Royal Geographical Society RGS-IBG Annual International Conference 2019

Minoia, P. (Speaker: Presenter)

Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Organisation and participation in conferences, workshops, courses, seminars

Description

Presentation: "Home sharing economy and entrepreneurialization of the society in Helsinki"
Session: Hopes and Troubles of New Urban Tourism

Period	30 Aug 2019
Event type	Conference
Location	London , United KingdomShow on map
Degree of Recognition	International

Documents & Links

The proliferation of Airbnb listings has been a major issue in tourist cities, such as Barcelona, and Venice, but the number of Airbnb listings is growing rapidly in many Nordic cities too. This is also the case in Helsinki, where Airbnb covers already one fifth of the existing sleeping accommodation. Helsinki’s city officials have acknowledged some of the possible disadvantages related to the dominance of Airbnb in the market, but, at the same time, the city administration is fostering an idea of the city as a platform of entrepreneurial action taken by local residents. Non-professional service provision based on new forms of solidarity are in the core of Helsinki’s new brand concept that emphasizes the importance of “people, encounters and actions with impact” in making the city a more desirable, unique and fun destination. We examine Airbnb as part of wider entrepreneurialization of the society and the self - processes through which private resources are leveraged for value creation. While touching on these ideas through public discourses, we pay attention to how the diffusion of home sharing economy is perceived and negotiated in neighbourhoods that do not (yet) suffer from obvious tourism-related problems such as overtourism. Our presentation is based on our ongoing study that uses discourse analysis of technical reports and media; mapping; landscape analysis; interviews and observation to address this issue.

Related content

Projects
Tourism platforms and urban justice
Project: Research project