1.2.1. The genesis of the sharing economy and the break with “consumer” society

Etymologically speaking, the word “to share” comes from the Latin partes agere: partes means “to make equal parts” and agere means “to push” and “to activate”. As a result, the concept has existed since antiquity and combines the two meanings: to divide an entity for a specific purpose. This can be a sharing of inheritance to benefit all heirs, or a sharing of power to delegate certain responsibilities.

In the notion of the “sharing economy”, each of the two words has kept its specificity.

Sharing always means leaving a part of something that belongs to us to one or more people, no matter how this action is carried out. It is the combination of the two words that makes the difference.

Indeed, the sharing economy has become the apanage of the solidarity economy and has experienced a staggering growth in recent years thanks to the development of information technology and mobile technology. Via software, or more precisely platforms, business transactions and meetings between suppliers and service providers are growing exponentially.

The term “sharing economy” was first added to the Oxford Dictionary in 2015. Similarly, the scientific literature on the concept is relatively new. Researchers looked at different aspects of the sharing economy using different names.

Among the names used, we can mention:

• – peer-to-peer economy;
• – collaborative economy;
• – collaborative production and collaborative consumption;
• – access economy;
• – consumption based on access;
• – local economy;
• – peer production based on commonality and mesh size;
• – product-system service and on-demand economy;
• – wholesale economics;
• – platform economy.

Nevertheless, the term “sharing economy” is the most commonly used term in the literature (Ranjbari et al. 2018).

“We believe that the economy of sharing can be the defining story of the 21st Century if we come together to build it.” These are the words of Natalie Foster, co-founder and executive director of Peers.org. The defenders of this ideology want to fight overconsumption and waste, create social equity and make the shared economy the “economic model of the third millennium”.

The sharing economy wants to break with the consumption practices that have occurred since the Industrial Revolution, where consumers are forced to consume excessively. It began after the Second World War and reached its peak in the years known as the Glorious Thirty.

Consumer society was born with the advent of Taylor’s theory and the launch of assembly line work. This process has resulted in an abundance of products and reduced prices, which have become accessible to all segments of society.

The bewitching power of advertising must be added to this, which manipulates the consumer at the whim of producers:

Advertising is the main instrument of manipulation, in fact, it conditions, brings a subliminal perception and influences the population subconsciously. Over the years, it has mobilized mental manipulation techniques from human sciences to encourage consumers to buy.¹

Without question, the consumer society has allowed man to satisfy his every desire for goods and services and to live in unavoidable comfort. A vehicle for moving, water and energy brought to your home, sophisticated objects for entertainment and many other gadgets. Nevertheless, it has had negative consequences, which have been denounced since the 1960s, in particular by George Katona, inventor of the term “consumer society” and initiator of consumer psychology.

At that time, “markets were not yet globalized; private and public spheres of life were not as commercialized as today; and the information and digital communication society was not yet born” (Reisch 2008).

The alternative to the consumer society was the unrelenting collaborative society, which aims to deal with the hyper-consumption that has governed consumer behavior for several years. The pivot of this new trend is “collaborative consumption”, which is defined as “the set of resource circulation systems that allow consumers to use and provide valuable resources temporarily or permanently, through direct interaction with another consumer or through a mediator” (Decrop 2017).

The concept of collaborative consumption was initiated by Felson and Spaeth in 1978, long before the boom in mobile technology and social networks, with a different objective than the one that is “now attributed to the concept” (Ertz 2017).

Collaborative consumption has changed the subjective conception of the value of goods and services, well known in the currents of economic thought. Indeed, collaborative consumption is based on a new principle of “access/use rather than purchase/ownership of goods, capital or services”, by pooling their personal resources (Decrop 2017).

Collaborative consumption is considered an economic model, in that it has brought about change in society by using old values, such as giving and altruism.

By affirming that collaborative consumption is the ultimate alternative to excessive consumption, Botsman and Rogers (2010) use examples of companies “within this model” in order to highlight the specificities of the different practices and trends of this new consumption model (Bicrel 2012).

