This week we conclude the video series, The roles of city governments in the sharing economy, with the fifth mechanism through which municipalities govern sharing economy organisations: ‘collaborating.’

In a collaborative mechanism both parties — municipalities and sharing economy organisations — play active roles in the governance process. At least two city roles can be identified here: the ‘city as a negotiator’ and the ‘city as a partner.’

The ‘city as a negotiator’ role refers to the instances when municipalities and sharing economy platforms negotiate on common principles and rules for the operation of platforms. For example, the City of Amsterdam was the first in Europe to negotiate a deal with the home sharing platform Airbnb. The ‘city as a partner’ role is often present when a municipality seeks to address its urban sustainability challenges through its engagement with the sharing community. In Sweden, the City of Malmö collaborates with Stapeln, which is a maker space that hosts many collaborative and sharing initiatives. The City of Gothenburg through the national programme Sharing Cities Sweden collaborates with the Clothes Library, the Toy Library, a repair workshop for bicycles Bike Kitchen, a platform that connects land-owners with urban farmers Grow Gothenburg, and a platform that connects Gothenburg visitors with its citizens Meet the Locals.

To learn more about these and other examples from the cities of Amsterdam, Gothenburg and Malmö see film “The Roles of City Governments in the Sharing Economy — Collaborating” here:

This is the last episode in the video series The roles of city governments in the sharing economy. Previous episodes discussed governance mechanisms of regulating, self-governing, providing and enabling. You may watch the whole video series here.

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These films are based on the research done in two research projects: Sharing and the City (funded by Swedish Research Council Formas) and Urban Sharing research programme, which has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No 771872). The films are a part of the Sharing Cities Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) developed at the International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics (IIIEE), Lund University, Sweden, and funded through the Sharing Cities Sweden project.