Loan, power, and morals. An ethnological study of the social and cultural significances of lending and borrowing in the Sharing economy and the Credit society
The sharing economy and the credit society are frequently used expressions in today s economic debate. They make up the framework of this study, as borrowing practices are a central ingredient in both. In the sharing economy borrowing is regarded as desirable and without problems, in the credit society as a necessary evil. Depictions of borrowing in media are often coloured by strong opinions and agitated feelings. This tells us that loans are culturally combustible zones, pointing at the social categorizing, power, and morality that surround money, property, justice, and freedom of action in society. The aim of this project is to increase the understanding and knowledge of the cultural meanings and social practices surrounding the loan of money and material things in the past, the present, and the future of Sweden.
By examining how the loan is discursively narrated, but also enacted, materialized, and embodied, I want to examine how everyday life in the 1900s has shaped- and been shaped by - beliefs, norms, and feelings about credit relationships and loans of objects; how social relationships and networks of trust and dependence have been affected by lending practices; and how differences in the perception of loans can be linked to intersecting identity factors such as gender, age, class background, ethnicity, etc.?
Collection of interviews, questionnaire answers, and excerpts from digital discussion forums, as well as older folk memories, will form the empirical base.
By examining how the loan is discursively narrated, but also enacted, materialized, and embodied, I want to examine how everyday life in the 1900s has shaped- and been shaped by - beliefs, norms, and feelings about credit relationships and loans of objects; how social relationships and networks of trust and dependence have been affected by lending practices; and how differences in the perception of loans can be linked to intersecting identity factors such as gender, age, class background, ethnicity, etc.?
Collection of interviews, questionnaire answers, and excerpts from digital discussion forums, as well as older folk memories, will form the empirical base.
Final report
Loan, power, and morals. An ethnological study of the social and cultural significances of lending and borrowing in the Sharing Economy and the Credit Society. Dnr 16:0145
Aim and development
The aim of the project is to arrive at a better understanding and knowledge of the cultural meanings and social practices that surround loans of money and material objects in Sweden in the past, present, and future. This reflects both an ambition to deepen basic research on lending and borrowing and a desire for these insights to be applied in discussions about future lending practices. To draw attention to basic practices and processes by linking to current research conducted in, for example, social anthropology, sociology, critical market studies, economics and sustainability studies on the circulation and transfer of material things, goods and assets, as well as value associated with various processes, I wanted to investigate the following questions: to whom should one lend, and who dares to ask for a loan? What should one be allowed to borrow money for and how should it be repaid? How should one value the possessions that are lent, and how can one act if a loan agreement is broken? Is it acceptable to say no to someone who wants to borrow, or should you always share? With the help of these questions, I have been able to study major societal changes and challenges concerning sustainability, consumption habits, participation, equality and poverty risk based on an established ethnological methodology focusing on everyday seemingly small events.
The project has focused slightly more on the borrowing of things, both between private individuals and in various public organizations. This is because during the first year, there was a great deal of interest in the media, among politicians, decision-makers and researchers for the opportunities and problems of the burgeoning sharing economy. It therefore felt relevant to document and investigate lending activities in this area. All the time, however, the comparison between borrowing and lending money and things has been relevant in interviews and questionnaire responses, and in this way it has been possible to compare different types of loans. The historical perspective was given less space in the study than was originally intended. It has mainly been captured through the processing of older questionnaire responses. The implementation has largely been able to follow the plan. Due to teaching during the first year, I have used the opportunity to extend the project over four years. The empirical material collection have been accomplished according to plan.
Results and conclusions
An important goal was to draw attention to how an everyday, unreflective and self-evident act - to borrow and lend - is expressed and regulated through ideas and norms, values and moral positions, social relations and specific materiality. This has been possible through a cultural analysis of extensive empirical material that has value both as contemporary documentation and as a basis for future research. The ethnographic survey has resulted in the following research data:
• 30 semi-structured in-depth interviews with people of different ages, employment, place of residence and background. There are also people who are active in newly started initiatives such as “leisure banks”, clothing libraries, free shops, etc., which has been particularly important to document.