This view is shared by a large number of authors who argue that collaborative behavior is increasingly becoming a socio-economic option for the economic crises of the capitalist model and a possible response to environmental problems.

The “abandonment” of abusive consumption behavior is imminent, and even if it is does not happen today, it is starting to seep into individuals’ morals. It is now the objective of the collaborative economy.

1.2.2. The sharing economy: which economy?

Sharing, in the formal sense of the word, means “to divide a whole into several pieces in order to own it with others”. But in this case, sharing means “to take part in a whole or to benefit from a part of a service or good”.

The representation of the economy according to the sharing orthodoxy revisits the economic reality. Does it simplify it? Or does it complicate it even more? We are not ready to decide, but we can argue that this is a new “identification” or “modeling” of the economy.

The characteristic of this model lies in the novelty of the process of sharing goods and services. Indeed, exchanges follow a horizontal and decentralized trajectory between individuals, by modifying the redistribution system (Penn 2016).

The sharing economy embodies a new socio-economic system based on the exchange of goods (vehicles, housing, tools, etc.) and services (carpooling, take-back, etc.) between individuals. It may involve profit-based transactions, in other words, there is a monetary exchange, or it may involve giving, bartering or volunteer activities.

But what makes the sharing economy famous?

The thing that offers all these opportunities for exchange and makes this new business model famous is a technical instrument: the “digital platform”. The sharing economy is thus also called the “platform economy”. It is defined as being constituted by trades between “peers with platforms, acting as brokers between them” (Nicot 2017).

Platforms ensure the success of the sharing economy because they contain several features:

First, the platforms provide an algorithm for efficient matching between labor providers and users. Second, technology reduces transaction costs because platforms can also facilitate micro-transactions. Third, platforms provide services to reduce or manage the risks associated with market transactions, thereby addressing market failures, in other words, incomplete or erroneous information. (Drahokoupil and Fabo 2016)

The sharing economy is not just a fashionable phenomenon. Today, an increasing number of companies depend on the intensive use of digital platforms, which allows for an easy relationship between supply and demand, in addition to the trust required by users.

Even materialistic consumers, who are more inclined to own things, are attracted to the sharing economy, and projections show that the main sharing sectors, namely carpooling, online staffing, music and video streaming, finance and housing have the potential to increase global incomes from about $15 billion to about $335 billion by 2025. Such exponential growth is a reminder of the importance of the subject in both theory and practice (Ranjbari et al. 2018).

It also creates jobs, can support the ecological cause (shared resources, reduction of negative effects) and can remedy excessive consumption (Torfs 2016a). It contributes to the achievement of the objectives of sustainable development, namely the sustainability of the economy.

Like any economic model, the sharing economy draws on basic elements to build its theory, through the formalization of the economic phenomenon and hypotheses, so as to identify its functioning and the scope of its model.

What are the foundations of the sharing economy? What does the technical nature of digital platforms give it?

Certainly, technology has attributed a particularity to the sharing economy in terms of conceptualization, but it remains a concept based on currents of theoretical reflection.

1.3.1. Peer-to-peer (P2P): a revolution in computer networks

The advent of the Internet has changed the way humans behave in relation to their ways of consuming. The prowess of IT has not only shaken up “the way in which purchases are made between online sales professionals and a consumer. Web 2.0 and its myriad of social networks are changing our relationships with others and also our way of consuming” (Evroux et al. 2014).

The tremendous expansion of the social web is embodied in peer-to-peer (P2P) technology, with the initial sharing of media, music and video files. The proper meaning of the word peer-to-peer is “node-to-node”. In this process, the interconnected nodes share resources with each other without using a centralized administrative system. In other words, each node of the computer network is both client and server, unlike the old client-server model.

The success of the P2P system as a social phenomenon has important economic (rights and taxes) and moral (knowledge exchange) consequences. It allows efficiency in the use of networks and economic performance (reduction of infrastructure costs and exploitation of the high inactive potential at the edge of the Internet (Benoît-Moreau 2006)).

