The Inner Sharing Economy in Tourism: From Transactional Platforms to Conscious Co-Existence

This conceptual paper rethinks the sharing economy in tourism by explaining why sharing-based tourism can generate access, connection, and opportunity while also producing commodification, inequality, social tension, and environmental pressure. Drawing on debates on platformization, trust, authenticity, sustainability, and post-growth tourism, the study introduces the Inner Sharing Economy in Tourism (ISE-T) framework. ISE-T conceptualizes sharing not as a linear progression or purely transactional practice, but as four relational orientations: transactional sharing, relational sharing, meaningful sharing, and conscious co-existence. These orientations may coexist, dominate, weaken, or be reactivated across commercial platforms, community-based tourism, non-profit hospitality exchange, and regenerative tourism. The paper contributes by shifting attention from platforms alone to the inner orientations through which sharing is understood, organized, and transformed. It also offers a diagnostic framework for redirecting sharing toward more relational, meaningful, and ethically conscious forms of sustainable tourism.