Today is the final day of OuiShare Fest 2014, a three-day conference in Paris bringing together over 1,000 collaborative economy entrepreneurs to examine every aspect of the sharing economy, from the Open Source Beehives Project to challenges for corporations in the collaborative economy.
For anyone under the impression that the rise of the sharing economy is simply a blip reaction to the recession, the OuiShare conference is proving otherwise. Consider this: on its first birthday in 2009, Airbnb, which lets people rent out part or all of their homes, was a tiny start-up many had never heard of. Today it's seen 11 million guests staying in 34,000 cities, not to mention 600 castles. Far from diminishing in influence as the global economy has shown signs of recovery, the likes of Airbnb have strengthened. Temporary blip this is not.
Although the increasing strength of the sharing economy is anecdotally evident, quantitative indicators of success beyond diffuse data from individual case studies are much harder to measure. Particularly since activity often moves offline once the sharing arrangement is established says Andrew Smith, Professor of Consumer Behaviour at Nottingham University. Like the informal economy, working out precise ways of measuring the sharing economy's size and impacts may take years – if possible at all – and will no doubt be the subject of much future debate.
Despite the lack of broad data, Rachel Botsman, author of What's Mine is Yours, and founder of Collaborative Lab, is in no doubt about the progress made since her renowned 2010 TED talk, The case for collaborative consumption. In Botsman's words, we have reached the "fight stage", where everything from regulatory legal battles to competition between start-ups are markers of the movement's successful evolution. However, there is still a long way to go in terms of deeper change to consumer behaviours and business systems:
"Scale is critical to change and 'big' does not have to be the foe, but we have to be careful not to dilute the humanness and empowerment that lies at the core of collaborative consumption."
So how do you scale up while maintaining "humanness"? What barriers prevent people from shifting to their peers, from the default of going to the shops? And what behaviour change mechanisms can encourage sharing?
Let's start by thinking about money. While monetised peer-to-peer services such as Airbnb enable hosts and guests to feel that they offer and gain something, it is less immediately clear how gift exchange systems such as Freecycle and City Dog Share benefit both parties.
Rather than direct reciprocity, these systems rely on a broader exchange community in which people contribute to a network from which they might later benefit. One obstacle to the rapid uptake of gift exchange systems therefore is a cultural expectation that offering something requires an immediate return. Interestingly, the reluctance is as much if not more on the part of the recipient of the free sofa or the Spanish lessons. The authors of Everyday Favours (pdf) point out that although we all have things and skills that others need: "Even from a close friend, but perhaps especially from a stranger, it does not always come naturally to ask for a favour." This creates a barrier to many projects keen to foster new connections.
Sam Stephens, CEO of sharing network Streetbank explains that for the sharing economy to flourish, it's critical to communicate that it's not only okay to ask, it's valuable:
"There's a feel-good factor when we fulfill a request for help, not to mention spin-off benefits such as de-cluttering. When there's no direct reciprocal benefit such as money exchange, projects need to convey that receiving really is as important is giving."
According to David Golightly, senior research fellow in the Human Factors Research Group at the University of Nottingham, habit is one of the major barriers, underpinned by cognitive cost, perceptions of potential discomfort, risk and embarrassment. Two important paths to substantial change are therefore to firstly identify times when habits are in flux – house moves for example, are one of the best times to get people to join a neighbourhood sharing project. And secondly to personalise the benefits quantitatively in terms of immediate gains, and qualitatively in terms of longer-term meaningful rewards: "Anecdotal evidence from car share schemes show that while people start out focusing on saving money, using a collaborative network becomes more of a community experience over time – and it can be a much more deep-rooted motivation."
Since a major incentive to start sharing is perceptions of peers' involvement, an activity can spread through a community, helping create the critical mass projects need become sustainable. And ideally where community builds, money that would have been spent on unnecessary goods, can be spent in the neighbourhood, supporting local economies.
The expansion of the sharing economy offers a more sustainable alternative to mainstream economics. It challenges growth as the marker of success and invests significance back into localised systems of exchange. In light of an impending energy crisis, a financial system that benefits few at the expense of many, and environmental degradation caused by unchecked, unnecessary consumption, it's clear something has to change. The arrival of a set of systems that prioritise collaboration is most certainly a welcome one.
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