The P2P network was mainly known under the Napster² brand. In this application, the P2P network concept was used to share media files, in other words, the exchange of compressed MPEG Layer3 (mp3) audio files. However, P2P is not only about file sharing, it is also about establishing multimedia, video, document and cryptography communication networks based on resource sharing (Schollmeier 2001).

Since its invention, P2P technology has been defined in several ways by computer theorists and professionals. Michel Bauwens³ describes P2P as “a form of network-based organization, based on the free participation of equipotent partners engaged in the production and use of common resources”.

Peer-to-peer does not use financial compensation as the main motivation, and it does not use traditional command and control methods:

It creates something common rather than a market or a state, and relies on social relationships to allocate resources, rather than a price mechanism or hierarchical system. (Evroux et al. 2014)

Bauwens’ definition considers the P2P system as a non-profit social organization, its only ambition is to share data between individuals, whether they are producers or users. It follows a protocol created by society and for society, without there being a system of supervision, and it tries to moralize the use of technology.

The Intel Working Group defines P2P as “the sharing of IT resources and services through direct exchange between systems”. Alex Weytsel of the Aberdeen Group considers P2P to be “the use of devices on the outskirts of the Internet without the customer’s ability”.

Ross Lee Graham identifies P2P according to three main requirements: possession of a server-quality operational computer, registration at an independent address, and the ability to cope with flexible connectivity (Milojicic et al. 2002).

Clay Shirky of O’Reilly and Associates is based on the following definition:

P2P is a class of applications that takes advantage of the resources – storage, cycles, content, human presence – available on Internet devices. (Evroux et al. 2014)

In this case, Shirky summarized the main operational elements of P2P into three concepts (Koulouris 2010) in 2001:

• – Presence: this includes the ability to say when a resource is online. Determining the presence of a resource is necessary for P2P networks, as the permanent availability of resources is not guaranteed. Once a user or resource’s online presence is established, any number of highly personalized services can be offered. Presence is essential for the creation of user-centric systems, such as instant messaging.
• – Identity: P2P networks must be able to uniquely identify available resources. The identification systems that were used were not suitable for machines permanently connected to the Internet and users without a stable IP address (see Box 1.2) could not be recognized or identified. Thus, P2P technology solves this problem by using its own naming system.
• – P2P networks make it possible to use the resources available at the “limits” of the Internet: processing power, storage, content, human presence. This is in contrast to current client/server services, where usable resources are concentrated in servers: the “core” areas of the Internet. P2P services organize a grouping of resources of variable size belonging to the participants and allow them to use it collectively.

Lastly, Kindberg believes that P2P system resources have independent lifespans (Deepak and Sanjay 2005).

All these definitions have outlined a profile of P2P technology, each with a specific approach. However, they all agree on two main characteristics. The first is that P2P technology can evolve, as there are no algorithmic or technical restrictions on system size. The second is that it is reliable, because the malfunction of a given node does not affect the entire system (Ding et al. 2005). It offers a wide range of opportunities and paves the way for initiatives and innovations in the field of the sharing economy.

P2P is a technical support and an asset to materialize exchanges between people. It is certainly essential, but it is not enough to make the sharing economy a realistic alternative to hyper-consumption, in terms of an economic model.

1.3.2. The gift: the abstract aspect of the sharing economy

There are subjective aspects inspired by ethics and human value that are a substantial base for sharing between people. The “gift” is one of these aspects. It is the act by which a person voluntarily disposes of a good or service for the benefit of another person (or organization), without financial compensation. If there are no monetary benefits, can we even be talking of an economic act? The question seems absurd.

Most of the time, gifting is not approached from an economic perspective, but rather from a socio-philosophical point of view. Thus, “a gift is a privileged object of anthropology and economic sociology since the essay on gifting by M. Mauss”⁵ (Athané 2008).

