The dark side of the sharing economy: A systematic literature review of externalities and their regulation

Abstract

As the sharing economy has grown, externalities, i.e., “dark sides,” have also surfaced. The intricacies surrounding these externalities and their regulatory measures have garnered significant scholarly interest; however, there remains a lack of comprehensive guidance on the appropriate regulatory approaches. Based on a systematic literature review of 99 papers, we provide an overview of two regulatory approaches (government and self-regulation) to address the sharing economy's economic, social, and environmental externalities affecting multiple stakeholders. We show that government regulation entails mechanisms based on avoiding, limiting, and guiding, while self-regulation entails mechanisms related to market entry, operation, and monitoring. We develop an externalities-based regulatory framework to suggest how these two approaches and recommended regulatory mechanisms could address each externality. Furthermore, we use our regulatory framework as a base to suggest a future research agenda and to discuss managerial implications.