• Recorded observations of various lending activities.
• More than a hundred answers to the questionnaire To borrow and lend which was designed and sent out in collaboration with the Folklife Archives at Lund University.
• About 60 answers to an electronic questionnaire (in collaboration with the Folklife Archives) with a special focus on new sharing activities and the sharing economy.
Two things are clearly noticeable in both interviews and questionnaire responses. Firstly, that money and financial relations, conflicts and violations of norms, but also the opportunity to help your children, relatives and friends with a loan, are important elements in life, which aroused strong emotions. Memories of loans - both of money and things - further back in time are still alive in the storytelling, which indicates that this is about socially and culturally charged situations with explicit and unspoken rules that it is punishable to break. Secondly, it is evident that the interview and the answers to the questionnaire have provided an opportunity to reflect on hitherto obvious and everyday events, which has sometimes resulted in existential and moral questions about what is right and wrong, or an acceptable behavior. To problematize borrowing in this way in relief to everyday action, the discourse on the sharing economy and the demands and promises of the credit society, I see as an important result.
Being able to make a cultural analytical and ethnographic contribution to research and societal development (both commercial and public initiatives) around the sharing economy and financial contexts as credit opportunities of various kinds, is another result of the project. Here, necessary economic, technical and behavioral science perspectives can be enriched with experiences and reflections from people who use and are dependent on various socio-technical infrastructures and organizational solutions to contemporary societal challenges such as changing consumption habits, welfare and sustainable living conditions.
An important conclusion is that it has proved important to map how social and cultural sense-making concerning, for example, private property, status, private / public and intimacy can affect whether new sharing activities will succeed. It is not enough to construct a well-functioning digital solution, or try out limited innovations in so-called living labs to test its sustainability. An ethnological contribution to the academic discussion of sharing is, for example, the anthology Mitt och ditt. Etnologiska perspektiv på ägandets kulturella betydelse, which I have edited and participated in (2018). The book shows how the two verbs to own and to share are impregnated with specific values, norms, practices and materiality that require their interpretation and explanation to be comprehensible and thus possible to change. What at first glance may seem like a permanent, unchanging cultural basic chord, (in this case ownership), in fact changes content, meaning and form - albeit slowly. The forms of ownership and different ways of transferring and circulating property are socially constructed, embedded in values, cultural norms, social relations and emotions, which explains its varying definitions and expressions in different societal contexts and times. The connection between borrowing things and borrowing money, which I saw as a methodical point, has proved to be true. If, for example, an initiative to get people to borrow instead of buying new is presented as a way to alleviate poverty, it puts obstacles in the way of more people wanting to share by borrowing. Infrastructure for borrowing, such as credit companies, digital lending opportunities, pawnshops or leisure banks, toy libraries and Facebook groups, are also interspersed with values and cultural norms, even though they may appear as neutral structures for exchange. That they are in fact clearly marked by the context in which they arise and the target group they are used by is clear from the analysis of the empirical material.
New research questions
The discovery of the clear symbolic value that money in various lending relationships seems to have, as well as the strong emotions that govern consumption practices and social relationships linked to the transfer and circulation of value in various forms, has aroused my interest in what can happen in a society when an established means of payment, such as cash, is increasingly being replaced by digital and mobile payment methods. The growing importance of a digital financial market in everyday life, whether in terms of credits or payments, and the ability of different groups to navigate this new landscape, has led to new research questions that focus on a changing transaction culture in contemporary Sweden, which quickly seems to become a cashless society. I now have the opportunity to continue working on these questions in the pilot project The Death of Cash? (Erik Philip-Sörensen Foundation, 2021). I am also part of an application entitled Nordic Cashlessness - monetary practices in a time of transition, which in February 2021 has been submitted to the call Future Challenges (RJ and SLS), as well as the main applicant for the application On the road to a cashless society (VR March 2021).