These disciplines try to explain the embedding of economics in the norms that control social relations. Embedding in Polanyi’s⁶ sense refers to the inclusion of the economy, as a means of satisfying human needs, in political and cultural orders that govern certain forms of movement of goods and services (Carvalho and Dzimira 2000).

Much research has focused on the issues of the role of giving in a business and the market value of the deed of giving. In the economic context, gifting is subtly integrated into the behavior of economic agents. “For many economists and managers, it is a social practice, of an emotional or moral nature, that is beyond their area of competence” (Gomez et al. 2015).

The logic of giving is an exception in commercial society. It is the opposite of merchant exchange, it is one-way. The donor does not expect any consideration when he decides to bequeath ownership of his property (Lasida 2009).

For some, to evoke giving in economics is an absurdity, they believe that several obstacles stand in the way of the gift being able to design a new economic model. For them, an economic good (or service) has an immediate value in use, in other words, it must have a monetary value to be exchanged.

However, if the issue of giving in the economy or market economy is addressed in a social context, it is likely to foster the social relationships that have developed in the market (Lasida 2009).

In their book on giving in a company, Gomez et al. (2015) argue that giving and free donation are found throughout the company and in markets:

The helping hand to a colleague, the return of an elevator, the free transfer of information, corporate gifts, free discounts to the customer, the service provided without being obliged to do so, etc.

This approach will help us to explain the “presence of the gift” in economic activity. Indeed, if we are in the new economic sociology, the market, in addition to being the (geographical or virtual) place where the supplier and the demander meet, “characterizes a specific form of social relationship: one in which prices determine relationships to things and individuals, even if these prices result from a struggle between agents before the results of this struggle are imposed on them” (Steiner 2012).

Economic sociology considers the market as a social structure. Steiner (2005) uses Swedberg’s (Swedberg and Smelser 1994) thought process to support this idea:

My main objective, however, will be to examine markets from a particular perspective, such as a specific type of social structure. Although social structure can be defined in different ways, this term is generally understood as a kind of recurrent and structured interaction between agents, maintained by means of sanctions.

Thus, he argues the following:

Contemporary economic sociology is interested in the origin of this social structure, in other words, the rules that allow it to function; it studies its different forms and researches the reasons for their evolution. This is now called the social construction of markets. Moreover, by highlighting the shareholder aspect, contemporary economic sociology is led to consider the question of self-interested behavior in this constructivist framework.

The considerations of economic sociology confirm that the economic aspect is “always socially situated”. They reaffirm that economic exchange depends on people-to-people relationships and “extra-economic factors” (Pascal 2002).

In other words, economic sociology integrates social consideration into economic activity by using concepts illustrating free trade, namely “giving and the social and solidarity economy”. It should be noted, however, that the paradigm of gifting and the solidarity economy current does not have a consensus. According to Steiner in 1999, they are “either excluded from the field of economic sociology”, or according to Levesque et al. in 2001, they are “included in it” (cited in (Lasida 2009)).

With reference to Godboult’s book (1992), giving finds its place in the economic sphere. The author integrates it into the business and corporate world with finesse. It certifies that the gift is for the “service of the circulation of things, the sale and disposal of products”.

Godboult’s latest reflection is based on Carnegie’s work, particularly his book⁷ on the personal development method adapted to the business world, published in 1936. He gave the giving formula to the business community and the market. In her book, Carnegie shares the lessons learned from her extremely successful experience of her years of leadership (Godboult 1992).

These lessons do not focus on power theft or career research. On the contrary, he discovered that to become more powerful and strengthen business, people had to be treated with kindness alone. The author suggests that the businessman should give before he hopes to receive. He suggests that the businessman be sincere by offering gifts before the merchandise, because the disinterest he shows is felt through the way he gestures, looks or simply does things.

Carnegie’s book describes the attitude that the businessman must adopt towards people. His behavior must emanate from the human values governing social relations (loyalty, faithfulness, impartiality, transparency, enthusiasm, team spirit) and the utilitarianism that prevails in the business world must kindly integrate the logic of giving.

