Municipal Governance of the Sharing Economy: Insights and Examples from Gothenburg, Sweden

Yuliya Voytenko Palgan presenting at the III International Conference European Dimensions of Sustainable Development, Kyiv, Ukraine

On 11 June 2021, Sharing and the City researcher Yuliya Voytenko Palgan presented her research done together with Urban Sharing project leader Oksana Mont at the III International Conference European Dimensions of Sustainable Development, which was held online in Kyiv, Ukraine. The conference gathered over 100 scientists and practitioners from Ukraine and other countries. The presentation “Municipal Governance of the Sharing Economy: Insights and Examples from Gothenburg, Sweden” was well-received by the audience, who asked questions and provided insightful comments comparing the sharing economy development in Sweden and Ukraine. The abstract of the conference paper is provided below.

ABSTRACT OF THE CONFERENCE ARTICLE

If managed well, the sharing economy may have a transformative impact on advancing sustainability in cities. Sharing economy is “a consumption-production mode in a city, in which value is generated through transactions between actors (both organisations and individuals) involving temporary access to idling or underutilised rivalry physical assets” [1]. The emerging research on municipal governance of the sharing economy provides a broad overview of examples for how municipalities regulate and restrict the sharing economy with a dominant focus on large commercial platforms such as Airbnb and Uber while leaving out other municipal governance mechanisms. Our research has revealed that municipalities engaged with the sharing economy in many ways. We propose a comprehensive analytical framework of the municipal governance of the sharing economy, which includes five governance mechanisms (i.e., regulating, self-governing, providing, enabling and collaborating) and 11 roles [1]. This is based on data from 8 global cities (Amsterdam, Berlin, Gothenburg, London, Malmö, San Francisco, Shanghai and Toronto) and 60 sharing economy organisations (SEOs). Data was collected via a mixed-method approach: a review of academic and grey literature, 170 semi-structured interviews with sharing economy actors, 8 mobile research labs, 7 participant observation workshops and 3 focus groups with sharing economy users. This data was analysed using the framework of municipal governance of the sharing economy. Here we present how the City of Gothenburg governs the sharing economy, and how its governance approach compares to the other seven cities. We focus on Gothenburg as it is one of the municipalities that works strategically with the sharing economy and exhibits most discovered governance mechanisms and roles.

Municipalities regulate SEOs using laws, rules, policies and bans. Gothenburg regulates electric scooters, e.g., Voi and Lime, through land use rules. Municipalities support SEOs by providing tangible resources: money, premises, infrastructure or time of municipal employees. Gothenburg has many examples of this mechanism. It is an owner of Fixoteket, a place to borrow, build or repair goods which is managed by municipal housing companies. Gothenburg acted as an investor by providing financial support to sharing initiatives, e.g., the Bicycle Kitchen. The City acts as a host as it offers parking for the bicycle sharing system Styr och Ställ and premises with lower rents for non-profit activities, e.g., the Toy Library. Gothenburg actively works to open different types of urban data to citizens and companies and is therefore a data provider. Municipalities enable SEOs by communicating about them or offering SEOs with possibilities to network. The City of Gothenburg acted as a communicator by developing the Smart Map with 100+ SEOs together with the NGO Collaborative Economy Gothenburg. It acted as a matchmaker, e.g., by organising in 2020 a network “Circular surfaces and sharing services” for the property owners in the city. Municipalities self-govern their internal operations by promoting the use of sharing services. Different administrations at the City of Gothenburg share used furniture, computers and other equipment. Gothenburg acts as a consumer of sharing services when its employees use bicycle and car pools for work. Cities can also collaborate with SEOs by being a partner or a negotiator. Through the national programme Sharing Cities Sweden, the City of Gothenburg acted as a partner to the Toy Library, an urban land sharing initiative Grow Gothenburg and an experience sharing platform Meet the Locals.

Fixoteket - a place to borrow and repair things, Gothenburg, Sweden

When we compare 7 cities from our study with Gothenburg, the following conclusions can be drawn: 1) Gothenburg uses most of the mechanisms and roles, which indicates its active involvement in the sharing economy. 2) Unlike Gothenburg, governing of SEOs in some cities (e.g., Toronto, Berlin, San Francisco) is rather reactive, i.e., they react when the problems arise and do not always perceive that the sharing economy can contribute to urban sustainability and local goals. 3) In Sweden, the large commercial platforms Uber and Airbnb are regulated nationally. This enables Cities of Gothenburg and Malmö to focus on the local, often small and more genuine SEOs that have greater potential to deliver environmental benefits and contribute to more democratic processes in society. 4) Collaboration between cities and SEOs is often problematic due to the competition rules as municipalities cannot choose to collaborate with certain organisations but should instead treat all equally. A creative way for a city to become “a partner” is via various urban experiments where sharing services can be tested, e.g., the test beds in the Sharing Cities Sweden programme. 5) The approach to how the sharing economy is governed differs in different cities. This is due to many factors including structural, political, economic, cultural and sustainability ones. 6) This research shows that municipalities have a very important role in creating both infrastructure and culture in the city so that the circular and the sharing economy can grow and become institutionalised.

References

[1] Voytenko Palgan Y, Mont O, Sulkakoski S. Governing the sharing economy: Towards a comprehensive analytical framework of municipal governance. Cities 2021;108:102994. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2020.102994.