Dissemination of research
I have published book chapters, edited an anthology and I am currently revising a peer reviewed and accepted article in English that will be published in the autumn of 2021, I am working on another English article that will deal with borrowing money through family infrastructures. I have presented papers at international conferences such as:
• International Society for Ethnology and Folklore 13th Congress, Göttingen, 2017; and the 14th Congress, Santiago de Compostela, 2019; and the 15th Congress, Helsinki, 2020
• ACSIS ’Conference, Norrköping, 2017.
• The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, 4th International workshop on the sharing economy, Lund, 2017. (Participated in the panel discussion “Sharing Economy: controversy in the making”).
• 34th Nordic Ethnology and Folklore Conference, Uppsala, 2018.
The project has been presented to research groups at Lund School of Economics, the IIIEE, Lund University and the Department of Service Management and Service Science, Lund University, Center for Consumer Science, University of Gothenburg. I have participated in national seminars at the University of Gothenburg and Lund, as well as I have participated on two occasions in the popular science “HT days” in Lund, the Book Fair in Gothenburg and participated in radio interviews in Swedish YLE and in SR.
Aim and development
The aim of the project is to arrive at a better understanding and knowledge of the cultural meanings and social practices that surround loans of money and material objects in Sweden in the past, present, and future. This reflects both an ambition to deepen basic research on lending and borrowing and a desire for these insights to be applied in discussions about future lending practices. To draw attention to basic practices and processes by linking to current research conducted in, for example, social anthropology, sociology, critical market studies, economics and sustainability studies on the circulation and transfer of material things, goods and assets, as well as value associated with various processes, I wanted to investigate the following questions: to whom should one lend, and who dares to ask for a loan? What should one be allowed to borrow money for and how should it be repaid? How should one value the possessions that are lent, and how can one act if a loan agreement is broken? Is it acceptable to say no to someone who wants to borrow, or should you always share? With the help of these questions, I have been able to study major societal changes and challenges concerning sustainability, consumption habits, participation, equality and poverty risk based on an established ethnological methodology focusing on everyday seemingly small events.
The project has focused slightly more on the borrowing of things, both between private individuals and in various public organizations. This is because during the first year, there was a great deal of interest in the media, among politicians, decision-makers and researchers for the opportunities and problems of the burgeoning sharing economy. It therefore felt relevant to document and investigate lending activities in this area. All the time, however, the comparison between borrowing and lending money and things has been relevant in interviews and questionnaire responses, and in this way it has been possible to compare different types of loans. The historical perspective was given less space in the study than was originally intended. It has mainly been captured through the processing of older questionnaire responses. The implementation has largely been able to follow the plan. Due to teaching during the first year, I have used the opportunity to extend the project over four years. The empirical material collection have been accomplished according to plan.
Results and conclusions
An important goal was to draw attention to how an everyday, unreflective and self-evident act - to borrow and lend - is expressed and regulated through ideas and norms, values and moral positions, social relations and specific materiality. This has been possible through a cultural analysis of extensive empirical material that has value both as contemporary documentation and as a basis for future research. The ethnographic survey has resulted in the following research data:
• 30 semi-structured in-depth interviews with people of different ages, employment, place of residence and background. There are also people who are active in newly started initiatives such as “leisure banks”, clothing libraries, free shops, etc., which has been particularly important to document.
• Recorded observations of various lending activities.
• More than a hundred answers to the questionnaire To borrow and lend which was designed and sent out in collaboration with the Folklife Archives at Lund University.
• About 60 answers to an electronic questionnaire (in collaboration with the Folklife Archives) with a special focus on new sharing activities and the sharing economy.
Two things are clearly noticeable in both interviews and questionnaire responses. Firstly, that money and financial relations, conflicts and violations of norms, but also the opportunity to help your children, relatives and friends with a loan, are important elements in life, which aroused strong emotions. Memories of loans - both of money and things - further back in time are still alive in the storytelling, which indicates that this is about socially and culturally charged situations with explicit and unspoken rules that it is punishable to break. Secondly, it is evident that the interview and the answers to the questionnaire have provided an opportunity to reflect on hitherto obvious and everyday events, which has sometimes resulted in existential and moral questions about what is right and wrong, or an acceptable behavior. To problematize borrowing in this way in relief to everyday action, the discourse on the sharing economy and the demands and promises of the credit society, I see as an important result.