The interest that giving theory evokes in economic sociology is not the same as that in economics and management. In these disciplines:

theories such as liberal theory, the neoclassical business model and the utilitarian paradigm exert an overwhelming dominance, both in scientific publications and in educational programs at universities and business schools. (Masclef 2013)

Thus, gifting remains a marginal phenomenon that does not reflect the reality of utilitarianism and exchange.

In this context, Godboult (1992) indicated that two economists, François Perroux (in 1960) and Serge Christophe Kolm (in 1984), specified three complementary economic systems: the market system, governed by interest, the planning system, governed by constraint, and the gift system, without considering the gift as an economic system.

The author unfurls his analysis by stating that:

The giving system is not primarily an economic system, but the social system of person-to-person relationships. It is not a complement to the market or the plan, but a complement to the economy and the State. And it is even more fundamental, more important than they are, as the example of disorganized countries shows. In the East, or in the Third World, where the market and the State are unable or no longer able to organize themselves, there ultimately still remains a network of interpersonal relations cemented by gift and mutual aid which, alone, makes it possible to survive in a world of madness.

Also, some analyses show that social exchanges do not oppose economic logic, on the contrary: they give it meaning (Alter 2010). Material exchanges between individuals intrinsically involve social ties and can lead to non-reciprocal economic relations. That is to say, to give without waiting for a material counterpart. In other words, in its quest for efficiency, economic activity, particularly business activity, is imbued with philanthropic and altruistic social values and is not focused on making profits.

Some global economies have understood the role of social values in the consolidation and sustainability of their business. Indeed, several researchers have been interested in the Japanese model in this context.

Japanese companies are drawing on their social culture, which is based on nine concepts:

National sentiment (pride), honor, reliance on virtue, respect for tradition (weight of history), respect for authority, social conformity, consensus (harmony), sense of work (taste for effort) and pragmatism. (Verne and Meier 2013)

These virtues give Japanese companies a specific character. The manager and employees believe in these values and act in a collective spirit of cooperation, commitment and firmness.

Companies are proud of their role in society by contributing to the “well-being and prosperity of employees, customers and suppliers, in addition to the community as a whole” (Rolland-Piégue 2011). In doing so, Japanese companies strengthen solidarity in their communities and awaken the spirit of sharing and giving in each of the stakeholders.

Thus, the gift, as an economy that supports exchange between people, lays the foundations for an economy based on social norms.

1.3.3. The service economy and the offer of use

Among the theories that have been mobilized to explain the purpose of the sharing economy, is the service economy. It is an economy that offers an alternative to excessive consumption of products and favors the use of a good over its ownership.

The concept of the “service economy” appeared in 1986 at the initiative of Walter Stahel and Granini (Bourg and Buclet 2005).

It was approached by two theoretical schools. The Anglo-Saxon School, whose thought processes are based on the Product Service System (PSS) model. The main contributors to this school are Walter Stahel, Buclet, Okasana. The second school is the École française de l'économie de la fonctionnalité et de la coopération (French school of service economy and cooperation or EFC), whose ideas are mainly supported by Christophe Sempels and Christian Du Terre (Chaput 2015).

Stahel (2006) testifies that:

The service economy, which aims to optimize the use – or function – of goods and services, focuses on the management of existing wealth, in the form of products, knowledge or natural capital. The economic objective is to create the highest possible usage value for as long as possible, while consuming the least amount of material resources and energy possible. The aim is to achieve greater competitiveness and an increase in corporate income. (Van Neil 2007)

It is also defined by ADEME (Agence de l'environnement et de la maîtrise de l'énergie – Agency of the environment and the control of energy) as the economy which “consists of providing companies, individuals or territories with integrated solutions for services and goods based on the sale of a performance of usage or a usage and not on the sale of goods alone. These solutions must allow a lower consumption of natural resources in a circular economy perspective, an increase in people’s well-being and economic development”.

