The
Sharing Economy
Common goods, private and state
property
The issue of managing common assets
is regaining ground in advanced societies. Some of the shared assets, such as
environmental knowledge and resources,
have indeed acquired major importance. It thus becomes essential, again, to address the highly complex issue of
the commons to overcome the economic and
ecological crisis.
Paradoxically so, this ancient topic presents
itself in new and original forms. In fact, we can state, without the fear of
being proved wrong, that human history
began with common assets, that is, when local communities started sharing goods.
Nowadays, however, apart from being a local phenomenon, commons have acquired
a global dimension as well.
In primitive societies, there was obviously neither state nor private or
individual property: agricultural, hunting and pastures, water and natural
resources were common property – not in legal, but in factual terms – as they
were controlled and managed by the
community, on the basis of well-established rules, sanctions, hierarchies and
rites.
Individual property did not exist and control over common resources was
exerted predominantly by adults and by the elders, whereas women and youngsters
were generally excluded.
Even though formal institutions of private property and state powers have
been developed, through a slow and gradual process, important forms of common
property still remain, such as pastures, catchment basins or fisheries and
hunting areas.
Some of the forms of assets shared by local communities have been
studied in particularby Elinor Ostrom, the American scholar who won the 2009
Nobel Prize in Economics. Her researches focused on the ways of managing commons
and scarce materials such as pastures, water basins and fisheries.
