The way to the ‘comedy of commons’ of a new business model-finding from Naples in Italy, and Jeju Island in South Korea

ABSTRACT

In this study, we seek to examine the success factors of the classical common goods of various capitalist economies and to apply them to diverse platforms that appear as new common goods. Our research question is as follows: Are there any common success factors that can be applied to produce and use common goods across economic conditions? With the goal of identifying the grounded theory of common goods, the study employed the interview method using a semi-structured questionnaire. Furthermore, it conducted participatory observation and a literature review of case studies as well as a comparative study of 20 Korean commons and 20 Italy commons. According to cases of common goods in Jeju, South Korea, the coupling effects of several public policies could motivate the privatization of common goods. Second, an empty area in common goods consists of a high level of participation with democratization and a low level of common condition. High participation with democratization can avoid privatization and increase new open business models of common goods. Third, active open innovation with a high participation in democratization and expansion of new business models based on tacit knowledge of common goods could be the activating engine of regional innovation systems.

KEYWORDS:

• Common goods
• open innovation
• business model
• regional innovation system
• grounded theory

Acknowledgements

This study received financial support on the research trip to Naples from the research project “industrial technology R&D-regional R&D linkage increase, and regional innovation ecosystem activating oriented R&D project planning research” by KEIT (Korea Evaluation Institute of Industrial Technology). We appreciate professor Kyung-Soo Hwang at Jeju National University for his arranging several interviews of Jeju common related persons.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the DGIST(Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science and Technology) 22-IT-10-02.