The basic idea of this concept involves the new view of the economic value of goods. While the traditional approach to economic and measurable character considers its cost, supply and demand, the contemporary approach, inspired by the principles of sustainable development, considers that economic value practically doesn’t include the damage inflicted on the environment by the production and over-consumption of this good. Therefore, in the absence of integrating negative externalities (of the production and use of the good), the value of the good no longer concerns its appropriation, but rather its use.

The service economy is a new business model, as it reorganizes the relationship between the market, the company and the consumer. Indeed, since the advent of industrialization, the focus of economic activity has been on large scale production and consumption. The objective of this economic situation was to produce more in order to satisfy consumption while constantly changing goods and services:

For a company, the growth of its markets goes hand in hand with the increase in number of units produced, related to the acceleration of the redundancy of its products. This redundancy is frequently ‘programmed’, either by influencing the material lifetime of products designed to no longer be repairable, or by stimulating consumers to equip themselves with the latest innovations, few of which constitute radical innovations responding to new needs and/or uses. (Buclet 2005)

However, the era of industrialization is no longer the representative of dream of the Trente Glorieuses, the 30-year period following the end of World War Two. According to Fordist doctrine, mass production for mass consumption is no longer perceived as an advantage for the well-being of people:

For many economists (Gadrey in 2002, Gadrey and Zarifian in 2002, Du Tertre in 2008 and 2009), overcoming the Fordist crisis implies the implementation of a new form of economic organization based on a service-oriented dynamic approach that they must present as a central phenomenon in current economic and societal developments. The idea would no longer be to buy the good you need, but to rent the service provided by its consumption. (Vaileanu-Paun and Boutillier 2012)

The principle of this new model is to change the relationship between the company and the consumer. This does not mean that the objectives of the company or the consumer have changed. Consumers are always looking to satisfy their well-being by considering the new situation (economic crisis, ecological crisis, etc.). The company also thinks about its profitability interest by remaining the owner of the assets and selling their uses (Buclet 2005).

Practices in the context of this logic are adopted by several well-known companies around the world: Michelin, Xerox, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft and many others.

It should be noted, however, that the development of the service economy depends on the prowess of the Internet, and we have previously demonstrated the role of digital platforms in economic activity. Indeed:

The Internet is not only the technical support for the transformations that give rise to the digital economy, it is also the driving force behind this new economy. (Brousseau and Curien 2001)

The service economy is considered as a new economic model that can change the relationships between economic players.

The question that challenges us is therefore: to what extent can this new economy contribute to the well-being of populations on an economic, social and environmental level?

The service economy is an economic model based on the substitution of the use of a good for its ownership, it is a solution that promotes the concept of “decoupling” between the added value created by economic activity and the consumption of energy and raw materials. “Decoupling is the breaking of the links between ‘environmental ailments’ and economic goods” (OECD 2004).

Decoupling is divided into two categories:

Relative and absolute decoupling. Relative or weak decoupling occurs when environmental pressures increase at a slower rate than economic growth; and absolute decoupling or strong decoupling occurs when the economic variable increases while environmental pressures stagnate or decrease. (Laurent 2011)

Conventionally, economic growth refers to the substantial increase in output measured by the macroeconomic aggregate known as GDP (gross domestic product). This increase also requires the intensive use of natural resources and energy, leading to environmental degradation through the overexploitation of resources and the formation of waste. The interest of decoupling lies in reversing the relationship between production and use of natural resources and energy.

Indeed:

Decoupling occurs when the wealth created (usually measured by gross domestic product) in an economy increases faster than the amount of natural resources used or consumed. The decoupling can be relative or absolute: in the first case, the amount of resources used or consumed continues to increase. In the case of absolute decoupling, the use or consumption of resources decreases while the wealth created increases. (Nicklaus 2017)

The service economy model novelty is that the creation of added value is not based on the company’s overall turnover, but on the optimal use of the good (Damesin 2013).