Being able to make a cultural analytical and ethnographic contribution to research and societal development (both commercial and public initiatives) around the sharing economy and financial contexts as credit opportunities of various kinds, is another result of the project. Here, necessary economic, technical and behavioral science perspectives can be enriched with experiences and reflections from people who use and are dependent on various socio-technical infrastructures and organizational solutions to contemporary societal challenges such as changing consumption habits, welfare and sustainable living conditions.
An important conclusion is that it has proved important to map how social and cultural sense-making concerning, for example, private property, status, private / public and intimacy can affect whether new sharing activities will succeed. It is not enough to construct a well-functioning digital solution, or try out limited innovations in so-called living labs to test its sustainability. An ethnological contribution to the academic discussion of sharing is, for example, the anthology Mitt och ditt. Etnologiska perspektiv på ägandets kulturella betydelse, which I have edited and participated in (2018). The book shows how the two verbs to own and to share are impregnated with specific values, norms, practices and materiality that require their interpretation and explanation to be comprehensible and thus possible to change. What at first glance may seem like a permanent, unchanging cultural basic chord, (in this case ownership), in fact changes content, meaning and form - albeit slowly. The forms of ownership and different ways of transferring and circulating property are socially constructed, embedded in values, cultural norms, social relations and emotions, which explains its varying definitions and expressions in different societal contexts and times. The connection between borrowing things and borrowing money, which I saw as a methodical point, has proved to be true. If, for example, an initiative to get people to borrow instead of buying new is presented as a way to alleviate poverty, it puts obstacles in the way of more people wanting to share by borrowing. Infrastructure for borrowing, such as credit companies, digital lending opportunities, pawnshops or leisure banks, toy libraries and Facebook groups, are also interspersed with values and cultural norms, even though they may appear as neutral structures for exchange. That they are in fact clearly marked by the context in which they arise and the target group they are used by is clear from the analysis of the empirical material.
New research questions
The discovery of the clear symbolic value that money in various lending relationships seems to have, as well as the strong emotions that govern consumption practices and social relationships linked to the transfer and circulation of value in various forms, has aroused my interest in what can happen in a society when an established means of payment, such as cash, is increasingly being replaced by digital and mobile payment methods. The growing importance of a digital financial market in everyday life, whether in terms of credits or payments, and the ability of different groups to navigate this new landscape, has led to new research questions that focus on a changing transaction culture in contemporary Sweden, which quickly seems to become a cashless society. I now have the opportunity to continue working on these questions in the pilot project The Death of Cash? (Erik Philip-Sörensen Foundation, 2021). I am also part of an application entitled Nordic Cashlessness - monetary practices in a time of transition, which in February 2021 has been submitted to the call Future Challenges (RJ and SLS), as well as the main applicant for the application On the road to a cashless society (VR March 2021).
Dissemination of research
I have published book chapters, edited an anthology and I am currently revising a peer reviewed and accepted article in English that will be published in the autumn of 2021, I am working on another English article that will deal with borrowing money through family infrastructures. I have presented papers at international conferences such as:
• International Society for Ethnology and Folklore 13th Congress, Göttingen, 2017; and the 14th Congress, Santiago de Compostela, 2019; and the 15th Congress, Helsinki, 2020
• ACSIS ’Conference, Norrköping, 2017.
• The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, 4th International workshop on the sharing economy, Lund, 2017. (Participated in the panel discussion “Sharing Economy: controversy in the making”).
• 34th Nordic Ethnology and Folklore Conference, Uppsala, 2018.
The project has been presented to research groups at Lund School of Economics, the IIIEE, Lund University and the Department of Service Management and Service Science, Lund University, Center for Consumer Science, University of Gothenburg. I have participated in national seminars at the University of Gothenburg and Lund, as well as I have participated on two occasions in the popular science “HT days” in Lund, the Book Fair in Gothenburg and participated in radio interviews in Swedish YLE and in SR.