Framing the collaborative economy -Voices of contestation

- As it stands, the sharing or collaborative economy remains a highly contested and heterogeneous concept.
- This heterogeneity makes the search for a globally-applicable definition questionable.
- The paper employs the Q method to analyze the subjective perceptions of heterogeneous actors involved in the sharing or collaborative economy.
- The different ways of understanding the concept reflect multiple interests, objectives and values of the involved groups.
- Local approaches, e.g. on city-level, can be helpful in governance and preventing further co-option of the concept by purely commercial interests, particularly in a multi-stakeholder setting.

Within the context of multiple crises and change, a range of practices discussed under the umbrella term of collaborative (or sharing) economy have been gaining considerable attention. Supporters build an idealistic vision of collaborative societies. Critics have been stripping the concept of its visionary potential, questioning its revolutionary nature. In the study, these debates are brought down to the local level in search for common perceptions among the co-creators of the concept in Vienna, Austria. Towards this aim a Q study is conducted, i.e. a mixed method enabling analyses of subjective perceptions on socially contested topics. Four framings are identified: Visionary Supporters, Market Optimists, Visionary Critics, and Sceptics, each bringing their values, visions, and practical goals characteristic of different understanding of the collaborative economy. The study questions the need for building a globally-applicable definition of the concept, calls for more context-sensitivity, exploratory studies, and city-level multi-stakeholder dialogues.