). Broadly speaking, and this is definitely good news, the future belongs to us; it is in our hands: we can state that the future of ShE will be what we want it to be: we only find ourselves at the initial stages of something that might imply—in the medium and long term—a relevant structural change in world economy.

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