Library guides
Subject: Economy and BusinessSharing economy
By "collaborative" or "sharing" economy, we mean the collaborative consumption and production of capital and work between peer groups, with the support of a digital platform. This concept has grown rapidly in recent years and become both a priority and a challenge for governments worldwide. The impact of corporate models such as Uber and Airbnb in cities is both disruptive and controversial.
What is the collaborative economy?
Joan Torrent Sellens, director of i2TIC and professor in the UOC's Faculty of Economics and Business, talks about how our way of living has changed and technology been integrated into our consumer habits. He presents the first episode of Sharing Economy, a series explaining how this second wave of technology could lead to increased productivity, employment and wages.
This Retos para ser directivo blog post by EAE Business School and Harvard Deusto Business Review offers a definition of the concept, the different types and its principal benefits.
Forbes presents twelve examples of the collaborative economy, with images. These companies have an assessment system helping the people on both sides of the transaction trust each other.
Why do we need to share? Does the collaborative economy build share capital? This web page asks the major questions that affect this economic model; for example, criticisms of the employment conditions promoted by some online platforms. The forum where this information is collated aims to foster academic discourse to contribute to new practices for global transformation.
Peer economy, sharing economy, access economy... are just some of the terms used to describe a wide range of initiatives that use digital technologies to connect service and goods providers directly with the customers. This article offers a straightforward explanation of what the collaborative economy is and what it isn't.
The Faculty of Economics and Business organizes an annual event to hand out the prizes for the best final bachelor’s and master's degree projects. At this year's event, international expert in collaborative consumption Albert Cañigueral gave a talk on the cornerstones of the so-called “collaborative age”.
The sharing economy has burst forcefully onto the scene in a wide range productive sectors (transport, tourism, finance, etc.). Despite these virtues being hard to dispute, a critical and constructive inspection must be carried out to see whether sharing economy companies are also helping to change society's values, or if they are simply making capitalism more efficient. In the analysis for this article, we differentiate between the wide variety of actors in the sharing economy according to their purpose.
Airbnb: a collaborative economy platform? What is the so-called 'token economy’? Find the answers in this article by UOC professor, August Corrons, in the UOC Economics and Business blog.
The discussion paper analyzes the fundamentals, definitions, conceptual frameworks and the empirical evidence of shared economy and collaborative consumption. In addition, and through a sample for 14,050 citizens of the 28 countries of the European Union in 2016, the profiles of users (1,792) and providers (496) of collaborative platforms are characterized, as well as their predictors are investigated.
“There is a leap of trust when we risk doing something new or different from how we've always done it”, explained Rachel Botsman in this video, one of the leading theoreticians on collaborative consumption. This expert reflects on the concept of trust on digital platforms and asks if they could lead to a more transparent, inclusive and responsible society. During her talk she refers to Uber, Blablacar and Airbnb.
