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Yuliya Voytenko Palgan

Yuliya Voytenko Palgan

Senior lecturer

Yuliya Voytenko Palgan

Urban sharing in smart cities : the cases of Berlin and London

Author

  • Lucie Zvolska
  • Matthias Lehner
  • Yuliya Voytenko Palgan
  • Oksana Mont
  • Andrius Plepys

Summary, in English

Addressing urban sustainability challenges requires changes in the way systems of provision and services are designed, organised and delivered. In this context, two promising phenomena have gained interest from the academia, the public sector and the media: “smart cities” and “urban sharing”. Smart cities rely on the extensive use of information and communications technology (ICT) to increase efficiencies in urban areas, while urban sharing builds on the collaborative use of idling resources enabled by ICT in densely populated cities. The concepts have many similar features and share common goals, yet cities with smart city agendas often fail to take a stance on urban sharing. Thus, its potentials are going largely unnoticed by local governments. This article addresses this issue by exploring cases of London and Berlin – two ICT-dense cities with clearly articulated smart city agendas and an abundance of sharing platforms. Drawing on urban governance literature, we develop a conceptual framework that specifies the roles that cities assume when governing urban sharing: city as regulator, city as provider, city as enabler and city as consumer. We find that both cities indirectly support urban sharing through smart agenda programmes, which aim to facilitate ICT-enabled technical innovation and emergence of start-ups. However, programmes, strategies, support schemes and regulations aimed directly at urban sharing initiatives are few. We also find that Berlin is sceptical towards urban sharing organisations, while London took more of a collaborative approach. Implications for policy-makers are discussed in the end.

Department/s

  • The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics

Publishing year

2019-07-03

Language

English

Pages

628-645

Publication/Series

Local Environment

Volume

24

Issue

7

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Carfax Publishing

Topic

  • Information Systems
  • Political Science (excluding Public Administration Studies and Globalization Studies)

Keywords

  • sharing economy
  • smart cities
  • sustainability
  • Urban governance
  • urban sharing

Status

Published

Project

  • Urban Reconomy: sharing for circular resource efficiency
  • Urban Sharing: From excess economy to access economy
  • Sharing and the City
  • Urban Sharing: Sustainability and Institutionalisation Pathways

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1354-9839