The objective of the service economy is to improve the well-being of populations. However, the concept of decoupling is considered in some research as a “myth”. Tim Jackson’s book sheds light on the impossibility of establishing an absolute decoupling between economic growth and the negative externalities generated by resource consumption. He argues that relative decoupling can be achieved with technological advances, but that absolute decoupling is out of reach, and would even be a dangerous illusion (Laurent 2011). Companies therefore request relative decoupling.

According to Jackson, absolute decoupling is out of reach and it can even be a dangerous pipe dream (Laurent 2011). As a result, the decoupling between economic growth, environmental impacts and resource consumption is imminent, even if pessimistic researchers persist. Despite this pessimism, relative decoupling is requested by companies because there is less pressure on them.

The service economy is thus defined and has been mobilized according to three referential theories, namely the service economy and cooperation (EFC), Product Service Systems (known as PSS) and the functional economy (this theory has been defined in the previous sections) (ADEME 2017).

The approaches used to explain the service economy have identified two economic models that are at odds with the industrial model of intensive growth. The “service-based” model and the “life cycle” model.

The service-based model marks the advent of an economic rationale based on the value in use of the good, whose added value is calculated in relation to the sale of the service derived from this good and not on the basis of the production and sale of this good.

In this context, ADEME (2017) defines this model as follows:

This logic corresponds to the development of service and customer relations that is focused on the useful effects and performance of usage of the resolution, mainly by valuing the intangible resources on which the company’s activity is based (skills, trust, organizational relevance, etc.).

It mobilizes beneficiaries, industrialists, local authorities and citizen-consumers in a co-production and long-term commitment dynamic. Innovation covers all aspects of the business model. This service-oriented logic aims to increase the value created and the quality of the offer, by eliminating the logic of production in volume associated with the reduction of unit costs.

To complete this model, which does not particularly consider the product life cycle, the life cycle model is used. The purpose of this approach is to improve the environmental performance of products:

It allows products to be designed differently by taking their environmental impacts throughout their life cycle into account. Thanks to this new look at products, this approach makes it possible to generate new ideas and be creative. (ADEME 2012)

The novelty in this concept is in “the technological evolution of the goods that are made available, in this case the extension of the lifespan of goods, and in the logistics put in place to ensure the closure of the physical flows of goods and materials. It requires the company’s business model to evolve” (ADEME 2017).

While the two models (service-based and life cycle) seem to be complementary, they nevertheless present some disparities.

Thus, the service-oriented logic aims for the performance of the use of the good and not just its availability in the hands of the customer. “Service-oriented logic is based on the company’s intangible assets.”

[This] intangible capital is essentially linked to the company’s competencies (professionalization of people, knowledge, know-how, etc.), the relevance of the company’s organization and offer (intangible and technological R&D, marketing, relevance of the integration of goods and services), trust between stakeholders (cooperation, reputation, internal and external communication) and the health of workers. (ADEME 2017)

The value of intangible factors in the company determines the success of a service strategy in the context of the service economy.

As for the life cycle logic, the company undertakes selling the use of the good, while remaining the owner. In this case, the company will not adopt a planned strategy of redundancy. It will be responsible for the maintenance of the assets, particularly if it manufactures them itself and manages them throughout their life cycle:

Extending the life of assets is not the only potential benefit. In theory, a looped management of assets will be facilitated. Manufacturers, retaining ownership of the products, will be able to reuse components and recycle materials to make new products. These practices will be encouraged all the more as the costs and risks of shortages of virgin raw materials are high. (ADEME 2017)

Even if you can approach the service economy with both logics, the life cycle logic is similar to the notion of the circular economy, unlike the service-oriented logic which has a tendency to replace the service economy.

Basically, the economy of sharing has been introduced by three theories: the free market and P2P economy, the giving economy and the service economy. The theoretical foundations of collaborative practices can also be placed in a religious context. Monotheistic religions all agree on the principle of sharing between humans and consider that giving part of one’s goods to the other is an act of faith emanating from a sensitive and virtuous soul.